A sales rep on your team does a good job—let’s say very good. The bosses want to reward her, so they promote her to the sales manager. Sounds logical, right? But behold the huge problem here: Having the qualities that make an excellent salesperson does not necessarily mean a person knows how to be a good sales manager and lead a team to success. 

77% of the time, management makes a mistake by promoting a sales rep into a sales manager, according to in-house research conducted by Drew Stevens Ph.D., a business development consultant to the medical industry and the author of Split Second Selling. The people they promote have no idea how to be a good sales manager. Just because they sell well as an individual contributor doesn’t mean they’ll become a good sales coach; performance as an individual contributor does not forecast performance as a sales manager.

Whether…