The “Next Steps” Field That Wasn’t Lying — Just Guessing

I was scrolling through a pipeline review with a sales manager a while back, reading down the “Next Steps” column on every open deal. Half of them said something real — “Call Thursday, walk through the revised quote,” “Waiting on their finance sign-off, follow up Monday.” The other half just said “Follow up.” Over and over. Same two words, deal after deal.

Turned out one rep had been taught years ago, by a manager who drilled it into her, that a vague next step is the same as no next step. The other rep just typed “follow up” because the field asked for something and that filled it — technically true, practically empty.

The sales manager thought the pipeline looked healthy, because every box had something written in it. Nobody had ever actually agreed on what belonged in that box.

If you scrolled through the “Next Steps” column on your ten most active deals right now, how many would tell you an actual plan — and how many would just be filling the box?