After designing 500 compensation plans, you stop counting achievements and start anticipating patterns.

In 1979, Dan Jensen wrote his first compensation plan algorithm. Nearly five decades later, we’ve learned something most founders miss: the companies that achieve sustained success do three specific things differently than everyone else.

We’ve spent 45 years discovering what those things are.

That pattern recognition—the ability to see in month one what will happen in month eighteen—is what we bring to every engagement.

After designing 800 compensation plans, you stop counting achievements and start anticipating patterns.

In 1979, Dan Jensen wrote his first compensation plan algorithm. Nearly five decades later, we’ve learned something most founders miss: the companies that achieve sustained success do three specific things differently than everyone else.

We’ve spent 45 years discovering what those things are.

That pattern recognition—the ability to see in month one what will happen in month eighteen—is what we bring to every engagement.

The people
behind the practice.

Dan Jensen:
The Architect

Dan thinks in algorithms and systems. When he encounters a business challenge, he sees mathematical relationships where others see chaos. This cognitive wiring has allowed him to design compensation structures that scale from startup to enterprise without breaking.

After 46 years, he still gets genuinely excited when a particularly elegant solution reveals itself—when competing requirements suddenly align into a structure that’s both mathematically sound and psychologically compelling. That sustained passion for the craft is what keeps the work exceptional.

Dan holds the field’s deepest understanding of how regulatory compliance, financial sustainability, and field psychology must integrate into a single coherent system.

Andi Sherwood:
The Visionary Strategist

Andi sees what others miss. She possesses an almost uncanny ability to observe a compensation plan and immediately identify the second-order consequences that won’t manifest for 18 months—the subtle design choices that will either accelerate or sabotage growth when the company scales.

Her clients describe working with her as “having someone anticipate problems before they exist.” That foresight has saved companies millions in mistakes avoided and crises that never materialized.

Where others see compensation as tactical execution, Andi understands it as the central strategic lever that shapes every other business decision. She has pioneered innovative approaches that transform how companies think about field relationships, growth trajectories, and market positioning.

Her work reflects a rare combination: the strategic vision to see what a company could become, and the technical precision to design the compensation architecture that makes that future possible. She has become one of the most sought-after compensation strategists in the world not through self-promotion, but through the quiet reputation that comes from consistently exceptional work.

Brian Jensen:
The Integration Technologist

Brian solves the problem that destroys most compensation plan launches: the gap between strategic design and technical implementation.

He understands both the business logic of compensation design and the technical requirements of software implementation—a rare combination that prevents the costly miscommunications that typically occur when consultants hand plans to programmers.

Brian built the Jensen Modeling Engine, the proprietary technology that simulates how compensation plan changes can affect every distributor in your field. Before you commit to anything, you see exactly what happens.

His technical depth gives him the ability to connect with your software programmers at a level that only other programmers can connect. He ensures that their understanding of the plan is accurate so commissions are calculated accurately from day one.

What makes
this team rare?

Three master strategists with complementary capabilities, working together for decades, developing a shared body of knowledge that none of them could have built alone. With almost 100 years of combined direct selling industry experience, they bring depth that simply cannot be replicated quickly.

  • Dan’s experience ensures value-based precision.

  • Andi’s strategic vision ensures business alignment.

  • Brian’s technical depth ensures flawless execution.

Every plan receives the full attention of all three perspectives.

industry recognition

We remain the only consulting team in the Direct Selling Association’s history to receive the Partnership Award twice. The award requires nomination by client companies, wonderful validation from the executives whose businesses depend on our work.

You don’t get junior consultants. You don’t get templated approaches. You get the combined wisdom of nearly a century of specialized experience, applied with full focus to your specific situation.

What makes
this team rare?

Three master strategists with complementary capabilities, working together for decades, developing a shared body of knowledge that none of them could have built alone. With almost 100 years of combined direct selling industry experience, they bring depth that simply cannot be replicated quickly.

  • Dan’s experience ensures value-based precision.

  • Andi’s strategic vision ensures business alignment.

  • Brian’s technical depth ensures flawless execution.

Every plan receives the full attention of all three perspectives.

industry recognition

We remain the only consulting team in the Direct Selling Association’s history to receive the Partnership Award twice. The award requires nomination by client companies, wonderful validation from the executives whose businesses depend on our work.

You don’t get junior consultants. You don’t get templated approaches. You get the combined wisdom of nearly a century of specialized experience, applied with full focus to your specific situation.

