B
Evidence Grade B
Graded
accuracy verified by the review judge
Safe to Cite
Recent
30%
30% -- team performance decrease for sales teams led by promoted top salespeople (US-based companies) (2025)
Benson's analysis suggests that poor leadership from promoted top salespeople decreases sales team performance by 30%.
- Benson's analysis suggests that promoted top salespeople decrease team performance on average
Attribution:
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Lighthouse Research Team
Last verified:
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Source verified
Evidence graded
Value
30%
Unit
Percentage
Data Vintage
2025
Entity
Sample Size
53,035
Evidence Quality
B
Strong, reliable evidence
Sourced from a well-regarded research firm or industry leader with transparent methodology and a reasonably large sample.
Single source - not yet corroborated
Score breakdown
Extraction
75
Source Trust
60
Citation Chain
20
Independence
30
Methodology
45
Freshness
95
Source
Alan Benson et al. (academic research)
Primary
Tier B
https://sbrconsulting.com/articles/the-principle-to-avoid-when-hiring-a-sales-leader/ ↗
Source Article
The principle to avoid when hiring a sales leader - SBR Consulting
LEADERSHIP Competency Frameworks
The principle to avoid when hiring a sales leader
2 min read
Getting the right people into the right roles is one of the toughest challenges faced by any organisation. Whether you’re promoting from within or recruiting from outside, finding the right people can make …
Original Research
Alan Benson et al. (academic research)
· Original study ↗
Methodology
6-year study of 53,035 employees at 214 US-based companies by Alan Benson et al.; 1,531 salespeople promoted to sales manager
Methodology documented
Segmentation
Industrymarketing
Cite this stat
Plain Text
sales teams led by promoted top salespeople (US-based companies): 30% team performance decrease. Source: Alan Benson et al. (academic research) (2025). Via Lighthouse Intelligence -- https://lighthousedata.io/data/peter-principle-sales-manager-team-performance-decline
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<blockquote cite="https://lighthousedata.io/data/peter-principle-sales-manager-team-performance-decline" style="border-left:3px solid #2563eb;padding:12px 16px;margin:16px 0;font-family:system-ui,sans-serif;background:#f0f4ff;"><strong>30%</strong> -- team performance decrease for sales teams led by promoted top salespeople (US-based companies)<br><small>Source: Alan Benson et al. (academic research) (2025) · <a href="https://lighthousedata.io/data/peter-principle-sales-manager-team-performance-decline" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Lighthouse Intelligence</a></small></blockquote>
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