Client Interview – Martin Beukhof on Sales Process
Martin Beukhof, President, Quality Business Solutions
Sales Hiring Mistakes Eliminated with SGS Sales Recruiting Screening Process
The Challenge:
After some miss-hires, the company wanted to hire a salespeople who would succeed in its rapidly changing sales environment.
What did you need help with?
“When I was previously looking for a salespeople, I usually yielded to the temptation to hire someone who was recommended by a respected team member. The interviews usually went well and we hired. But, we ended up living with far too many mistakes. It was counterproductive to our growth effort.”
“This time around, I wanted to use a structured approach to stack the deck in our favor and avoid the same hiring mistakes.”
What stood out about SGS that made you want to work with them?
“What impressed me about SGS was their assessment scoring system that appealed to my strong analytical side. The results would give me a clearer, deeper understanding of candidates’ sales strengths and weaknesses in our sales environment, because SGS would tailor it for QBS.”
How did SGS help?
“We used SGS’ template for writing our recruiting ad, which attracted more qualified candidates than my previous process. They all took the Express Screen. Then we reviewed the dashboard report for each one, including the ‘confidence’ factor, or how trustworthy the findings are based on how consistent the answers are. After the telephone screening step, we interviewed the three who bubbled up to the top.”
“It was really surprising to learn that the two top finalists who had scored quite similarly actually had polar opposite personalities. That punctuated the exact reason why hiring a salesperson should not be based on personality testing alone.”
“In addition to walking us through a structured recruiting/hiring process, Danita helped me stay focused on and committed to the process. At one point, when no one had passed the Express Screen, I panicked. Without her coaching, I would have surely let my impatience get the best of me and hire one of them.”
“One of Danita’s best traits is that she’s not afraid to tell me something I may not agree with. In my book, that’s what makes her a trustworthy consultant. The development plan based on the assessment results is a great follow-up that provides coaching guidance for improving any weaknesses.”
How is the new hire performing?
“Way ahead of the predecessor, which indicates to me a good connection with prospects. Our new person closed on two clients right away and has another two or three brewing. And, although corporate deals take longer to nurture, one is already in the bag, which the predecessors didn’t do in an entire year.”
Company Background:
Quality Business Solutions provides Information Technology consultants and business solutions to companies in the Twin Cities area. They provide staff augmentation at all levels of IT and also develop IT solutions for businesses. Main practice areas include protecting and securing information related to: Payment Card information, Personally Identifiable Information and Personal Health information.
Sales Growth Question: What steps have you taken to avoid common hiring mistakes?
Sales Growth Lesson: Following a structured recruiting/hiring process will ensure that you attract the right caliber sales candidate.
To learn more download the sales hiring assessments ebook.
© Copyright 2011, Danita Bye Sales Growth Specialists, All Rights Reserved.
Client Interview – Bruce Hanson on Recruiting Process
Bruce Hanson, CEO, Andrew Tool/Superior Tool CEO
Skeptical Client Converts to the SGS Sales Talent Screening Process
The Challenge:
Recognizing that the previous sales recruiting efforts for a new business development sales people had not been successful, Bruce wanted to recruit salespeople who could, and would, successfully sell in their environment. In addition, they wanted help developing a compensation plan that was not aligned with the business growth plan, but would also attractive top producers and retain successful salespeople.
What prompted you to contact Sales Growth Specialists?
“Our growth objectives, plain and simple. We wanted salespeople that could open doors for us. Once we get in front of a prospect, we’re generally quite successful in closing business. But we’re not good at that first essential step.”
Why did you ultimately choose to work with SGS?
“First, you need to know that I don’t like consultants, and I don’t trust salespeople. So I approached SGS very skeptically. However, I was intrigued with the assessment tool and their process.”
“Instead of rushing into recruiting mode, we started by assessing our three current salespeople to see if any of them might be a match. Although the results indicated none of them would likely be successful, the power of the tool became evident.”
Would you recommend SGS’ process?
“I would. The assessment is a remarkable tool that anchors their process. It’s the first of its kind that exposes weaknesses. Most just pat you on the back. Plus, it’s directly related to the candidate’s ability to sell as opposed to personality indexes.”
“In addition, you need the right folks to help relate assessment results to job requirements. You have to trust those people as much as you trust the tool. I have become a firm believer in both. SGS has won my respect by demonstrating they can tailor their process to the selling environment.”
How would you compare SGS’ process to a typical recruiter?
