A prime example is emotional control.  Successful salespeople have this trait.  It is a broad term so let me put a finer point on it:

This is the ability of a salesperson to maintain rational and objective actions when experiencing strong internal emotions. This trait measures one’s ability to control their own internal emotions and prevent them from affecting their actions, logic, objectivity, etc. Emotional Control deals with keeping internal emotions in instead of letting them get the better of the salesperson.

I’ve seen this trait showing up more frequently among salespeople in this recessed economy.  My theory is that deals are hard to come by in most industries.  When salespeople do lock on to a solid opportunity, they need to stay focused and keep qualifying.  However, if they lack emotional control, they may get giddy, over excited, even panicky to get the deal closed.  This approach is absolutely uncomfortable to observe (yes, I have seen it first-hand recently).

The other facet of this trait, or lack of it, is an angry, desperate salesperson who reacts negatively to a stressful prospect interaction.  The salesperson can become infuriated with a deal not moving forward.  Even experienced salespeople can respond with a quick cut on the prospect or fire off a curt email that turns the prospect negative.

Whichever way this weakness plays out is highly detrimental to any company.  Salespeople must maintain objectivity throughout the most difficult of discussions to properly qualify an opportunity.  Failure to do so leads to the aforementioned problems.  This potential weakness can be identified before you ever hire a salesperson.  The tools are available so please contact us if you are ready to keep this weakness out of your sales team.

I was blue-purple (can you tell from the website colors?).

All these years of selling assessments…maybe we overlooked something simple here.

Ok, maybe not.  Still, you have to admit it was interesting.

That judgment is what’s called, in psychology, the Fundamental Attribution Error. Meaning that we tend to attribute people’s behavior to their core character rather than to their situation. So when somebody cuts you off in traffic, you think, “What a jerk!” You don’t think, “I wonder situation he’s in that’s causing him to drive so crazy.” Even though in those times when YOU have driven crazily, it was almost certainly because of the situation you were in—you were late for a job interview or a date.

May I make a suggestion?  The use of assessments introduces objective measurement into the situation which helps to limit fundamental attribution error.  Limiting subjectivity generally leads to better hiring especially with salespeople.

One underperforming salesperson I talked to recently has hit a true low point.  He’s not certain where to start.  I thought about that discussion for quite some time afterwards.

The lack of performance becomes a spiraling nose dive like those old WWII videos of planes with one wing shot up.  The salesperson senses the spiral and over adjusts.  This is the pattern I have seen – the salesperson starts attempting to be someone they are not.

Generally, here is what I have seen in these salespeople:

-Less aggressive
-Less empathetic
-More data-driven
-More pessimistic
-More uncertain

These salespeople become unsure to the point where they do not move like they used to when qualifying prospects.  Instead, the salesperson requires larger amounts of data to make decisions.  They become uncertain in areas where they used to be decisive.  They tend to be less empathetic – they switch off their ability to read others as they become more robotic in attempting to close quickly.  They lose the natural aggressiveness that comes from being successful.

The key here is to get the salesperson back to their natural state.  This activity is supported by assessments.  In each of the instances I encountered recently, the salesperson’s assessments revealed a highly stressed state.  None of them were operating in their natural state.  This overshift was causing large amounts of stress and gross underperformance.

Each of the salespeople are operating well outside of their natural style which is neutralizing their abilities.  They are using energy to be someone they are not in an attempt to preserve their job.  Unfortunately, that approach is counterproductive to success in most cases.  My recommendation to each of these salespeople was specific actions to move them back to their natural style.  This has to be the first step in rejuvenating an ailing salesperson.

My experience has been that most people focus on big personalities when it comes to selling.  If the person is a good talker, tells funny stories, lights up the room, etc., then they must be a good salesperson.  The bigger the personality, the more they will sell.  Ok, I grant you that is oversimplifying it, but you get my point.  I have encountered it for years when working with hiring managers.

The issue becomes more pronounced when these same hiring managers employ a personality assessment only.  Now they look for big personalities with highly extroverted assessment results to confirm their gut-level decision to pursue a boisterous candidate.  Sales is a listening profession – asking the right questions, gathering information and directing decisions are the core competencies of sales success.

I always tell prospects who are using personality assessments that it is good they are using assessments.  They do tell you something of the candidate’s style that hiring managers can use in interviewing.  But if you want to know how they will perform in the role, you have to measure their skills, aptitudes and motivations.  These items are predictive of success and provide a detailed view of a salesperson’s abilities.