Dave Kurlan

  • Senate Confirmation Hearings Shows Us What Salespeople Do Wrong Every Day

    • October 12, 2020
    • Posted by: Dave Kurlan
    • Category: Understanding the Sales Force

    Oh no, another post on the political climate.  Don’t worry, I’m not taking sides, I’ll be right down the middle, and very critical of both sides.  And stay with me for the pivot to the good stuff – my sales analysis.  Here goes!

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  • The Difference Between OMG and Extended DISC Assessments

    • October 7, 2020
    • Posted by: Dave Kurlan
    • Category: Understanding the Sales Force

    When it comes to sales assessments, things are also not what they appear to be.  For example, take the FinXS Extended DISC which, at first glance, appears to have much in common with Objective Management Group’s (OMG) Salesperson Evaluations and Sales Candidate Assessments.  But are they the same, similar, or is it more like the Chinese rip-off?

    Let’s take a look under the hoods of both assessments and then you can decide.  We’ll begin with a comparison of the two respective dashboards.

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  • Top 10 Reasons Not to Test Your Sales Candidates

    • October 5, 2020
    • Posted by: Dave Kurlan
    • Category: Understanding the Sales Force

    Testing is not only normal, it’s expected.

    So why in the world is it so difficult to get Sales Leaders and HR professionals to test sales candidates?

    We hear everything, including this week’s top 10 reasons for not assessing:

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  • New: The 21 Sales Core Competencies for 2020 And Beyond

    • September 27, 2020
    • Posted by: Dave Kurlan
    • Category: Understanding the Sales Force

    Like Apple, OMG updates its assessments on a non-stop basis but rolls out significant updates a couple of times per year.  Last week OMG introduced the latest revision to the 21 Sales Core Competencies.

    There are thirty competencies in all, each with between six and twelve attributes but some are more important than others and OMG measures twenty-one of them in the following three categories:

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  • The Crucial Step Missing from Most Sales Training Programs

    • September 21, 2020
    • Posted by: Dave Kurlan
    • Category: Understanding the Sales Force

    There is a lesson here for those of us in the sales development space.  When we train, coach and develop salespeople, we must demand that customer service get the training and coaching required so as to not sabotage the great work we do with sales organizations.

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  • Masks and Sales Assessments – You Lose a Little Freedom and Control for Safety and Confidence

    • September 18, 2020
    • Posted by: Dave Kurlan
    • Category: Understanding the Sales Force

    The same thing happens when clients use Objective Management Group’s (OMG) accurate and predictive sales candidate assessments.  They lose a little freedom because they no longer arbitrarily interview salespeople who they feel like interviewing, and refrain from simply offering positions to people because they have a gut feeling about a candidate.   However, they lose some control because one half to two-thirds of the candidates will not be recommended when they aren’t great fits for the particular sales role for which the company is hiring, or simply aren’t very good salespeople – period.

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  • How the Correlation Between Restaurants and Covid 19 Applies to Sales Assessments

    • September 17, 2020
    • Posted by: Dave Kurlan
    • Category: Understanding the Sales Force

    But does it really matter whether this is causation?  Is there that big of a difference?  Is correlation enough?  It depends on what you are trying to show.  Let’s take sales assessments for example.

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  • Most Companies Can Boost Sales From 30-100% in Just One to Two Years

    • September 10, 2020
    • Posted by: Dave Kurlan
    • Category: Understanding the Sales Force

    Many companies already experienced at least 3 to 6 months of uncertainty and they can not withstand even 2 more months of that.   As a result, companies are investing, streamlining, expanding, hiring and going all in to save their 2020s, and position their companies for historical growth in 2021.

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  • 3 Selling Characteristics for the Age of Covid, Politics and Recession

    • September 8, 2020
    • Posted by: Dave Kurlan
    • Category: Understanding the Sales Force

    Thanks to the non-stop political news cycle, I went from averaging just over one article that mentioned politics per year to two!

    This article will be different.  For the first time in fourteen years of blogging, I am going to share what I think, uncensored, and despite some concern for what you think, not quite enough concern to stop me from writing about it.  There will still be a sales tie-in so stay with me as I build the case for 3 powerful sales characteristics.

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  • FDR and Sir Isaac Newton on Why Salespeople Fail

    • August 25, 2020
    • Posted by: Dave Kurlan
    • