We have been sourcing for a handful of sales positions around the country this past weekend and we are starting to see some potential movement of strong candidates.  What I mean is that there is some contraction about to start among large sales forces.  Some strong salespeople will be pushed out in the contraction which makes for an excellent time to expand or upgrade your sales team.

Revenue-generating positions are always a priority no matter what the economy does.  A slowdown generally pushes companies towards cost-saving maneuvers which is good for sales hiring - some good salespeople are going to be squeezed out.

One example is a candidate we recently talked to who is starting to actively look for a new opportunity.  He works in the specific territory for a national company, but the company is going to eliminate some under-performing salespeople.  They are then going to combine territories and have fewer sales reps cover more territory.

This candidate is going to have his territory combined with a more tenured rep.  They are both selling at the same high level and are paid comparable salaries.  The candidate is going to be told he will take on a territory in another geographic location so he will have to move his young family.  He has no interest in that move and has no other options with his company.  Hence, he is looking.  Actively.

These types of situations are going to play out in greater frequency for the remainder of this year.  Good salespeople will become available.  Now is the time to upgrade or expand your sales team.

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Interesting article here from BusinessWeek.com titled Talent and “Humbition” that discusses a common problem with hiring superstars - they tend to have a me-first mentality.  Part of that mentality is what makes them successful, but there are stars out there who approach their work with a humbleness that is inspiring.

Here is a good point in regards to this approach:

First, to CEOs, HR directors, and the founders of startups: The best-run companies I know are indeed obsessed with filling their companies with great people. But they also believe that recruiting stars doesn’t mean succumbing to a me-first star system. They understand that what it means to be great is as much about values as virtuosity, as much about what makes people tick as what they know. Call it the character of competition—the relationship between a company’s identity in the marketplace and the sense of identity that people bring to the workplace. Winning the war for talent doesn’t mean lavishing big stock-option packages on every self-impressed MBA or Java programmer you meet.

And now the definition of humbition:

What’s humbition? It’s a term I first heard from Jane Harper, a nearly 30-year veteran of IBM. It is, she explains, the subtle blend of humility and ambition that drives the most successful leaders—an antidote to the know-it-all hubris that affects so many business stars. “The more I know,” she says sensibly, “the more I know there is to know.”

We have seen these types of salespeople before, but they are somewhat difficult to find.  In sales, we often encounter a certain swagger amongst the highly successful salespeople.  Some swagger is ok, maybe even helpful.  ONLY some.  We have encountered salespeople who were highly successful, but their swagger had grown into arrogance.  More times than not, these salespeople crossed a line that led to their dismissal.

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One of the real draws of working at a smaller company is the opportunity to have direct access to management-level decisions.  As larger companies trim their payrolls, skilled employees will enter the candidate pool.  These candidates may find a smaller company provides new opportunities for their personal skill set.

The Wall Street Journal discusses this topic in Moving to a Small Company Can Lead to Big Rewards:

That close proximity to upper management often leads to quicker action. Mr. Macdonald, the former Bristol-Myers worker, says he has the power to get things done more expeditiously at his new employer, Acorda Therapeutics Inc. in Hawthorne, N.Y. “There’s less bureaucracy,” he says. “Decisions are made without having to go through a number of layers of approval.”

Being able to influence a company’s bottom line is what led Scott Ruthfield to join WhitePages.com Inc. in April as vice president of engineering and technology. “Everybody plays a core role, so if you do a good job, you are directly contributing to way the business is going to succeed,” says the former Amazon.com Inc. manager.

And here is the pull quote that gets to the alluring aspect of a small company (emphasis mine):

Small-company converts also mention the room to gain experience in new practice areas—or to return to the heart of a business—as another plus. “You get divorced from the nuts and bolts of operating a business when you work for large companies,” says Mike Barnes, a newly hired logistics executive at Halton Co., a provider of construction equipment in Portland, Ore. Mr. Barnes says the depth of involvement he has at his new firm has another upside: A level of job satisfaction he says he hasn’t felt in a long time.

We have had much success placing large-company candidates into small company positions.  A common theme amongst the candidates is a bureaucracy burnout from the larger company culture.  The opportunity to have an impact on the direction of a company provides an incentive that is less attainable at the larger company.

Granted, there are drawbacks to be addressed, mainly compensation (especially benefits) and resources.  These items have to be addressed in the early stages, but we have found the upside of our smaller customers to be of great interest to large-company candidates.

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Here’s a good post on sales “rainmakers” from my friend Bob Rosner.  I suspect that most of you are aware of our emphasis on salespeople with strong listening abilities.  Part of a rainmaker’s skill set?  Absolutely:

DO Listen and synthesize. The biggest difference between an average salesperson and a rainmaker? Mr. Average assumes his most important tool to making a sale is his golden tongue. While Ms. Rainmaker knows that it’s her ears.

That may be the most important aspect of their abilities.  Unfortunately, we have seen this work against them in an interview.  Some hiring managers want to be wowed in the interview by some form of verbal gymnastics.  Often, we have to point out to the manager specific instances from the interview where the candidate was qualifying them.

One other factor that I think is common to all rainmakers is pointed out early in Rosner’s post:

It’s a story that I heard from a sage salesman at my dad’s car dealership when I was a kid. Two shoe salesmen land in Africa. Upon seeing hundreds of people walking around barefoot, one salesman sends a telegram back to his home office. “No sales here, no one wears shoes.” While the second salesman wrote back, “Huge market, everyone needs shoes.”

