1. Dan has had plenty of opportunity to politely request inclusion, as this wasn’t the first sales contest. He let his dissatisfaction build until he couldn’t control himself.
2. Jane didn’t do a good job of managing - she didn’t anticipate how the rest of the organization might react to her sales team incentive program.

Working in an organization that doesn’t pay commissions or any other sales incentives, I am convinced that it does take the whole company to generate a positive and outwardly competitive spirit. Internal competition, as we see often in sports, results in less collaboration and weaker results. With this in mind, Dan had a right to feel excluded, but could have addressed the situation sooner and more supportively. Jane could have done a better job of incenting the whole organization to boost customer response to the new products.

What I find challenging for Jane is that I imagine she does not want to reward bad behavior. Rather than get a bad attitude, Dan should have come to her and talked to her about his thoughts about the matter in a professional way. Know we all know that sometime this is hard to do and we have all probably fallen prey to the dreaded BA (bad attitude) at times. I know I have.

Most important I would (again) look at self….perhaps this as a communications issue and would be asking “why” didn’t Dan come to me (Jane) and just talk about this?

As for solution…I am sure she is measuring ROI on the various programs thus perhaps she could come up with some type of algorithm point system that Dan could also participate in the contest based on contributions to overall sales for the whole. I am not a sales expert, but would be happy to share some of the things I have used in the past.

Good Luck.

Christine