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In this episode, Mark Jewell sits down with veteran sales strategist Ken Pieh, a man with nearly four decades of experience transforming sales organizations—from Medtronic to fast-growing startups—through better incentive design.

Ken shares real-world stories of how one small med-tech company went from $30 million to $200 million in revenue by overhauling its compensation model. He breaks down why most sales incentive plans unintentionally reward the wrong behaviors, and how to fix that before it costs you your best people.

This is an episode every CEO, VP of Sales, and sales manager in agribusiness needs to hear. If your incentive plan doesn’t align with your culture, goals, and leadership vision—you’re probably burning money and morale.

Key Takeaways:

💡 Great sales incentives are leadership tools—not accounting formulas.

Most organizations treat comp plans like spreadsheets, but the best leaders use them to drive culture, motivation, and performance. When reps believe they can win, they sell more—and stay longer.

💡 Simplicity wins.

Ken compares a well-built comp plan to hiking 100 miles with a 15-pound pack: you only take what’s essential. Sales plans should fit on one page and be easy enough for every rep to explain.

💡 Quotas should stretch—not break—your people.

Unrealistic targets crush motivation. A “Hall of Fame” performer will still have a bad quarter now and then. Your comp design should keep them in the game, not push them out.

💡 The wrong contest can destroy culture overnight.

When the wrong people walk across the stage, resentment spreads fast. Fixing a comp plan is easy—fixing morale after a bad contest isn’t.

💡 Leadership, not luck, drives retention.

When Medtronic expanded from 95 to 750 reps, turnover stayed low because leaders treated people right and designed incentives that made sense.

Notable Quotes:

“You can’t imagine the transformative change that happens when a company moves from poor sales comp design to one that works.” – Ken Pieh

“There’s more emotion tied up in sales contests than there is in money.” – Ken Pieh

“Every time I ended up resentful in life, it was because I was the least intentional. Intention is the antidote.” – Mark Jewell

“If your incentive plan doesn’t match your message, you’re shooting yourself in the foot.” – Mark Jewell

Action Steps:

• Audit your incentive plan. Identify where it may be unintentionally rewarding the wrong behaviors.
• Simplify. If your comp plan takes more than one page to explain, it’s too heavy.
• Align training with incentives. Make sure your sales development investments have incentive structures to back them up.
• Revisit quota setting. Are your targets achievable—or demotivating?
• Bring in outside perspective. Sometimes it takes a fresh set of eyes to spot your fatal flaws.

Listen If You Are:

• A sales leader or CEO struggling to retain top performers
• A sales manager trying to fix morale or turnover
• An agribusiness leader whose team doesn’t buy into the incentive plan
• A consultant or coach looking for better ways to align behavior and performance