“There are several differences. SGS’ assessment tool is more statistically valid than a recruiter’s subjective approach of reviewing a resume and telephone screening. They did a nice job of looking over our job description and translating it into an effective recruiting ad that attracted the right kind of candidates. Plus, their insights helped us structure a compensation plan that would not only attract good candidates, but also retain a successful new business development professionals. For us, it was more cost-effective than working with a recruiter.”
Is your new salesperson meeting expectations?
“Early indications are quite positive. We’ve seen a lot of activity, and I would say we’re off to a good start.”
Andrew Tool & Machining is known for:
- Extreme tight tolerance machining complemented by effective process development design/build custom engineering
- On-time delivery and uncompromised precision
- Latest manufacturing technology and highly skilled and creative manufacturing engineers and machinists
Sales Growth Question: What type of assessment tool and compensation plan do you use to attract the right sales candidate?
Sales Growth Lesson: Using an effective assessment tool and compensation plan will ensure the success of your sales team.
Get this free sales recruiting white paper now.
© Copyright 2011, Danita Bye Sales Growth Specialists, All Rights Reserved.
Hire Sales Reps Who Will Be Rock Stars On Your Sales Team
Learn a process to identify the standouts in the crowd and quickly eliminate the bad fits for your company
“How do I hire a sales rep with the best chance to become a superstar in my company? Identifying exceptional sales talent for your unique team is not a one-size-fits-all approach, and a wrong sales hiring decision can cost you hundreds of thousands of dollars. Hiring the wrong salespeople results in lost revenue, longer sales cycles and, ultimately, a loss of market share.
Danita Bye, sales hiring expert and contributing author to Business Expert Guide to Small Business Success, helps companies turn generic resume and interview screening into skills-match assessments leading to peak-performing sales teams. She teaches you how to systemize your unique sales process, profile ideal candidates and make hiring decisions that deliver the highest sales ROI. Learn to quickly identify candidates who best fit your business’s needs and bring aboard reps with the greatest potential to deliver outstanding sales results.
In this virtual training session, you’ll learn how to:
- Ask the right questions to determine if your applicant will be a headache or a go-getter
- Test the questioning or qualifying abilities of the candidate
- Peel away the fluff and hone in on the “real goods” in your interview
- Compare your applicant’s selling capabilities with your company’s critical selling strategies and process
- Assess quickly whether the salesperson is coachable, trainable and has a growth mindset
- Avoid high failure rates and slow ramp-up times of new sales hires … freeing up more resources for growth initiatives
All registrants will receive Danita’s eBook “Measuring Sales DNA.”
Sales Growth Question: What measures do you take to hire a sales rep that outperforms the sales market?
Sales Growth Lesson: Make sure you hire salespeople that are coachable, trainable and have a growth mindset.
© Copyright 2011, Danita Bye Sales Growth Specialists, All Rights Reserved.
Sales DNA: Match Culture During Sales Recruiting
You may have already heard about the launch of one of my new ebooks – and hopefully have even had a chance to read –Measuring Sales DNA: A Fact-based Approach to Sales Talent Acquisition. I have had lots of questions about Sales DNA — notably, “Why do I need Sales DNA?” and “How do I identify it?”
Making the right Sales DNA match is not easy. New approaches to sales recruiting must be developed to match the right Sales DNA with the unique demands of your company culture and sales environment.
Why bother? When we make matches in life, whether in our work or personal domains, we often ignore the lessons that Mother Nature has already taught us. For example, the right Sales DNA can act like the chemical composition around a Sequoia tree, the giant Coastal Redwood tree that is known for its stature and longevity. This majestic tree’s chemical composition is ideally suited to survive in its environment. The Sequoia tree has naturally adapted to its environment with a chemical defense against insects and other tree pests.
The right sales person, or Sales DNA, for your sales culture naturally adapts to the unique challenges of your environment. It would be fruitless, for example, to put the Coastal Redwood in a desert. These awe-inspiring trees have a symbiotic relationship with the mild coastal climates it excels in. Similarly, a sales manager would not choose to place a seller of commoditized goods in a high-value sales territory. A Sales DNA match that makes a strong connection between symbiotic sales traits and sales climate must be identified in advance of the hiring decision.
The Sales Growth Question: How much clarity do you have around the Sales DNA needed to succeed in your company?
The Sales Growth Lesson: The Sales DNA of your sales team must have a strong symbiotic match with your company culture and your strategic objectives.
If you haven’t read Measuring Sales DNA, I invite you to do so. I appreciate your feedback and insights.
In addition, I’m a contributor to a chapter on hiring in Business Expert Guide to Small Business Success.
