Playing the Yearly Game Under Pressure
“Something strange happened right after our Sales Kickoff,” he said.
“What kind of strange?” I asked.
“We launched the plan. It was solid. Clear priorities, a coherent roadmap, full alignment. And yet, less than a week later, it was already shifting.”
“Officially?”
“No. Nothing formal. No announcement. It just… changed.”
I asked what had triggered it.
“A couple of things,” he said.
“Early Q1 numbers were a bit softer than expected. Nothing dramatic.
A few deals took longer to move than planned.
And it all happened right before the first board update.”
He paused.
“Staying the course suddenly didn’t feel like an option.”
I asked whether he genuinely believed in the plan at the time of the Kickoff.
“Yes,” he answered, without hesitation.
Then he added, almost immediately:
“We needed to show the CEO that we were reacting.
And the CEO needed to show the board that something was being done.
Investors were asking questions.”
“So it wasn’t about making the right decision,” I said.
“No,” he replied. “It was about making a visible one.”
I asked one last question.
“If this were your own company, what would you do?”
He didn’t think.
“Nothing.”
He saw the situation as temporary.
He didn’t believe it would change the trajectory over the next 9 to 12 months.
Accepting short-term consequences felt reasonable if execution stayed consistent.
This exchange is not about who is right.
It points to something many organizations recognize, even if they rarely say it out loud.
Under pressure, teams are often not asked to make better decisions.
They are asked to show that they are doing something.
Reassurance becomes more important than coherence.
Reaction feels safer than consistency.
This pattern repeats itself every year.
A plan is launched with clarity.
Intent is explicit.
Direction is shared.
Then the first signs of tension appear.
A forecast tightens.
A deal slips.
Questions begin circulating.
And the system responds.
Not because the plan suddenly stopped making sense.
Not because commitment disappeared.
But because pressure shifts the state from which decisions are made.
At that point, two types of decisions tend to emerge.
Some are fear-driven.
They prioritize speed and visibility.
They reduce discomfort quickly.
They signal responsiveness, even if coherence is weakened.
Others are opportunity-driven.
They tolerate short-term tension.
They protect the trajectory rather than the moment.
They optimize for what sustained execution could make possible later.
Both can feel rational when pressure is high.
But they are not playing the same game.
This is where the distinction becomes clearer.
In finite-game contexts
short mandates
quarterly incentives
performance judged checkpoint by checkpoint
systems naturally drift toward fear-driven decisions.
Under pressure, coherence becomes expendable.
In infinite-game contexts
longer horizons
continuity of responsibility
performance assessed by trajectory rather than moments
systems are more likely to support opportunity-driven decisions.
The objective is not to “win the quarter”.
It is to remain in the game long enough for differentiation to emerge.
From that perspective, not reacting is not passivity.
It is a choice.
Stability becomes a strategic variable.
Consistency becomes a source of advantage.
This is not a moral argument.
It is a structural one.
When pressure increases, decisions do not become irrational.
They become revealing.
They reveal:
- the state driving action
- the time horizon that actually matters
- the game that is really being played
So the question for sales leaders is not:
“What should we do next?”
It is more basic.
When pressure rises, what kind of decisions are being made?
Fear-driven.
Or opportunity-driven.