Some patterns are undeniable

In our experience across 800 plans, certain patterns emerge consistently. After decades of continuous practice across every market condition and growth stage, certain truths become impossible to ignore.

Rewarding the Wrong Behaviors

One of the most damaging mistakes in compensation design: emphasizing behaviors that contradict distributors’ long-term success. When plans reward recruitment before sales, activity before results, or potential before performance, they create compounding risk.

These structures encourage behaviors that undermine sustainability: front-loading, inventory loading, participant over-recruitment. The company optimizes for metrics that look good in the short term, while inadvertently teaching distributors to prioritize exactly the wrong things instead of demonstrated performance.

We’ve watched this pattern contribute to failure across dozens of companies. Different products. Different markets. Different founders. The math often looks sound on paper. The behavior it incentivizes frequently proves problematic in practice.

Bonuses That Don’t Support Advancement

The most effective plans create alignment: the bonuses that pay distributors this month guide them toward next month’s rank qualifications. When this alignment breaks down, distributors receive conflicting signals about where to focus.

We’ve seen plans where fast-start bonuses emphasize product pack sales, but rank advancement requires customer acquisition. Or where the highest-paying bonuses reward personal volume, but leadership ranks demand team development. These disconnects create predictable problems.

If the plan inadvertently teaches them to prioritize short-term gains over sustainable business-building, or if bonus structures and rank requirements point in different directions, the field will become confused about what success actually looks like.

Small Choices Can Have Huge Consequences

Whether a particular bonus pays weekly or monthly. Whether rank advancement requires one leg or two qualified legs. Whether generation bonuses are calculated through 3 or 4 generations, or if they reach infinitely deep. These might seem like minor technical details when you’re designing a plan.

But these choices compound over time. By month 24, they can significantly influence whether your plan encourages sustainable team-building or creates gaming opportunities. Whether your best leaders stay or get recruited away. Whether your costs scale predictably or explode unexpectedly.

Many of these downstream consequences aren’t immediately obvious during the design phase. We’ve seen these dynamics play out hundreds of times, allowing us to anticipate how today’s small choices shape tomorrow’s outcomes.

Some patterns are undeniable

In our experience across 500 plans, certain patterns emerge consistently. After decades of continuous practice across every market condition and growth stage, certain truths become impossible to ignore.

Rewarding the Wrong Behaviors

One of the most damaging mistakes in compensation design: emphasizing behaviors that contradict distributors’ long-term success. When plans reward recruitment before sales, activity before results, or potential before performance, they create compounding risk.

These structures encourage behaviors that undermine sustainability: front-loading, inventory loading, participant over-recruitment. The company optimizes for metrics that look good in the short term, while inadvertently teaching distributors to prioritize exactly the wrong things instead of demonstrated performance.

We’ve watched this pattern contribute to failure across dozens of companies. Different products. Different markets. Different founders. The math often looks sound on paper. The behavior it incentivizes frequently proves problematic in practice.

Bonuses That Don’t Support Advancement

The most effective plans create alignment: the bonuses that pay distributors this month guide them toward next month’s rank qualifications. When this alignment breaks down, distributors receive conflicting signals about where to focus.

We’ve seen plans where fast-start bonuses emphasize product pack sales, but rank advancement requires customer acquisition. Or where the highest-paying bonuses reward personal volume, but leadership ranks demand team development. These disconnects create predictable problems.

If the plan inadvertently teaches them to prioritize short-term gains over sustainable business-building, or if bonus structures and rank requirements point in different directions, the field will become confused about what success actually looks like.

Small Choices Can Have Huge Consequences

Whether a particular bonus pays weekly or monthly. Whether rank advancement requires one leg or two qualified legs. Whether generation bonuses are calculated through 3 or 4 generations, or if they reach infinitely deep. These might seem like minor technical details when you’re designing a plan.

But these choices compound over time. By month 24, they can significantly influence whether your plan encourages sustainable team-building or creates gaming opportunities. Whether your best leaders stay or get recruited away. Whether your costs scale predictably or explode unexpectedly.

Many of these downstream consequences aren’t immediately obvious during the design phase. We’ve seen these dynamics play out hundreds of times, allowing us to anticipate how today’s small choices shape tomorrow’s outcomes.

We’ve learned valuable truths about how direct selling companies succeed. We work with those who value precision, foresight, and excellence.

If you’ve read this far, you probably recognize whether we’re right for your situation. Trust that instinct. The industry benefits when more companies succeed.

If we are the right fit, we look forward to the conversation.