Sales Hiring Intelligence
Over the past 12 months, I’ve been involved in capturing some of sales management and leadership insights I’ve gleaned over the years of being involved in sales, sales management and sales leadership. As my husband, Gordon, often says, “Danita, you’re like an unindexed encyclopedia! You can walk into any sales situation and figure out how to take it to the next level of performance.”
However, in order to help more clients get better traction with their sales teams, we need to start indexing the encyclopedia! Therefore, I’ve written a number of articles on the challenges of hiring high performance sales people.
And, I’ve assembled all of our sales hiring intelligence in one place. Take the time to walk through and draw on our expertise.
Then join my Business Expert Webinar , Sales Hiring Strategies that Return High Sales ROI, and bring all your experience and questions with you. Together, we will keep growing our network of sales hiring expertise!
Books:
- Measuring Sales DNA
- Business Expert Guide to Small Business Success, A Grounded Approach to Hiring Salespeople
Blog Postings:
Articles:
- Hiring Successful Salepeople by the Number
- Why Sales Talent Recruiting Must Be Done Right the First Time
- Five Steps to Hiring Salespeople Better Than Your Top Performer
- Identifying Selling Skills and Hiring a Good Salesperson
- Rules for Successful Sales Recruiting
Sales Hiring Strategies That Return High Sales ROI
Join my Business Expert Webinar and Learn why the rockstar sales person was a dud on your sales force..and how you can make certain you don’t hire duds again!
If you are like most sales managers, the sales hiring goal posts have moved and you are rethinking your sales assessment strategies. The skills
you sought yesterday are not the same core competencies you need to sell your products to your customers today. You only have one choice: adapt. My next Business Expert Webinar Learn Why the Rockstar Sales Person Was a Dud on Your Sales Force will show you how.
How much does a wrong sales hiring decision cost? It can range from $100,000 to $250,000! Failing to align your sales skills requirements with the unique aspects of your market, sales strategies, pricing position and sales process will result in lost revenue, longer sales cycles and, ultimately, a loss of market share. Even worse, one day you could find your sales pipeline barren and sales leads dried up. Before that happens, join in on my Webinar and discover how to:
• Identify the unique marketplaces, selling environments and special qualities that your salesperson needs to succeed
• Assess whether the sales person is coachable, trainable and has a growth mindset
Are Poor Sales Hiring Fits Lowering Sales Performance?
In sales recruiting, we often ask, “If the sales job could talk, what would it say?”
In a sense, we personify the job and then interview it, asking it the kinds of questions we might ask of a sales hiring prospect. What should Johnny’s job description look like? Finding the right Sales DNA for your market, sales management processes and sales strategy starts with a lot of questions. For example, what types of sales motivation approaches are the most conducive to your success? Where do you see yourself in five years?
My experience is that many hiring managers fail by compromising on required sales skills. Each sales recruiting process should involve a list of five to ten sales skills, and they’re non-negotiable. Sales recruits will often tell you what you want to hear so be sure to test for validity. Another common mistake is failure to define measurable responsibilities: Sell $50K per month in services and products; Maintain a lead conversion rate higher than 50 percent.
The Sales Lesson: To narrow the chance of a Sales DNA mismatch and the resulting poor sales performance, identify five to ten must-have skills in your sales recruiting profile and make them non-negotiable sales hiring terms.
The Sales Question: Do your sales recruiting candidates possess all of your required sales staffing skills? Have you assigned quantifiable measurements to sales staffing responsibilities?
For more info, get my new eBook, Measuring Sales DNA, or read “Hiring Sales People, A Grounded Approach to Hiring Sales Stars,” in the recently published Business Expert Guide to Small Business Success.
Plus, join me at the upcoming BEW Webinar entitled: Sales Hiring Strategies that Return High Sales ROI
Sales Recruiting and Organizational Fit
You are down to the last three candidates, so what’s the clincher?
Organizational fit.
Sales Hiring & Organizational Fit
The first interview builds on the insight you gain from employee screening allowing you to dig deep into their selling mindset. In addition, it gives you an opportunity to observe composure, style, maturity, and resilience while in an uncomfortable situation.
It is not, however, a popularity contest, and you’re not looking for the nicest one of the bunch. In fact, I have lots of stories about hiring based on “nice”….but, they couldn’t close any business! I learned through the school of hard knocks that I need salespeople who are strong at qualifying and closing!
Once you’re through the first set of interviews and are convinced that this person CAN and WILL sell for your company, you’ll shift your focus to verifying whether or not there’s a good fit with your sales organization and sales goals. The candidate who is the best fit for your organizational culture will deliver the highest sales performance. For most, however, organizational fit is hard to define.
