Train when the agent does not know how. Fix the store when the agent was never told clearly what good looks like. Replace when a clear standard, practice and coaching over about 30 to 60 days produce no change in behavior on scored calls. Most cases written off as attitude turn out to be the second kind.
Three Different Problems That Look the Same
A low set rate looks identical on the report whether the agent lacks the skill, lacks the drive or is in the wrong job. The fix is different for each, so the first task is to tell them apart.
| Skill | Will | Fit | |
|---|---|---|---|
| What you hear on calls | Tries, but skips discovery or never asks for the appointment | Can do it when watched, does not when alone | Does every step and still sounds uncomfortable on the phone |
| What you see in the CRM | Activity is there, outcomes are weak | Activity is thin, tasks overdue | Activity is fine, results flat after real coaching |
| The quick test | Role-play it. If they cannot do it in the room, it is skill | If they can do it in the room and do not on the phones, it is will or environment | If skill and effort are both present and results do not move, it is fit |
| First response | Train and practice | Clarify the expectation, then hold it | Look for a different seat |
The role-play test is the most useful ten minutes in this whole decision. Give the agent a price-first caller and listen. Someone who cannot set the appointment in the room is not being lazy on live calls. They do not have the skill yet. The role-play drills give you scenarios to use.
Check the Store Before You Judge the Agent
Here is the part that is uncomfortable for managers. A lot of "attitude" is an agent guessing at a standard nobody wrote down.
In Cox Automotive's 2019 Dealership Staffing Study, only 50% of current dealership employees said their manager meets with them regularly to set goals and objectives. The study is from 2019, it covers all dealership roles and it had about 1,200 respondents including people outside the industry, so it is not a measurement of BDCs today. It is reason enough to ask the question of your own store.
Ask these before you put anyone on a plan:
- Is there a written definition of a good call, and has this agent seen it?
- Has anyone scored this agent's calls and gone through them together?
- Does the agent know their own contact, set and show rates, and the target for each?
- Is the comparison fair? Same lead sources, same shift, same share of fresh leads as the agents they are being measured against?
- Does the pay plan reward the behavior you want, or just appointment count?
If the answer to most of these is no, the agent has not failed yet. The store has not started. Fix that first. Reading your BDC numbers shows how to separate an agent's skill gap from a routing or lead-mix problem, and coaching the number, not the effort covers the conversation.
What to Try First, and for How Long
What follows is practitioner judgment, not research. Adjust the timing to your lead volume.
- Week 0: set the standard. Sit down, show the scorecard, play one of the agent's own calls and one good call. Agree on a single behavior to change. One, not five. "Ask for the appointment with two specific times on every contact" is a behavior. "Be more assertive" is not.
- Weeks 1 to 4: practice and score. A short drill on that behavior several times a week. Two scored calls reviewed together every week. Write the score down each time.
- Day 30: read the behavior, not the sales. Is the behavior showing up on scored calls? Set and show rates lag, so they are the wrong test this early.
- Days 30 to 60: read the rates. If the behavior changed, the agent's set rate on contacts should start to follow. If the behavior did not change after a month of real coaching, you have learned something.
How you give the feedback matters. A large review of feedback research by Kluger and DeNisi (1996) found feedback improved performance on average, yet more than one-third of feedback interventions made performance worse, and that feedback became less effective as attention moved away from the task and toward the self. That is general research, not dealership data. The practical reading is simple: talk about the call, not the person. "At 1:40 the customer asked about the trade and we went straight to price" is useful. "You don't listen" is not.
A weekly rhythm for all of this is laid out in the BDC coaching cadence, and a ready scorecard is in how to score a BDC call.
The Evidence to Keep
Keep a simple file per agent. It protects the agent from a manager's bad week, and it protects the store if the decision goes the other way.
- The written standard and the date the agent received it.
- The one behavior agreed, in the agent's own words if possible.
- Each scored call: date, score, what was discussed.
- The agent's rates by month, next to the lead sources they worked.
- What the store changed on its side (schedule, lead mix, script).
