Candidate Testing

An extension of the role-play scenario is to do an audition. Give the candidate some product information and ask him to come to the next interview prepared to “sell” the product to the interviewer. It needn’t be one of your company’s products or services, just something neutral.

For example, you might give the candidate a cup (somewhat expensive), a key ring (relatively inexpensive or even cheap), and a calendar (moderately priced), along with the following scenario:

“You will be making a presentation to the owner of a flower shop that wants to reward repeat customers and encourage additional business. The owner has a limited budget and hasn’t used advertising specialty items before. Which of these three items would you suggest and, if suggesting more than one, in what order would you suggest them, and why.”

The resulting presentation should give you some idea of how creative the person is and how well attuned he or she is to the prospect’s needs. It doesn’t really matter which product the person proposes as being the best one just as long as he or she can properly justify (sell) it to the prospect (and you).

The advantages of this approach are that it gives the candidate time to properly prepare for the “sales call” and it gives the interviewer a better idea of the type of questions the salesperson uses to qualify a prospect (or to see if he qualifies at all).

The disadvantages of this approach are that you don’t get an opportunity to see how fast the candidate is on his feet and it requires an additional meeting.

With the cost of hiring a salesperson ranging from $1,000 to $10,000 or more, making the right hiring decision is critical. Psychological profile tests, such as our Sales Temperament Assessment (STA), can be a valuable tool in the decision-making process.

When hiring a salesperson, you are basically looking for three things:

• Ability: Can the person do the job?
• Character: Does the person have the desire and determination
• Temperament: How will the person go about doing the job?

The interview process can usually help you find the answers to the first two qualities. The third ingredient for selling success — temperament — is harder to assess.

The STA is a tool designed to measure the basic temperamental qualities that make up a successful salesperson:

• Competitiveness
• Sociability
• Drive
• Independence

Here are some of the things the STA can reveal about salespeople:

• Are they competitive, ambitious, decisive?
• Are they sociable, persuasive, optimistic?
• How good are they at pushing for results?
• Will they be overly talkative?
• Will they shy away from objections?
• Are they persistent?
• Will they be comfortable making cold calls?
• How likely are they to close a sale?

These are some of the things you want to find out before you hire someone, not after.

As a sales manager, one of your responsibilities is to hire people who will get the job done properly. However, finding competent salespeople is easier said than done. There is no process in place to certify that a person is capable of performing as a salesperson.

While there is no single secret to finding competent salespeople, here’s an idea that will help you separate the wheat from the chaff during the hiring process and come up with potential winners.

If you were hiring an auto mechanic, you’d want to be sure that the person knew what the timing chain was for, the firing order of the engine, how to adjust the brakes, etc. In other words, you’d want to know the extent to which the auto mechanic understands the basics of his trade. The same applies when hiring a salesperson. You want to be sure that he or she knows the basics of selling.

What you need to do is develop a list of 10 questions you can ask to determine if you have someone who knows something about selling. If you’re having problems coming up with 10 questions, contact me and ask for a copy of my Mini Competency Test for Salespeople. 

I always delight in telling people that there are two types of sales managers in this world — those who have hired a dud and those who are going to hire a dud.

One of the most critical functions you perform as a sales manager is putting together the sales team. The right people, working together, can make business life a pleasure. On the other hand — hire the wrong people and your life can become hell.

Most sales managers figure they're an excellent judge of character and can spot sales talent from a distance of 500 feet, if not farther.

I used to think that too. That's why a lot of my earlier hires were done after a 15- to 30-minute interview and a brief assessment of what my stomach was telling me about the candidate. I simply didn't have the time for lengthy interviews or testing procedures.

Here are some startling statistics that emphasize why sales managers should take the time to find the right person. In their book “How to Hire and Develop Your Next Top Performer” (McGraw-Hill), Greenberg/Weinstein/Sweeney point out that their studies show the following:

• 55 percent of those people earning their living in sales should be doing something else,
• 20 to 25 percent should be selling something else, and
• the remaining 20 percent account for about 80 percent of everything that’s sold.

Assessment instruments like our Sales Temperament Assessment can help sales managers improve the odds of finding salespeople who fall into that 20 percent category.

And let's face it, we need all the help we can find.

I’m not a big fan of asking the candidate to “sell” me something like a pen, a coffee cup, a glass or whatever. Most salespeople don’t like role-playing at the best of times and a job interview is certainly not the best of times.

The advantage of this approach is that it gives you an opportunity to see how fast the person can think on his feet. This puts a great deal of pressure on the other person and if he survives the ordeal, he probably deserves the job.

The disadvantage of this approach is that too often the interviewer doesn’t really know what to watch for and if the candidate doesn’t “sell” the way the interviewer “sells” the candidate fails the test.

Nevertheless, the “sell me” exercise can often give you interesting insights into how sharp a person is. I remember one time when I was interviewing a candidate in a restaurant and I asked the fellow to “sell” me an ashtray. He began to extol the many benefits of the ashtray, one benefit being that it was virtually unbreakable. At that point he demonstrated by dropping the ashtray on the floor where it shattered to a hundred pieces. The salesperson looked at me and said, “We need to tighten up on our quality control a bit.” Now that’s fast!

I hired him.