I spoke to a sales candidate this week who took a couple days to get back to me after completing a phone interview last week. Her comments were almost unbelievable. The one that caught me most off guard was a statement that the General Manager of the company “clearly didn’t know a thing about sales.” This statement was not true, but even if it was, that is not something to blurt out in a follow-up discussion.
She was a strong candidate who screened well, assessed well for fit to the position (with one anomaly) and phone interviewed well. In the end, she was not the right salesperson for the role.
This candidate was doing a good job of masking her true colors before she unraveled. As disappointing as that fact is, running a timely process allowed us to flush her out before getting to a face-to-face interview or worse, an offer. One key point for hiring salespeople is to have many contacts (phone discussions and emails) before getting to the inperson interview.
Without a process to maximize interactions, sales candidates can fake their way onto your payroll. Don’t let me do this to you. Run a timely process (don’t stretch it out) and use numerous contacts with the strong candidates.
Oh and that anomaly was this – she had stronger self-esteem than empathy. That assessment result is always one that needs to be explored. Salespeople with that result value themselves and their own needs far more than any one else’s. In the worst-case scenarios, they act like this candidate did.