I spend a lot of time talking to private equity and venture capital-backed companies about growth, and almost every conversation circles back to the same point: if your sales team isn’t exceptional, it’s tough to build the kind of revenue story that gets buyers or investors excited.

But in 2025, sales teams are carrying more weight than ever. Yes, VC funding rebounded this year, but it’s not a return to easy money, and capital is flowing to companies that can prove real revenue traction, fast. Meanwhile, PE firms are holding assets for longer and shifting their focus from blitzscaling to margin-driven growth – an initiative that lands squarely on the commercial function.

Sales leaders are expected to deliver not just growth, but efficiency, predictability and a clear path to value creation. And they’re expected to do this with tighter budgets and smaller teams. That pressure is driving churn. Solving it isn’t about hiring more, it’s about hiring right, and building the kind of culture that keeps high performers in the building.

What high-performing sales talent really wants

I’ve helped numerous PE and VC-backed companies secure impactful revenue leaders and build high-performing sales teams. Four things show up every time when it comes to attraction and retention: incentives, culture, career growth and engagement from the top.

Incentives that reflect real impact

The best sales talent – at every level – wants a clean structure: a competitive salary, performance-based compensation linked to achievable targets, and a path to earning well above base if they deliver. The smartest firms bring this to life through tiered commissions, team-based bonuses that drive cross-functional results, and retention kickers linked to key milestones or exit events.

These work because they reflect the pace and pressure of PE and VC-backed environments, ensuring top performers are rewarded in proportion to the impact they deliver. But it’s not just about hitting quotas. Sales talent want to know they’re building something that matters and that they’ll benefit if it works. That’s where equity comes in.

Ownership is powerful. If your CRO, VP of Sales or frontline sales leaders don’t have a stake in the outcome, you’re telling them they’re not part of the long game. In 2025, when most seasoned sales talent are weighing two or three solid offers, that message costs you the hire.

A culture that values commercial leadership

Sales leaders walk away when they’re treated like executors, not strategists. I see it constantly: sales is expected to “go deliver” while decisions around product, pricing, marketing and customer success happen without them. That disconnect doesn’t just frustrate, it undermines.

When sales teams are handed a roadmap they didn’t help shape, the results are predictable: misfires, missed targets and (eventually) attrition. The companies that scale well embed commercial input into decision-making from the start and give their commercial leaders a real seat at the table – early and often. After all, they’re the ones responsible for making revenue happen.

The work doesn’t stop at the leadership level. If you want your broader sales team to stick around, the culture has to support performance without chaos. That means:

• Sales-led collaboration: Revenue doesn’t exist in a silo. It’s the output of strategic coordination between product, marketing, operations, finance, etc. The best GTM strategies are co-created with sales in the room from day one.
• Operational transparency: Even elite performers can’t hit moving targets. If your CRM is messy, data is unreliable or KPIs keep shifting, you’re sabotaging your team. Set clear metrics, give them access to live data and let them build the system to deliver results.
• Performance culture, not pressure culture: There’s a difference between running hot and burning out. High expectations are fine, but they must be matched by clear direction and internal alignment. If your sales team is constantly in firefighting mode, chasing contradictory goals or reacting to shifting priorities, that’s not pressure, it’s dysfunction.

Ultimately, if you want to build loyalty among your sales team, bring them into the strategy, give them influence and let them shape the engine they’re expected to run.

Career growth with real teeth

Firms have a historical struggle with retaining top sales talent. The average tenure of a CRO, for example, is just over two years. That should terrify you because every time a senior sales leader walks, you don’t just lose momentum. You lose relationships, pipeline predictability, team confidence, and usually one or two other good people in the fallout.

Why do they leave? Usually because the role stops growing. Top sales talent want progression, scope and visibility. Not just a bigger title, but a bigger challenge.

The companies that retain their best people are deliberate about it. They provide clear development pathways, tie commercial success to strategic influence and give talent a line of sight to the next level.

Sales needs real engagement from the top

Hiring well isn’t enough. You – the business owner, the decision maker – need to show up. Too many founders, CEOs and operating partners treat sales as a separate lane, engaging with it when targets get missed, but not when strategy’s being set. If you want your commercial team to succeed (and stay) you need to keep close.

Sit in on pipeline reviews. Ask hard questions. Remove blockers. Understand how the GTM engine really works. Because when your best sales talent feels backed, not just scrutinized, they show up differently, and they stay longer.

Final thoughts

When you’re in the business of building or backing high-growth companies, the pressure on sales teams doesn’t go away. And the talent you need won’t tolerate outdated structures, weak incentives or shallow engagement.

If you’re not sure you’ve got the right sales leadership in place, or you want help attracting and retaining the kind of talent that drives real revenue outcomes, get in touch. This is what I do.

Let’s make sure your next hire is your best one.