Marketing says leads are up. Sales says the leads are junk. Neither side is wrong. They just don’t trust each other’s math.

Ken Blanchard studied trust inside teams for decades. He broke it into four parts he calls the “ABCD Model of Trust”: Able, Believable, Connected, and Dependable. Able is competence. Believable is integrity. Connected is empathy. Dependable is follow-through. Miss one, and trust collapses no matter how good your intentions are.

Look at that model through a revenue lens and the marketing/sales friction makes total sense:

• Able: does the lead score actually predict who buys? If sales has watched “hot” leads go nowhere for two years, the score has already failed this test.
• Believable: does marketing tell sales the truth when a campaign underperforms, or just roll the number into next quarter’s slide?
• Connected: does anyone from marketing sit in sales’ deal reviews and hear, firsthand, why a lead didn’t close?
• Dependable: when marketing promises a follow-up, a report, a fix, does it show up on time, every time?

Most lead scoring problems get treated as a data problem. Rebuild the model, buy new software, add more fields. But Blanchard’s framework says something simpler: sales stopped trusting the score, and no dashboard fixes that on its own.

I’ve been in those meetings for 15 years and it’s enough to make your blood run cold when your name is called. Before you touch the model again, ask which of the four is actually broken. It’s rarely all four. It’s usually one.

Book a free lead qualification method review and let’s add an E for “Excellent” when deals start closing again.

Which ones need the most attention in your org: Able, Believable, Connected, or Dependable?