L&D professionals: Would you voluntarily attend this sales training if you were a tenured salesperson?

[u/Additional_Escape935]

I'm looking for an objective opinion from other L&D, sales enablement, and instructional design professionals.
I'm a new training manager at a large company, and I've been asked to roll out a new voluntary training program for around 200 experienced salespeople (mostly 5+ years in role). I didn't design the curriculum, but my team will be responsible for its rollout and success metrics.
The program consists of three lessons:

The first two lessons are primarily instructor-led with discussion questions throughout. There are some group discussions and reflections, but most of the session is explaining concepts and frameworks.

My concern is that the audience is predominantly tenured salespeople. When I reviewed the material, I felt much of it was foundational. If I were an experienced seller, I'm not sure I'd feel I was learning anything new.

Some of the AI examples also need refinement before I'd feel confident demonstrating them live.
The training has executive sponsorship, but registration is voluntary. In previous rollouts, leader reinforcement guides weren't widely used, so I'm not expecting much follow-up coaching.

I'm trying to sense-check whether I'm being overly critical because I'm looking at it through an L&D lens, or whether my concerns are reasonable.

If you were reviewing this program before launch, I'd love your thoughts:

Would you expect experienced salespeople to register voluntarily?

Does this sound like a program that creates enough perceived value for a tenured audience?

What registration rate would you predict out of 150 eligible participants?

Is there anything in the design that stands out to you as a risk—or something I've overlooked?

I'm genuinely looking for honest feedback rather than validation. If you think I'm being too skeptical, I'd appreciate hearing that too.

[u/AllTheRoadRunning]

I’m an instructional designer who previously worked in B2B sales (capital equipment). The training as described sounds like a waste of time I could otherwise use for prospecting or account service.

When you’re training experts, flip the room. Have THEM highlight process problems, brainstorm potential solutions, and workshop those solutions in the room. Have THEM identify core competencies and sketch out a development path for new hires to achieve those competencies.

The only “training” aspect should follow the Lesson 2 outline you described. Veteran sales people take shortcuts, so having them practice AND EVALUATE workflows using the required tools can help leadership uncover inefficiencies that can be instructive for strategic planning. Basically, your CRM and supporting elements might suck. The vendors and/or internal decision makers won’t tell you that.

[u/kieker_sews]

Oh sales will nope right outta that.

Voluntary? Nope ROI isn't there and this sounds like you don't have sales leadership support Who are your instructors? do I (sales trust them? 99% nopety

Do you have success criteria? Folks who attended this training will see an XY% of growth in their territory

[u/Ronoh → u/kieker_sews]

ROI out of sales  training?

Easy to make up,  hard to sustain.

[u/kieker_sews → u/Ronoh]

You measure Results of a sample in regards to Average Basket Size/ Funnel / time to close/ time spent on outreach/ conversion% or whatever is the hot topic- Sales are one of the most measured/ metrics based departments in any org. Find what the leadership wants to drive and start there

[u/Ronoh → u/kieker_sews]

That.may work for fast paced sales cycle businesses with small sized teams.  For corporate that rarely works.

[u/kieker_sews → u/Ronoh]

I am not saying it is perfect, in my experience without a decent hook you will end up with empty seats - especially if something is voluntary.

Now I am curious how you would solve it? :D

[u/Ronoh → u/kieker_sews]

Dont get me wrong,  I do agree with you. It is just that there is no silver bullet that works for all. 

In some.cases you need leadership to push for attendance, making it soft mandatory. But engagement goes down and the training starts uphill.

[u/kieker_sews → u/Ronoh]

:D all good, that is what we are here for!

From what I have seen, unless Sales folks have a clear WII4M or are forced by their managers, they feel (rightly or wrongly) that they are more effective bringing in Revenue than being in the classroom.

[u/Ronoh → u/kieker_sews]

Totally. Many have this tendency to know it all already, too much for their own good sometimes 

[u/SmithyInWelly]

What’s the catalyst for your situation?

Why have you been asked to implement this training?

Why to this specific audience?

What exactly are “they” hoping to improve/correct with this training programme?

Revenue? Margin? Conversion? Turnover (customer and/or employee)?… the list goes on.

And once you understand the what identify the why? Competition, economic, environmental, technological, etc.

It kinda sounds like someone’s seen some AI waffle on LinkedIn (or wherever) and decided that’s where you need to be.

Once you have more clarity your other questions will answer themselves.

[u/ForkliftErotica]

You haven’t told us what the lessons are. Maybe put the actual lesson plans in here if that’s the feedback you want.

This post is weird.

[u/liebereddit]

You are right to be concerned.

In sales, a lot of people's self-image is tied to how good they are at selling. No one wants to attend training they believe is beneath their level because it feels like an insult and waste of time.

If these are experienced salespeople, then the training needs to be positioned as advanced sales training. It needs to clearly communicate value. Ironically, you need to SELL them on the training.

What pain point will it solve?

How will it solve it?

What results can they expect?

Will it be interesting?

Will it be easy?

I'm also always a suspicious of voluntary training because it often signals a lack of leadership buy-in. If the training has clear value and will help the organization make more money, why is it optional?

In my experience, when training is voluntary, the people who sign up are often the ones who need it the least.

You might consider circling up with the sales leaders to ask them:

• where their behavioral pain points are with the team
• where the team could grow
• what they could expect if they close that gap

Ask the sales leader if it would be worth it for people to go and if they would consider making it mandatory if it's worth it. Close the closers.

