Sales Competency Self-Rating Scorecard

Scale (same language your manager uses, use it verbatim in your 1:1)

1 = Novice | 2 = Developing | 3 = Competent | 4 = Advanced | 5 = Expert

1. Discovery & Needs Analysis

1. Novice: Asks scripted discovery questions, accepts surface-level answers.
2. Developing, Follows up on stated pain but rarely digs further.
3. Competent: Consistently quantifies pain (cost, time, risk) before proposing.
4. Advanced, Surfaces pain the buyer hadn't articulated before the call.
5. Expert, Reframes how the buyer defines their own problem.

Your score: ___ Evidence: ____________

2. Qualification & Deal Strategy

1. Novice, Relies on manager to call a deal dead or alive.
2. Developing, Applies the qualification framework with prompting.
3. Competent, Applies it independently and can defend the call.
4. Advanced: Builds a custom win strategy per deal, not just a framework pass.
5. Expert, Sets the qualification bar other reps get coached against.

Your score: ___ Evidence: ____________

3. Objection Handling

1. Novice, Responds with memorized lines regardless of the real objection.
2. Developing, Sometimes asks a clarifying question first.
3. Competent, Consistently isolates the real objection before responding.
4. Advanced, Handles objections from multiple stakeholders in one motion.
5. Expert, Anticipates and defuses objections before they're raised.

Your score: ___ Evidence: ____________

4. Negotiation

1. Novice, Escalates most terms conversations to a manager.
2. Developing, Trades concessions without a clear value-for-value logic.
3. Competent: Trades value for value deliberately, holds margin.
4. Advanced: Shapes the frame of the negotiation (scope, timeline, process).
5. Expert: Navigates multi-party/committee negotiations, including through 3rd parties.

(Full behavioral detail: see the Negotiation Skill-Level Rubric.)

Your score: ___ Evidence: ____________

5. Active Listening

1. Novice: Talks past pauses, prepares next point while buyer is speaking.
2. Developing: Reflects back what's heard, inconsistently.
3. Competent, Consistently confirms understanding before responding.
4. Advanced, Notices and names what's not being said.
5. Expert: Buyers describe being genuinely heard, unprompted.

(Full checklist: see the Active Listening Skill Checklist.)

Your score: ___ Evidence: ____________

6. Storytelling & Value Narrative

1. Novice, Reads case studies verbatim from material provided.
2. Developing, Picks the closest-matching case study to the buyer.
3. Competent, Adapts case studies to the buyer's specific context.
4. Advanced, Builds a narrative arc that carries across a multi-call deal.
5. Expert, Narrative gets repeated by the buyer internally to sell it upward.

Your score: ___ Evidence: ____________

7. Stakeholder Mapping & Multi-thread Selling

1. Novice, Sells to a single contact only.
2. Developing: Aware other stakeholders exist, doesn't engage them directly.
3. Competent, Identifies and directly engages 2-3 stakeholders.
4. Advanced, Runs a formal map and engagement plan across all threads.
5. Expert: Navigates buying committees of 6+, including hostile stakeholders.

Your score: ___ Evidence: ____________

8. Executive Presence & Communication

1. Novice, Comfortable only with peer-level contacts.
2. Developing: Comfortable with manager-level, scripted.
3. Competent: Comfortable with director-level, semi-scripted.
4. Advanced: Comfortable with VP-level, unscripted.
5. Expert: Comfortable with C-suite, sets the agenda in the room.

Your score: ___ Evidence: ____________

9. Pipeline & Forecast Discipline

1. Novice, Updates CRM only when reminded.
2. Developing, Forecasts inconsistently accurate.
3. Competent, Forecasts own pipeline accurately most months.
4. Advanced, Forecast trusted without manager double-check.
5. Expert, Forecast quality informs leadership planning.

Your score: ___ Evidence: ____________

10. Territory / Account Planning

1. Novice, Works only inbound/assigned leads reactively.
2. Developing: Has a basic account list, no written plan.
3. Competent, Builds a written account plan for top accounts.
4. Advanced, Builds and executes a whitespace/expansion plan with results.
5. Expert, Shapes territory design decisions for others.

Your score: ___ Evidence: ____________

11. Cross-functional Collaboration

1. Novice, Escalates to manager to loop in CS/legal/product.
2. Developing, Loops in the right function when told to.
3. Competent, Loops in the right function independently.
4. Advanced, Pre-empts cross-functional friction before it blocks a deal.
5. Expert, Consulted by product/legal before policy changes.

Your score: ___ Evidence: ____________

12. Coaching & Peer Enablement

1. Novice, Receives coaching only.
2. Developing, Occasionally shares a win informally.
3. Competent, Regularly shares technique in team forums.
4. Advanced, Actively mentors 1-2 newer reps.
5. Expert: Coaching output is formalized (training material, shadowed calls, onboarding curriculum).

Your score: ___ Evidence: ____________

Summary tally (bring this into your 1:1)

Using this before your next 1:1

1. Score yourself honestly using evidence (a specific call/deal), not general impression.
2. Bring the summary tally, not just the total, the gap column is the actual conversation.
3. Where you and your manager differ by 2+ points on a competency, that's the discussion: not who's "right," but what evidence each of you is using.
4. Your 2 lowest-scoring competencies become the input to your next Individual Development Plan (IDP) quarter.