Selling Style is one area we assess in our process. Some people refer to it as personality which I don’t believe is particularly accurate. Nonetheless, style is an important assessment for managing the salesperson but too many hiring managers assume certain skills based on a candidate’s style.
When we refer to “gut-level decisions,” often those decisions are made based upon a candidate’s style. That method leads to hiring mistakes.
One of our newer customers offered an interesting take on this style issue yesterday after a couple of candidate interviews. The candidates were markedly different in their styles, but their aptitudes, skills and motivations were relatively similar.
Our customer’s comment: “I’m surprised the candidates are so different. I would have thought you would pursue similar profiles.”
Lee walked him through our graphic on this page and explained the greater importance of selecting salespeople based off the deeper-seated data and, more importantly, which specific abilities are needed for the position. This approach is what differentiates repeatable, successful sales hiring as opposed to best guesses.