How to Conduct an Interview – Two Sales Interview Goals You Are Looking to Achieve

If you are reading this after having selected applicants by reading resumes and want to know how to interview them — sorry, you need to go back to square one. Using resumes as a strategy for picking sales applicants in the words of Richard Milhous Nixon is “as useful as a pot of warm spit.”

Resumes are “BS” squared — they are too inaccurate to use as a selection tool. Look here for a better strategy for selecting applicants to interview.

Warning aside, once you have at least three applicants who have passed a scientifically validated profile, interviewing them right is the key to making great hires.

The purpose of the interview is two-fold:

1. You are looking to determine if you applicant has applied their natural talents. What have they accomplished in life? Where have they shown follow-through?. What adversities have they successfully overcome? Have they demonstrated an entrepreneurial style?

You’ve determined from the profile they have a natural talent toward sales.. Yet, sadly, most people never do anything with their natural talents. (Or maybe among “sales types” they sell themselves on not doing the work.)

2. You want to find out if the applicant will fit in your “corporate culture.” Each of our companies has a “culture” based on what we produce, the type of people who work in our company and the kind of people who buy our product. Determining whether the applicant will fit is key.

You want this decision to be a good permanent solution, not some quick fix — get more sales in here thing. Good salespeople become more valuable to you over time. Ask yourself whether they belong in your type of organization.

To ascertain what sales hiring method is right for you so you don’t waste time and money on profiling tools that don’t work, Take our FREE Survey here to get your sales hiring scorecard.

Quick. Which are the highest paying jobs?

According to Wiki, right behind Doctors, Dentists, Lawyers and Airline Pilots, Sales and Marketing are the highest paid jobs.

In our society (even if governments of every stripe have screwed things up royally in the economy), people still want to make more money. Overall, as a society, we value it. We ooh and aah at the Bill Gates and Warren Buffets because they’ve made a lot of it.

Those who weren’t willing to sit for an extra four to eight years in school to become Doctors, Dentists or Lawyers, can still make tons of dough in sales.

Sales has a proven track record to making serious money!

Why Money in Sales Hiring Is the Problem

The desire to make a lot of money is important for success in sales, but it’s not enough of  a qualifier. Just because your applicant wants to make a lot of money is not enough.

Applicants for jobs as Doctors need certain diplomas as a condition to being hired. We’ve shown our clients that there are also certain  “diplomas” you must require of your sales applicants.

These “diplomas” for successful salespeople have to do with your applicants’ personality styles. Make that, too, a requirement for joining your sales team and watch your sale hiring successes rocket!

I thank you for the time and patience in getting us on board!  Process worked beautifully and my new hire  is most certainly a keeper.  I can see how the time and effort paid off already!

Nationwide Evaluations

‘When you’re recruiting, resist the urge to grant a face to face interview to applicants who aggressively get past your receptionist.

When you are running a Hiring “Module” and are really looking hard for new salespeople, resist granting face to face interviews before testing applicants. Even if the candidate effectively gets past your receptionist and gets you on the phone, politely resist the urge!

Send them through your hiring system first — have them complete a ValuesMatrix and a Styles profile in order to get a good salesperson profile.

There is an important principle of Scientific Hiring at work here:

Although it is true that skillfully getting past a blocker is important in sales, it is only one of many skills required of a salesperson. You are looking for “complete” salespeople, not just those that are good in certain areas.

If you need some reinforcement on this decision, remind yourself of all the salespeople who you’ve hired in the past who had gotten past your receptionist — and then failed.

Commit to a hiring system. A system is a series of actions that cause a desired result  When you do this you have committed to having the best sales team possible. Only through creating a system, setting up rules and following through on these rules will you get a great  sales team.

Shortcut your system and you’ll be back in the same boat with the rest of the Sales Managers who hire 1 good salesperson out of every 4 hires!