[theoryofx]

Sales people that don't sell just get fired, that's the thing about being such a quantifiable role. So in practice at a startup with a hot product you end up with a team of sales people receiving huge amounts of cash comp.

Everyone in in a well run startup org gets performance based compensation in the form of increases in salary, bonus, and equity.

There's no reason sales people couldn't be compensated in the same way. The reason they're not is just that it's considered an 'industry standard' to reward instantly with cash.

Sales people have themselves a sweet deal they're loath to give it up whether or not it's in the best long-term interests of the company or even themselves. It's not a terrible thing but it does seem an anachronism that will go away.

[jasode]

>Everyone [...] gets performance based compensation in the form of increases in salary, bonus, and equity. There's no reason sales people couldn't be compensated in the same way.

There is a reason and it's based on the external market dynamics that the company itself can't control. The potential candidate salespeople can see/compare how other companies pay for sales.

Whatever principled stance the company wants to take on compensating salespeople in a different way than "industry standard" e.g. "same salary + same bonus as the devs" or "flat salary no commission" etc ... those idealistic plans still have to compete in the marketplace with other companies paying high sales commissions. Therefore, if the more egalitarian sales comp structure means the "rainmakers" are choosing other companies instead of yours, it's a moot point.

E.g. 0xide's comp plan for recruiting good salespeople still has to be competitive with everybody else such as: https://www.cbinsights.com/company/oxide-computer/alternativ...

Sales commissions aren't an "industry standard" just because they're an "industry standard" type of circular reasoning. It's an industry standard because other compensation methods for salespeople that pay them like all the other non-salespeople don't work so most successful companies converge on paying high commissions for high performers. A lot of non-salespeople don't understand this so it seems like paying commissions for sales positions is arbitrary and unnecessary and therefore, "unfair". As a dev, I used to think sales commissions that exceeded my salary were ridiculous but having attempted sales myself, it now makes perfect sense.

Salespeople don't want to be paid like devs with an annual bonus. You have to treat them differently: https://a16z.com/why-must-you-pay-sales-people-commissions/

[theoryofx]

"It's an industry standard because other compensation methods for salespeople that pay them like all the other non-salespeople don't work ..."

[citation needed]

I think it's more accurate to say that it's an industry standard because it works, not because nothing else can work. There's a lot of herd mentality and (much more reasonably) risk aversion when it comes to messing with revenue generation.