I have seen versions of this statement appearing in quite a few sales ads:

The ability to work well independently and within a collaborative environment

I think I understand what they are saying, but it is a poorly constructed bullet point.  Independent salespeople tend not to work well in collaborative cultures.  The same is true of collaborative salespeople, they tend to struggle in an independent role.

For me, this type of writing is either lazy, unfocused and/or wishful.  The better approach here is to define what a typical sale looks like in your company.  Use that information to determine if you need a salesperson with an independent mindset or a collaborative disposition.  This simple adjustment will relieve some of the qualifying that is surely occurring with this unclear ad.

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Isn’t that the truth?  Here are some sobering points from a CNNMoney.com article:

Businesses with fewer than 50 employees cut another 75,000 workers in October, according to estimates released Wednesday from payroll processor ADP.

…

A telephone survey of 830 small business owners conducted by management consulting firm George S. May International from Oct. 28-30 found that 74% of the owners polled do not plan to increase their staff headcount in the next 90 days.

It has been our experience that sales hiring typically slows down during the holiday season, but companies often discuss their Q1 hiring plans with the intention of a fast start to the new year.  Unfortunately we simply aren’t hearing that talk this year.

The article provides insight into the small business world today (my bold):

After three years of growth, sales at small companies — those with annual revenue of less than $10 million — have declined by nearly 4% this year, according to a recent analysis by Sageworks, which tracks financial data at privately held companies.

There is one type of company that continues to hire – aggressive companies set to grab market share.  We are still working with them in assessing sales candidates at a reduced, but steady rate.

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How about this quote from Stephen King’s Danse Macabre (h/t JustSell.com):

… talent is a dreadfully cheap commodity, cheaper than table salt. What separates the talented individual from the successful one is a lot of hard work and study; a constant process of honing. Talent is a dull knife that will cut nothing unless it is wielded with great force — a force so great that the knife is not really cutting at all but bludgeoning and breaking… Discipline and constant work are the whetstones upon which the dull knife of talent is honed until it becomes sharp enough, hopefully, to cut through even the toughest meat and gristle.

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Here is a job title of a job posting I read this morning on one of the 2 large boards:

SECRET CASH LOOPHOLE

Here is the opening line of the ad:

EARN AN EXTRA $1,000 a Week Working Less Than an Hour a Day, or $500 a Day Working 2-3 Hours a Day.

As an aside, it is a good policy to be highly suspicious of any position that leads with your ability to earn more doing less.  Perhaps couch potatoes are their top prospects.

I realize in a recession with extremely high unemployment that these types of positions materialize.  However, the two big boards are being overrun by these ridiculous ads.  It hasn’t taken long for these ads to swell up to 25-35% of the sales ads for any given day.

Clearly the job boards are trying to survive this economy, too, so I understand their desire for revenue.  However, the quality, and usefulness, of the two big boards is falling precipitously as these types of ads become a higher percentage of the listings.

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From an article in our local StarTribune.com (bold mine):

A Carnegie Foundation study once found that only 15 percent of a businessperson’s success could be attributed to job knowledge and technical skills — considered an essential element but overall, a small contribution. A whopping 85 percent could be determined by “attitude” and the “ability to deal with people.”

I grant you that “attitude” is a fat word – I’m not sure exactly how he defines it in this survey.  Nonetheless, you get the point when it comes to hiring.  I would estimate that 85% of sales hires are based on technical skills as opposed to the ability to deal with people.

Soft skills often get marginalized in sales hiring, but companies do that to their own peril.  Successful selling requires “the ability to deal with people.”  Not only people, but people who have different motivations, values, perceptions, etc.  The strongest salespeople know how to leverage these human aspects when they are using their skills.

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Don’t flame me on the title, there is a method to this madness.  I like cliché questions for sales interviews.  There, I admitted it.  Now, I should clarify, I’m not talking about an entire interview of these questions, but rather some strategic ones sprinkled into your question list.

Here is why – if the question is cliché, the candidate should have a sparkling answer.  Their answer may be well-rehearsed – that is fine.  You, as the interviewer, simply need to drill down on their response to get to the unvarnished truth.

However, the catch to this approach is when they don’t have a strong answer.  I am always concerned about candidates who provide weak answers to expected questions.  They should have expected some of these questions and, more importantly, should have prepared for them.  This lack of preparation is often indicative of how they will prepare for an initial meeting with a prospect.

Here is one I often incorporate, “Tell me about a time when you had to go well beyond your normal responsibilities to close a deal.”  Simple, cliché, but here is why it works – I want to hear a good, real example.  I’m looking for what they perceive as being a stretch for their role.  There is much to be learned in their response.

There are many sales prima donnas who have a high maintenance attitude.  Some tasks, in their opinion, are beneath them.  I’m always looking for where they draw the line in that I don’t want a salesperson who tries to do everything themselves either.  There is a happy medium that works for your position.  My experience has shown that smaller companies expect salespeople to do more tasks while larger companies expect more specialization.

Keep those cliché questions handy next time you interview a strong sales candidate.