Let’s start with corporate culture. McKinsey famously described it as “how we do things around here.” Corporate culture encompasses a broad set of influences. Here are some examples:
- Leadership style: Will the candidate take instruction well from your dictatorial but high flying sales manager?
- Organizational structure: Does the sales candidate have experience working in a self-directed, flat organizational structure?
- Routines: Is the sales candidates flexible enough to cheerily accommodate your 15 minute daily status meeting?
- Discipline: Does the candidate have the discipline to track both activities and results?
The Sales Lesson: The right organizational fit provides the enabling environment for sales motivation and high sales performance.
The Sales Question: In your sales recruiting process, how many dimensions of organizational fit do you measure?
I introduce a number of tools that can be used to assess the organizational of your sales hire in my new eBook, Measuring Sales DNA. Or, you can read “Hiring Sales People, A Grounded Approach to Hiring Sales People,” in the recently published Business Expert Guide to Small Business Success.
Plus, join me at the upcoming BEW Webinar entitled: Sales Hiring Strategies that Return High Sales ROI
Smart Sales Recruiters Model the Sale
Sales recruiters can learn a lot from comedians.
I’m a Stevie Ray fan. In fact, I’m planning on taking an Improv Class from him this fall. From seeing Stevie in action, I know that a good comedian knows how to sell an audience. They understand human behavior. At comedy nights, they have to hit the right funny bone in order to keep the sales happening.
Similarly, in an ideal sales world, every prospect is delighted to hear from you, hands over their checkbook and credit cards, and instructs you to take as much as is needed to solve their problems — plus a little extra for your trouble. Truth is, each sale introduces a unique set of factors that must be identified and fed into your sales strategy…and your sales hiring process.
Before you can write the sales staffing descriptions, you have to know what it is you are looking for. Start by modeling your ideal sale. What sales strategies will help you develop the ideal selling process? Are you a gazelle up against alligators? Do you have brand recognition and market share? What sales motivation techniques sell the higher value in your unique product and service features.
The sales person who can respond to these unique selling demands will get the gig — that is, make the sale. Profiling the skill sets required is step one — getting on the stage. What sales strategies reach your audience? Is it through a consultative sales process? Or do you need an ambassador to introduce a new product? Or both? It’s all
in the delivery. Before you can write the sales staffing description, you need to model the ideal sale.
The Sales Lesson: Successful sales recruiting is finding the right Sales DNA for your ideal client and best-case sale. When the right sales staffing match is made your sales strategy works and profit is maximized.
The Sales Question: What sales recruiting strategies will lead to sales hiring that targets the Sales Gene for your markets and prospects?
For more info, get my new eBook, Measuring Sales DNA, or read “Hiring Sales People, A Grounded Approach to Hiring Sales People,” in the recently published Business Expert Guide to Small Business Success.
Plus, join me at the upcoming BEW Webinar entitled: Sales Hiring Strategies that Return High Sales ROI
Sales Recruiting and Brain Science
It is being touted as the “most important project in human history.” By 2030, scientists expect to have succeeded in reverse engineering the human brain. This announcement has raised a debate among
Sales Assessment
scientists over whether the brain is coded in the genome.
I will enter the scientific fray by affirming that, based on experience over thousands of hires, Sales DNA can be identified. And, the best science today for identifying it is a tailored sales recruiting process that includes customized sales assessments based on strong research data.
In the future, we may be able to run a battery of brain tests to identify the ideal sales candidates for our sales cultures. During the interim, the closest tool that we have is the Express Screen for determining Sales Compatibility, Sales Motivation, Sales Skillsets, Sales Strengths and Weaknesses.
In my new eBook, Measuring Sales DNA, I suggest you address each of the elements discovered in the sales assessment and use it to generate a customized 30-60-90 day fast-tracking plan and a personal development plan. This plan is designed to address any identified weaknesses and capitalize on strengths. This will ensure that your onboarding process supplies your new sales recruit with the tools and support he/she needs to achieve high sales performance.
Excuse the pun, but it is not brain science. The right sales job match requires rigorous sales evaluation processes to identify the right mix of sales traits for your sales culture.
The Sales Lesson: Sales Aptitude Tests evaluating candidates on Sales Compatibility, Sales Motivation, Sales Skill sets, Sales Strengths and Weaknesses will help to ensure successful sales recruiting.
The Sales Question: How many dimensions do your sales assessment measure to determine the sales hire – and sales culture fit?
For more info, get my new eBook, Measuring Sales DNA, or read “Hiring Sales People, A Grounded Approach to Hiring Sales People,” in the recently published Business Expert Guide to Small Business Success.
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