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7 questions a CEO should ask every sales manager every week, and the evidence (2026)
Short answer
Ask each sales manager the same seven questions every week: what changed, which rep is at risk and why, who you will coach and on what, the pipeline by rep, what could stop the number, who the top performer is, and what you did about last week’s answers. Each answer needs a name, a date, a comparison and a next action, or it cannot be checked. Weekly is for this week’s actions; trends go monthly and plans quarterly.
Why ask every sales manager the same 7 questions every week?
Because the week is the unit of a sales team’s work, and the first-line manager is the only person who sees every rep’s week. You can inspect whether the person paid to watch them is watching. Asking the same seven questions every week teaches the manager what to prepare, and teaches you what a good answer from that manager sounds like, so a change stands out early.
Prima Ressource (Frédéric Lucas, 2018) sets the floor: "a business leader must have, at a minimum, one conversation per week with each of his sales managers." Dave Kellogg (Kellblog, 2016) separates how well the VP executes the model agreed with the CEO and board from whether that model works, and holds that execution can be inspected. The seven questions test execution, one team at a time.
What are the 7 questions, and what evidence does each answer need?
Seven, in a fixed order, the same every week. Six of the seven follow the shape of Prima Ressource’s 2018 weekly list; the seventh, the follow-through question, is ours. It replaces their ride-along question, which fits a field team, with the one that makes the other six stick.
| Question | A good answer sounds like | The evidence behind it | A vague answer sounds like |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1. What changed since last week? | "Rep A’s $80,000 deal moved to best case after the buyer pushed the date. Rep C booked three first meetings after two dry weeks." | Stage, close-date and amount changes in the CRM; the manager’s 1:1 commitments (work items only); the calendar. | "Pretty steady. A few deals moved around." |
| 2. Which rep is at risk this week, and why? | "Rep C. Two skipped 1:1s, quiet in the team channel, no new pipeline in three weeks. We sat down Tuesday." | A named rep, two or three observable work signals with dates, and what was done that week. | "Everyone is fine. Rep C will catch up." |
| 3. Who will you coach this week, and on what? | "Rep D, on discovery. We review Thursday’s recorded call together; it is on my calendar." | A name, a skill tied to a specific call or deal, and a calendar entry. | "I coach everyone, all the time." |
| 4. What is the state of the pipeline, by rep? | "Team coverage 3.2×; Rep A 4×, Rep C 1.8×. Two committed deals sat 14 days with no activity; both now have a buyer meeting booked." | Coverage by rep; deals past the no-activity line and what happened to each; forecast category changes. | "Pipeline looks healthy." |
| 5. What could stop the number, and what are you doing about it? | "Three deals are 60% of commit and close in the last two weeks. I am on the next call for the two largest." | The named deals the number depends on, the last buyer contact on each, and the action with a date. | "Nothing I can think of. We will make it up." |
| 6. Who is your top performer this week, and what can the others learn? | "Rep B again. Her discovery calls convert at nearly twice the team rate. I am playing one at Friday’s team meeting." | A conversion rate or a call compared with the team’s, and a dated step to spread it. | "Rep B is a natural." |
| 7. What did you do about what you told me last week? | "Rep C: 1:1 held Tuesday, written plan with two dates, first check Friday." | Last week’s answers, each marked done, moved or dropped, with a line on why. | "It is in hand." |
The no-activity line in row 4 is 7 days for a sales cycle under 30 days, 14 for 30–90 and 21 for over 90, a rule of thumb to adjust to your data. A manager who cannot produce the evidence column usually has nothing that holds the reps the way the CRM holds the deals.
How do you tell an evidence-backed answer from a reassuring one?
Run four tests on every answer. A name, a date, a comparison, a next action. An answer that passes all four can be checked by someone who has never sold; one that passes none is a feeling, however confident. Prima Ressource (2018) again: "A vague answer often masks a problem."
- A name. Which rep, which deal. "The team" is not a weekly answer.
- A date. When it happened and when it was noticed. "Recently" means the manager found out when you did.
- A comparison. Against last week, the team or the plan. "Coverage is 3×" says nothing on its own.
- A next action with an owner and a date. "We are on it" is the question deferred a week.
Question 3 is where the gap is widest. Alexander Group (own benchmark, first published 2013, updated 2024, per the page’s metadata) puts first-line managers at "an average of 16% of their time coaching" against a best practice of 28%. The calendar count is the evidence; ask for it monthly.
Watch out
The reassuring answer
It arrives calm, fluent and without a name in it. "The team is in good shape." "We will make it up next month." Press once, in the same tone: "Which rep, and what did you see?" A manager with the evidence answers in ten seconds; one without it goes quiet.
What should a CEO ask weekly, monthly and quarterly?