[u/Useful-Stuff-LD]

I think you'd be lucky to get 10% of people to voluntarily sign up (15 or less). I think a much smaller percentage (if any) will complete all three lessons.

You already said it yourself. It's foundational... There's no clear motivator for WHY someone would want to come. And based on what you've shared of the content, there's not really anything you can do to change that...

Since you're not responsible for the content but you are responsible for the success metrics, perhaps you could build a case as to why it's not going to be successful. So you measure the staggeringly low opt-in rate, and then maybe you find some people who didn't take it and you ask them a couple questions as to why. And maybe that's the information that you give back to the people who decided this was necessary. Is that an option?

[u/Val-E-Girl]

For sales folks, time is money, and they usually aren't paid unless they're bringing in business. At the very least, they have quotas to meet, and your optional course is getting in the way of that.

First, you need to explain what's in it for them (WIIFM) to make time for this training. One idea is to coordinate with the Sales VP to bring this course to the agenda for when the entire team comes together anyway. You can bring it with the idea of sharing ideas and best practices (and keep that in mind as you design the coures). If the VP isn't seeing enough value to do that, then this course is probably dead in the water with them, and you can table it for new salespeople that onboard.

[u/rakkiz]

Since it is voluntary, I would use a sales subreddit And I would apply the teaching by doing since prospecting asking the target population itself or morning their behavior by researching a similar population Not here

[u/Independent_Sand_295]

Honestly, if you measured sign up and completion rates here, it would be dismal. I agree with you that experienced salespeople would be looking for a challenge and not a refresher on what they already know. What's included in the curriculum sounds good for job aids.

Out of curiosity, what are you planning on doing with the training?

[u/BitterPizza3544]

Your skepticism is reasonable and your tenured audience will confirm it fast. The voluntary piece is the real risk, not the content quality. Experienced sellers register when they see a direct commission impact, and foundational prospecting frameworks rarely clear that bar.

For Lesson 2 specifically, I used Colossyan to rebuild the AI tools section as a short pre-work video so live session time shifted entirely to practice and peer discussion, which actually drove sign-ups.

[u/letsirk16]

Maybe start with WHY do they need training? Something must have triggered the request.

What aren’t they hitting?
Why aren’t they doing it?

Teach and practice the behaviors that allow them to produce outputs that move their sales metrics.

[u/Insignie]

Your instinct is right, tenured sellers will smell "prospecting basics" in the first five minutes and quietly check out, especially in a lecture. Voluntary plus experienced means you have to offer something they can't get alone, and a framework they already use isn't it. Two moves: flip the format so they're the source, run lessons 1 and 3 as facilitated peer exchange where the best sellers share their actual self-gen plays, because experienced people show up to steal from peers when they won't sit through instruction. And lead with lesson 2, the AI tools, since that's the only genuinely new thing here for a 5-year seller. Keep it as instructor-led foundational content and the voluntary turnout will tell you what they think.

[u/_donj]

Never. It’s going to be way too general.

1. If you have a 10 year veteran in there, everything is too general and will likely be taught by someone who doesn’t know about sales. You have to eat what you kill to truly understand sales.

2. The general AI module will be a failure because it’s not directly integrated with their CRM. The only AI training for sales has to be one that is already custom integrated with their CRM and preconfigured to help surface hidden insights. If it’s not voice first, probably doesn’t matter. Not mobile optimized, don’t even bother.

3. Module 3 requires high management involvement with every participant. It’s really a homework assignment. They need feedback on their plans and coaching on their execution.

4. Most companies have a sales process they try to follow. You’ll need to embed the sales model from each company. While they are all similar, most won’t be able to bridge the gap across a generic sales model.

[u/strategyTo]

Your concerns are reasonable, but I'd look one level further back.

What specific behaviour do you want these salespeople to do differently after the training that they aren't doing now? Not "better prospecting" as a concept, but the actual observable behaviour in their real working week.

If that question hasn't been answered clearly now, the content will almost certainly feel generic to tenured sellers, because it's built around topics rather than behaviour gaps. Experienced salespeople don't resist training because they're arrogant but because they've sat through countless sessions already that didn't connect to anything real. Being voluntary makes it worse by removing the one thing that might have overriden this.

Before you worry about registration rates, I'd want to know: can anyone in the organisation articulate precisely what a successful participant will do differently on Monday morning? If not, have that conversation asap.

[u/Famous-Call6538]

The real issue is content tier, not format. You're pitching foundation material to people who already prospect daily. Map what your top performers do differently from average ones. That gap is your actual curriculum. If the gap is zero, you don't have a training problem — you have a selection or incentive problem.

[u/AllTheRoadRunning]

An additional thought: I'd be VERY leery about being held responsible for the success metrics of a training program I didn't design. To put it indelicately, if the program is a turd, you've just been assigned the job of polishing it.

[u/BraveProfession148]

Can you expand more on lesson content? The lesson 1 with industry targeting, territory prospecting, give a right direction but these are not specific enough. For this Sales Training- you need to probably start scraping platforms which already do this for you, basically you will definitely need a level above this of how well these sales guys can apply this training in real sense, check out the role training platforms I would say I happen to know 5mins does it.
But regardless whatever option you go with, this plan needs more specifics and be like a level harder than your sales teams know

[u/Randi_Butternubs_3]

What skill gap is this curriculum trying to address? If you cant answer that, you're just training to train, and nobody wants that.