This article is about coaching, not employment law. Before a termination, follow your handbook and talk to whoever handles HR for the store.
What Replacing an Agent Costs
Replacement feels free because no invoice arrives. It is not. Here is one labeled example. Every input other than the wage data is an assumption, so substitute your own.
The Bureau of Labor Statistics reports a median annual wage of $39,910 for customer service representatives inside automobile dealers (May 2025 data, pulled from the Bureau's public data service in October 2026; it is the nearest occupation, since the Bureau has no BDC agent category). Its June 2026 compensation release shows wages are about 70% of what a private-industry employee costs. Divide $39,910 by 0.70 and the loaded cost is about $57,000 a year, or roughly $1,100 a week.
- Assume the seat sits empty for four weeks. You save the wage. You lose four weeks of that agent's leads being worked, or you spread them across a team that was already full.
- Assume the new hire takes eight weeks to reach full pace and averages half output over that time. That is four weeks of loaded pay with nothing back: about $4,400.
- Add the manager's hours spent interviewing and training, which come out of coaching everyone else.
On those assumptions the store gives up about eight weeks of one seat's production, plus $4,400, plus manager time, and then finds out whether the new person is any better. Against that, a four-week coaching plan is usually the cheaper bet. The full cost of a seat is itemized in what an in-house BDC really costs.
We are not quoting a turnover rate, because there is no verified one for BDCs. The dealership turnover figures that circulate come from a NADA study that has no BDC line, and the last ones NADA released publicly that we could read describe 2013 and 2015.
When Moving On Is the Right Call
Coaching first is not coaching forever. Replace, or move the person, when:
- The standard was clear, the practice happened, and scored calls show no change after 30 to 60 days.
- The agent can do it in role-play and chooses not to on live leads, after the expectation was stated plainly.
- Notes are falsified or appointments are invented. That is an integrity problem, and training does not address it.
- The agent is capable and unhappy on the phone. Some people are good with customers face to face and miserable on a headset. A different seat in the store may keep a good employee.
Fairness works both ways: an agent kept for a year without a clear standard or an honest conversation has been left to fail slowly. Hiring and onboarding the replacement well is covered in the BDC staffing guide, and the retention side in reducing BDC turnover.
Where Outside Training Fits
If several agents share the same gap, it is not an individual problem and a team fix makes more sense than a series of one-on-one plans. Pinnacle's Sales BDC Training lists refresher courses for new hires or underperforming staff, live call audits with feedback sessions, and leadership coaching for BDC managers. That last item matters here, because the train-or-replace call is only as good as the manager making it. More on the whole subject is in the Sales BDC Training Resource Center.
Frequently Asked Questions
How long should I give an underperforming BDC agent?
Our working rule is 30 days to see the behavior change on scored calls and up to 60 to see it in the agent's set rate, counted from the day the standard was made clear and coaching actually started. Time spent before that, with no standard and no scored calls, does not count.
Can you train attitude?
Not directly. What you can do is remove the common causes of what looks like bad attitude: unclear expectations, no feedback, an unfair lead mix or a pay plan that rewards the wrong thing. If those are fixed and the agent still will not do the work, you have a will problem and training is not the answer.
Should a strong agent with poor CRM notes be replaced?
Rarely as a first step. Poor notes from a strong agent are usually a habit nobody enforced. State the note standard, check ten records a week and tie it to something the agent cares about. If notes are being invented to hit a count, that is a different and more serious problem.
What if the whole team is underperforming?
Then it is very unlikely to be seven separate attitude problems. Look at the standard, the lead routing, the coverage and the manager's coaching before the people. A team-wide gap points to a process or training issue, and replacing individuals will reproduce it with new names.
Summary
Decide whether the gap is skill, will or fit, and check first that the store ever set a clear standard. Coach one behavior for about a month with scored calls, read the behavior before the rates, and keep the record. Price the replacement honestly: an empty seat, a slow ramp and manager hours. Move on when a fair, documented effort changes nothing, and do it without dragging it out.