Weekly is this week’s actions, rep by rep and deal by deal. Monthly is the trends the weekly answers point at. Quarterly is the plan for the next three months, and the read on the last three.
| Cadence | What it is for | Questions | The evidence |
|---|---|---|---|
| Weekly (20–30 minutes per manager) | This week’s actions per rep and deal. | The seven above, in order. | Written answers the day before; last week’s marked done, moved or dropped. |
| Monthly (45–60 minutes) | The trends the weekly answers pointed at. | "Are we still on track for the targets, and is this the team that gets us there?" "Which rep came up in three of the four weekly conversations?" | Attainment to date by rep; activity against the rate the plan needs; the outcome for each rep flagged weekly; coaching hours from the calendar. |
| Quarterly (90 minutes) | The next three months, and the read on the last three. | "Which stage of the sales process will you coach on next quarter, and how will we know it moved?" "Which two reps will have moved by the end of it?" | Last quarter’s plan against what happened; the spread of attainment across reps; reps who left, and when the manager first flagged them. |
End every cadence on the same question: "What do you need from me?" The answer should be a decision you can make in the room. The weekly, monthly and quarterly split and the closing question also follow Prima Ressource’s article.
How do you run your weekly meeting with each sales manager?
Twenty to thirty minutes per manager, the same slot every week, the seven answers written and sent the day before. You read them first, so the meeting goes to the evidence and to the reps who did not appear in the answers.
The CEO’s weekly meeting with a sales manager (copy it into your running notes)
- The seven answers arrive in writing the day before, one line each, with names and dates
- Minutes 0 to 5: last week’s answers, marked done, moved or dropped, before anything new
- Minutes 5 to 15: the rep at risk and the coaching plan, evidence opened rather than described
- Minutes 15 to 25: the pipeline by rep and the deals the number depends on
- Minutes 25 to 30: the manager’s ask, and the three things you will hear about next week, written down and read back next time
How diffi helps
diffi is used by the first-line manager, which is why the seven answers take minutes. Each rep has a living file built from Salesforce or HubSpot (read-only), the Slack public channels the manager picked, the Gmail labels or Outlook folders they selected (or the whole inbox if none were selected), and the calendar and recorded meetings: a summary, a cross-source timeline, active signals with the evidence behind each one (deal and pipeline risk, disengagement, coaching gaps), open actions and 1:1 prep. The manager can ask in plain language what changed this week and who needs attention; the answer links to its sources. There is no roll-up above the manager and no CEO dashboard. You ask each manager to open their team, your standing ask becomes "bring what you saw, not what you feel," and whether they read it right stays your judgment. Book a demo to see what a manager brings to the weekly meeting.
See it on your own teamWhat if a VP of Sales sits between you and the sales managers?
Ask the VP the same seven questions about their managers, and check that the VP asks them one level down. The names in the answers become managers as well as reps. A VP who cannot say which manager is coaching has the same gap as a manager who cannot name a rep.
Keep your own line of sight. Scott Weiss at a16z (2015), a former CEO with two VPs of sales, held "1:1s about every two weeks" and set a rule of thumb that "at least 25% of my time should be spent with our customers and sales teams." Sitting in on one manager’s weekly meeting each quarter is the cheapest version of that rule. The VP’s own manager 1:1s are in the VP and sales manager 1:1; what to do when the answers keep failing the four tests is in is my VP of Sales the problem.
Frequently asked questions
What questions should a CEO ask sales managers every week?
Seven, in a fixed order: what changed since last week; which rep is at risk and why; who you will coach this week and on what; the state of the pipeline by rep; what could stop the number and what you are doing about it; who the top performer is and what the others can learn; and what you did about last week’s answers.
How often should a CEO meet with each sales manager?
Weekly, for 20 to 30 minutes, as the floor. Prima Ressource (2018) sets one conversation a week with each sales manager as the minimum, and suggests a daily discussion for a newly appointed manager. Add a monthly conversation about trends and a quarterly one about the plan.
What should a CEO ask in the weekly sales meeting?
The things that changed this week, per rep and per deal, and what the manager did about them. Keep the annual plan, the comp plan and the hiring plan out of it; those belong in the monthly and quarterly conversations. The one question to ask at every cadence is the manager’s ask: "What do you need from me?"
How can you tell if a sales manager is giving a vague answer?
Run four tests: does the answer name a rep or a deal, give a date, compare against something (last week, the team, the plan), and end in a next action with an owner and a date. An answer that fails all four is a feeling. Press once, in the same tone: "Which rep, and what did you see?"
What should a CEO ask a sales manager monthly and quarterly instead of weekly?
Monthly, the trends the weekly answers pointed at: are we still on track for the targets, is this the team that gets us there, and which rep came up in three of the four weekly conversations. Quarterly, the plan: what happens in the next quarter, which parts of the sales process the coaching will focus on, and which two reps will have moved by the end of it.
Should the CEO ask the VP of Sales or the sales managers directly?
Ask the VP the same seven questions about their managers, and check that the VP asks them one level down. Keep some direct contact: Scott Weiss at a16z (2015) held 1:1s with his VPs of sales about every two weeks and spent at least a quarter of his time with customers and sales teams. Sitting in on one manager’s weekly meeting each quarter is a cheap version of that rule.