With countless ways to configure territories, quotas, and sales incentive plans within traditional ICM systems, scaling sales performance management can often feel like a huge tradeoff.  

You can (seemingly) either have highly customizable plans that are technical, difficult to change, and require deep expertise—or simpler, rigid plans that sacrifice flexibility for ease of administration in legacy ICM software.

Which raises a crucial question: Is there a better way to balance adaptability and efficiency? How is the landscape evolving for the needs of the business and sellers?

Many people wrestle with this complexity vs. ease tradeoff, but perhaps few at the level of Brian Le, global sales compensation leader at Notion. With a career spanning compensation roles at Salesforce, Carta, and now Notion, Brian has designed and optimized sales compensation programs for some of the largest and fastest-scaling sales organizations in tech.

In this in-depth discussion, Brian shared how he's used modular compensation frameworks to help keep plans flexible without adding complexity, how AI and predictive analytics are reshaping quota-setting and incentives, and he weighed in on common SPM myths—from the alledged need for technical expertise to run your programs—to the idea  that AI's about to replace sales comp professionals.

If you’re a revenue or sales compensation leader looking to reconcile plan complexity with scalability, tune in and check out some our key takeaways below.

Episode resources

• Connect with Brian on LinkedIn

• Book recommendation: The Sales Acceleration Formula by Mark Roberge

Enterprise vs. rapid-growth scale up: Tailoring your compensation approach

With experience at both enterprise giants like Salesforce and fast-scaling organizations like Carta and Notion, Brian has seen firsthand how your approach to sales compensation must evolve to fit a company’s growth stage.  

Which is to say, he knows what works at a well-established enterprise doesn’t always translate to a hypergrowth environment—making it critical for compensation leaders to strike the right balance between structure and flexibility.

As Brian puts it, the core difference often plays out this way:

“At large companies, you already have the key metrics, and it’s a matter of plugging into existing frameworks. In contrast, at a high-growth company, you’re constantly evaluating whether the metrics you’re measuring truly align with strategic objectives—and whether they provide scalability.”

Brian Le, Sales Compensation Partner

At Notion

In other words, at large enterprises, you're typically focused on optimizing within an established structure—iterating on aspects of a mature framework. But in high-growth orgs, problem solving for net new scenarios quickly is key.

In either structure, comp teams must prioritize agility, adapting incentives to shifting go-to-market strategies and ensuring the right metrics are in place to drive scalable growth.

• At an enterprise you might be refining existing accelerators—adjusting thresholds within a proven pay curve to optimize performance across thousands of sellers. With the core structure largely set; in which case, your work becomes optimizing.

• At an org like Notion, however, you might contend with the launch of a new sales-assisted motion or expand into enterprise deals, so you must evaluate if the existing framework can support the new motion—or if a new compensation structure is required.

This ultimately comes down to being able to recognize when to optimize within a system and when to build for adaptability. Whether you're scaling or refining, the key is ensuring your incentives evolve with your company’s needs and how fast you can be.

Here's Brian on the importance of agility in particular amid SPM's evolution:

Standardize core, modular elements to stay agile

One of the biggest challenges in sales compensation design is maintaining flexibility while ensuring plans remain scalable. On this, Brian advocated for a modular approach, where core compensation components can be combined in different ways instead of creating entirely new plans for each scenario.

For example, rather than designing compensation separately for every sales motion or different regions, a modular framework can use adjustable multipliers based on factors like market maturity or strategic priority.  

Here's how Brian sees it:

This same concept can apply to compensating on different product lines, allowing companies to incentivize sellers differently based on new versus established products—without creating unnecessary complexity.

A modular or component-based approach enables organizations to:
✔ Reduce the number of unique compensation plans
✔ Quickly adapt incentives to business priorities on a dime
✔ Maintain clarity while still allowing for customization  

As laid out in examples in this episode, you might benefit from:

• Territory-based compensation: Instead of designing separate plans for each region, Le’s teams developed a framework with base multipliers for different market types—emerging, established, or strategic.

• Product-line compensation: Rather than creating a new plan for every product launch, you might consider adjusting commission structures with modifiers. Higher multipliers can incentivize new products, while mature products maintain a steady commission structure.

• Role-specific accelerators: wherein compensation can be tailored for different roles, like SDRs or AEs, using adjustable variables within the same core structure.

Keep comp plans simple (watch out for where crediting's adding complexity)

Throughout the discussion, it was clear: simplifying compensation structures is always a smart move—but don’t overlook where the real complexity often creeps in: crediting.

As both Brian and Nabeil pointed out, the math behind a plan is usually straightforward. It’s how you assign credit that gets messy—especially in large organizations with tons of SKUs or multiple sales motions.

Here are the most common pitfalls to watch for:

• Sales specialization: When reps are only credited for certain products, segments, or regions—requiring precise logic.

• Multiple sales channels: Partners, resellers, and cross-functional GTM teams create added crediting layers.

• Edge cases & exceptions: Trying to solve for every edge case leads to bloated, brittle crediting rules.

Here's a clip of this part of their discussion:

Overall, Brian notes companies should focus on automating and streamlining where possible—ensuring that crediting decisions are transparent and easily understood by sales teams.

Focus on simplifying crediting logic early—and find the right balance between automation and policy clarity:

"The goal is to align crediting logic with the business motion, ensuring that roles are credited consistently without unnecessary administrative overhead."

Brian's take: AI won’t replace comp planning—but it will make it smarter

AI is reshaping sales compensation, but Brian Le emphasized that the future is not full-on automation.

He predicts AI will play a crucial role in scenario modelling, quota setting, and optimization, helping organizations identify the best strategies faster—but believes sales comp leaders will always need a human perspective to ensure incentives align with broader company objectives and human psychology.  

"AI is playing an increasingly crucial role in scenario modelling and quota setting," Le explained.
‍
"But the future isn’t about complete automation—it’s about augmenting human decision-making with better data and insights."

Looking ahead, Le sees the future of sales performance management moving toward predictive systems that proactively suggest optimization opportunities:

This might look like:

• Using AI to explore what-if scenarios faster
• Setting more accurate quotas based on real-time performance data
• Uncovering new optimization opportunities before problems arise

Nabeil agrees, positing that—as execution becomes more increasingly streamlined—the real differentiator in SPM will be an individual (and organization's) ability to generate and act on innovative compensation ideas rather than simply administering plans efficiently. As he put it:

"The currency of the future isn't how well you execute administration—it’s the quality of the ideas you generate."

SPM Mythbusting: Debunking common misconceptions

Nabeil and Brian also tackled some myths in sales performance management. Particularly on over-engineering plans, and the need for technical expertise.

Tune in for more

As the sales landscape continues to evolve, so must sales compensation. Our key takeaway from this conversation with Brian?

By structuring sales compensation with scalability in mind and embracing emerging technologies, revenue leaders can reduce complexity while maintaining the flexibility needed to drive business growth. And there are emerging systems aimed at helping you eliminate this out-dated tradeoff!

Sales compensation leaders who embrace scalability, automation, and adaptability will be especially well positioned for success in the years ahead.