What savvy companies and sales managers do—and don’t do—to build a team of high-performing sales achievers:

1. Never give a salesperson an automatic increase in sales goals based on the previous year’s performance. Each year’s goals should be formulated individually based on company and market circumstances.

2. Never give across-the-board sales increases for the entire sales force. The company may have a goal of a 10 or 20 or even 30 percent increase in sales, but that doesn’t mean each salesperson’s quota should be increased by that amount.

3. Never assign quotas without input from the salesperson. People don’t buy into goals that are arbitrarily assigned. They do take ownership of goals they had a part in developing.

4. Always provide regular, consistent, short-term feedback that will help each salesperson achieve long-term success. Make the feedback honest and constructive. To accomplish this, the best sales managers are out in the field with their salespeople on a regular basis.