The Chainsaw Massacre and Building Sales Teams

I was on the back of our property with my chain saw and I was ready to take down the third tree of the afternoon.  I determined where the tree needed to fall, made the two front cuts to create a hinge and made the final cut in the back to take it down.  Only it didn’t go according to plan.  Somehow, the tree began to drop right where I was standing, ninety degrees from where I intended.  if cutting down trees is a hit or miss proposition, this was definitely a miss – as long as I could get out of its path quickly enough.  There is a science and a process for taking down trees and obviously, I didn’t follow it properly!

Despite the existence of both a science and a process for hiring salespeople, most efforts also tend to be hit or miss and the emphasis always seems to be on miss.  There are plenty of reasons why, and we can discuss some of them, but the biggest and most insane reason is…

There are processes, websites and tools and plenty of help is available every step of the way. With all of those resources, why is hiring salespeople still such a hit or miss proposition?

The answer is: Stubbornness.

HR professionals are stubborn because they think hiring salespeople is the same as hiring everyone else in the company.  It isn’t.  Salespeople have three additional challenges which no other employee has to face:

1. Competition – competitors will try to prevent your new salespeople from succeeding. Who other than salespeople in the company have to overcome that?
2. Resistant and Disinterested Prospects – they hide from your new salespeople and when your salespeople do manage to get them to the phone they are resistant and disinterested.  Who other than salespeople in the company have to overcome that?
3. Fear – salespeople have a lot of self-limiting beliefs, discomforts and fears that prevent them from doing some of the things required to be successful in sales even after they have learned to do them.  Is there any other role in the company where demons interfere with getting the work done?

Sales Managers are stubborn when they insist that their years of hiring salespeople validates their gut instinct and because of their experience they will get it right.  Yes – they can get it right as often as 50% of the time.  With only 50% of salespeople hitting quota each year, sales is the only profession where employees can fail dramatically and still have a job.  Unfortunately, as Elton John sang, “I’m still standing” is not a KPI for sales success.  Meeting or exceeding quota each year is.

CEOs are stubborn because they refuse to hold their Sales Leaders accountable for eliminating mediocrity. That mediocrity includes not just the horrible quota achievement, but failing to meet forecasts and sales hiring results.  How long would it take the CEO to fire the CFO if the CFO could only account for 50% of the company’s money?

Recruiters – both internal and external – are stubborn because they don’t want to change the way they do things.  As such they attempt to prevent companies from using Objective Management Group’s (OMG) very accurate and predictive sales candidate assessments because it makes their job so much more difficult when they have to present quality candidates instead of any old candidates.

When Sales Leadership, HR, Recruiters and CEOs break through the stubbornness barrier, they are rewarded with the benefits of using OMG’s sales candidate assessments – the equivalent of a sales hiring crystal ball.  OMG is incredibly accurate and predictive, as well as customizable down to the specific selling role so HR, sales leadership and recruiters can all see into the future and determine in advance whether or not each sales candidate is ideal for the selling role the company is attempting to fill.  As a result:

• Recruiters deliver and recommend candidates with confidence!
• HR saves dozens of hours they would have spent pouring over applications and resumes as well as making calls and can focus on reaching out to only those who will succeed in the role.
• Sales Leadership interviews only those candidates who have the sales capabilities to succeed.
• New salespeople hit quota, forecasts are finally realized and CEOs celebrate.

Best of all, executives can hire the salespeople they need and then move on to the other important aspects of their job.  it doesn’t have to be hit or miss and it doesn’t have to be difficult.  If it wasn’t for stubbornness, hiring salespeople would not be a year-round proposition!

Speaking of resources, here are some I can point you to:

Free sample of OMG’s Sales Candidate Assessment
Free trial of OMG’s Sales Candidate Assessment
Free White Paper on the Science of Salesperson Selection

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