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I come across this often – a company wants to hire a superstar salesperson and the hiring manager’s first instinct is to find a loquacious talker.  Perhaps you have seen this approach too?  Clearly no readers of the Hire Sense would administer this approach in their hiring.

Right?

Ok, maybe not.  The point is that smooth talkers are not categorically the best salespeople.  I am appreciative of good communicators, but being good at talking is the lesser part of communication.  Being an active listener is more important.  This fact is often overlooked in sales hiring.

The reason this ability is important is that is supports the foundation of successful selling – qualifying.  Salesopedia.com is featuring an article this week by Kelley Robertson that addresses this point (my bold):

The most common mistake sales people make is to immediately launch into a product presentation or “pitch” when they first meet their prospect. They extol the virtues of what they sell and tell the prospective buyer how good, fast, reliable, inexpensive or easy to use their product is. They talk, talk, and talk hoping they’ll convince the buyer that their product or service is of value.

The problem with this approach is that the “pitch” seldom addresses the issues or concerns of the buyer. Because their needs have not been addressed, there is no compelling reason for them to consider using your machines or to change vendors. If you really want to give prospects a reason to buy from you, you need to give them a reason. One of the most effective ways to do this is to ask a few well thought-out questions to uncover what is important to the prospect.

Exactly right.  One of the more overlooked aspects of a sales interview is to pay attention to a candidate’s questions, both the content and the sequence.  I try to write all of them down in an interview to review them afterwards.  The candidate’s questions in the interview provides a glimpse into their qualifying ability without asking the candidate about it.  It is most important that you, the hiring manager, observe this ability closely both on a phone screen and during a face-to-face interview.

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Here’s a headscratcher from an ad I read today, Sept. 10:

On September 30, 2009, ABC Company will be upgrading the technology we use to receive job applications. Due to the upgrade, you will be asked to reapply to any jobs you have bid on. Any job applications, resumes, and/or cover letters that are submitted to ABC Company prior to September 30th, will not be converted to the new system.

They are advertising for a sales position…today.  So my assumption is that if I am a candidate, I can apply today and hope they are so overwhelmed they contact me immediately.  Right?  Otherwise, I will need to reapply in a few weeks.

If they are going to Taleo their entire process is whacked.

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I’m back from a needed break in this sour economy.  Everywhere I go I ask people about their business.  It is fairly consistent – something from “could be better” to “really down.”

That economic context allows some freedom for hiring companies to incorporate what I call contextual hiring techniques.  These are typically techniques that take longer to measure and allow the hiring company to see the salesperson in action.

Some examples:

Job Shadowing – just as it sounds, the candidate spends time with an existing sales rep to get an understanding of the position.  Peggy McKee at Medical Sales Recruiter has a post on this topic.  A friend of mine recently did this for a sales position that provided him the opportunity to ask many questions that would be difficult to ask in a formal interview.

I am a fan of this approach especially if the job market is slow.  It can be difficult if the market is hot and candidates have many opportunities.  However, this approach is a strong qualifier for the candidate’s interest.

The one caveat here is to pick the right salesperson for the candidate to shadow.  My friend learned many topics about the hiring company from the sales rep.  The topics that the rep offered up were too much of “inside baseball” to be sharing with a good candidate.

Trial Periods – yes, every position is technically a trial for the first 90 days.  What I’m talking about involves is a 30 – 60 day trial for observing a new salesperson.  Again, I’m a fan of this approach in this type of economy.

The main topics that can be ascertained in this time period is the candidate’s fit to your culture, his or her approach to the job and his or her interaction with you the boss.  Unless you have a short sales cycle, you won’t be able to observe them through the entire sales cycle.  You will have to monitor/observe their activity and extrapolate from that data.

It is a short window, but combining pre-hire assessments with a day of job shadowing and a trial period and you will have an in-depth understanding of your newly hired salesperson.

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I keep an eye on the sales employment ads looking for trends, positions, companies and prospects.  I admit it.  One of the aspects that catches my attention is the sheer length of some of these ads.  It seems apparent that some companies simple publish their internal, HR-drive job descriptions as an employment ad.  Mistake.

Ads that incorporate this style read as an onerous task list as opposed to describing the opportunity and, more importantly, describing the ideal salesperson in his or her terms.  The salesperson should read the ad and think to themselves, “Those are my skills, those are my strengths.”

Many ads like to list the reporting requirements of the position.  This task is assumed in sales – you have to provide a forecast, you have to update the CRM package, you have to keep notes.  The specifics of these tasks are not required in the ad.  In fact, they create word bloat in the ad.  Don’t waste the space.

Here is a prime example from an ad:

6.  Engage service delivery owners within the company coordinating mutual stakeholders meetings for repetitive or client initiated strategic business issues or launching of a new/additional service.

Look up “bloviation” in the dictionary and you will find this ad.  Couldn’t the above quote simply state something like “coordinate internal, strategic customer review meetings” or something to that point?  The example is so overwritten that I am not sure of the gist of the sentence.

Concise, succinct writing is key when writing sales ads.

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