Don’t Look to Hire Sales People in All the Wrong Places

Today’s Wall Street Journal’s front-page article “Why Companies Aren’t Getting the Employees They Need” says if you want to hire salespeople you are facing a hard task in this economy. In fact, in 2011 one of the hardest jobs to fill is sales reps.

With unemployment at 9% according to government stats, you’d think it’d be a piece of cake to find good salespeople.

The Journal article dwells on companies need to see past job experience – and many applicant’s lack of experience as the problem.

That kind of thinking, that sales experience predicts future sales success, is the heart of the problem…

Fifteen Years of Research Shows Why Most Sales Hires Fail

Since 1996 research by Advanced Hiring System on successful sales hiring has concluded that experience in sales should only count for 10% of the decision.

Much more weight needs to be put on the sales applicant’s personality style and values. These characteristics can be measure with Sales Assessment tools like ValuesMatrix(TM) and StylesMatrix(TM)

Why Don’t Sales Managers Hire Better Reps?

Top sales reps possess a unique blend of drive and charm – coupled with a willingness to break rules. Also, top reps have highly practical values and are motivated by money and power.

Since these characteristics can be measured effectively with ValuesMatrix(TM) and StylesMatrix(TM), managers can go beyond resumes.

Data suggests that going beyond resume reading gives companies a much wider pool of applicants to chose from. Considering more applicants, rather than a small handful, give managers the ability to successfully fill the critical role of salesperson.