Rainmakers aren’t witch doctors who dance to make it rain. Rather, they’re salespeople who see markets overflowing where most of us see nothing but desert.

Exactly.  Rainmakers have the ability to see opportunity through what appears to be obstacles to others.  This reason is why some rainmakers are boat-rockers within a company.  They desire to power through these obstacles to reach the goal.

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Might be a good idea to leave this bit of data out of the cover email:

Position must be daytime hours and reachable BY THE BUS SYSTEM. I am without a vehicle and License at this time, this is only temporary until I pay a fine.

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We’ve been working through a fair amount of initial sourcing activities the past week or so and I’ve come across something that catches my attention.  I’m seeing more and more posted resume/cover letters that state what a candidate is not looking for in their next position.

No telemarketing positions.

No work-at-home schemes.

Not interested in travel.

Must have benefit plan or not interested.

I understand the desire to be focused in a job search, but I notice a negative effect when I read through these types of statements.  Immediately, I start thinking about what other restrictions may be part of this candidate’s baggage.

I suspect there are many companies out there approaching any new resume listing with the chance to become a millionaire by selling weight-loss drugs for just 2 hours a week from your home computer.  Annoying for sure, but I don’t think an introduction to an online resume is necessarily the best forum for voicing restrictions.

Sales candidates who take this approach always give me pause.

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Lee sent this short article to me - Paying Recruits to Interview?  I’m woefully out of touch on this one:

Notching Interviews: Why would corporate recruiters pay candidates to interview for jobs? To Los Gatos Hills, California-based Notchup.com, the answer is simple: Companies ideally will find top candidates, so the money will be well spent. The startup job board adds a twist to the traditional online job search by enabling job-seeking professionals to name their price at which they will agree to interview with prospective employers. Notchup.com says employers benefit by being able to target passive candidates. The company says its tools include optional background checks on candidates and a money-back guarantee on all interviews.

I wonder if this is a natural outcropping of the impending labor shortage.  Imagine demand for candidates is so great that companies will pay for an interview!  The day may be closer at hand than you think.

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Salespeople, with strong skills, are always in demand in any economy.  Certainly some sales opportunities have an ebb and flow tied to the current economic conditions, but those are mainly business-to-consumer positions.  From that understanding comes a 2008 sales hiring outlook from Monster.com.

First key graph:

In 2008 as always, salespeople in nearly any industry will find work, if they’ve got the contacts, the product knowledge and the street savvy. “Any successful salesperson in any industry is able to write their own ticket,” says Brandon Gutman, director of marketing and business development for recruiter Stephen-Bradford Search in New York.

Couldn’t agree more.  As companies make difficult decisions, some strong salespeople are let go due to financial considerations.  This fact is why we do not abhor a bit of a hiring slowdown.  The slowdown puts some strong salespeople on the street who may have been much harder to recruit out of their former position.

Some of the hot niches this year:

Salespeople in hot information technology sectors can remain optimistic, despite the slow economy.

“In online advertising sales, there are more positions open than bodies to fill them,” he says.

From biotech to carbon credits to the robots that have replaced factory workers, 2008 will see the continued proliferation of complex products, creating a need for salespeople with high-level skills and special subject-matter expertise.

High-level sales skills are in demand today.  The days of shake-and-howdy, round of golf sales calls are waning.  Salespeople with the skills to navigate long sales cycles with multiple decision layers are the ones who will be in the most demand.

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This excerpt is from the cover letter of a salesperson:

Telemarketing There is no better.

willing to work Short Term, Long Term, Temp. Commision, depending on rate of pay.

Currently i am working a sales job, however, i do not like it, although i am very good, great at it I am only making $7 an hour.

Pass.

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Ok, the whole candidate attire topic seems to be floating around the areas of the web I patrol. CareerJournal.com offers a follow up article titled Tassels, Pantsuits and Other Interview Fashion Faux-Pas. Great title. Here is a quick description of the debate from the article:

Perhaps it’s lamentable that a person should be judged on how he maintains his car interior or what he wears. “I’ve encountered far too many empty suits who are perfectly groomed but have little relevant knowledge,” wrote Marty Robins, an attorney in Buffalo Grove, Ill. “Conversely, many people who emphasize keeping current their technical skills and industry knowledge do not have time to spend preening over their wardrobes.”

True. Yet employers are attempting to assess the character and abilities of people they often hardly know. You go with the information you have.

Those two paragraphs sum up the two sides of this discussion rather well.  However, that article takes a real turn later:

But tell that to the New York-area financial executive who wrote me, extensively, that he avoids hiring women who wear pants because, he argues, women who wear skirts and pantyhose tend to be better employees. He considers a woman in a pantsuit equivalent to a man in a suit with no necktie. “Certainly, no man is going to get offended if she shows up in a skirt and hose, but there are men who like me feel a pantsuit on a woman is a step down. Why take that chance?” he wrote. This 35-year-old man asked not to be quoted by name because he said his comments could be interpreted as sexist.

See, this is the point I was making in my previous post - the danger here is that hiring managers get sucked into strange biases when they focus on attire.   What a strange statement from the financial executive.  How can you counteract that thinking?  Imagine a strong skilled, perfect-for-the-role sales woman who is passed up because she wore dress pants.

As a recruiter, I cringe at the thought of working with someone who uses that type of thinking in his hiring process.

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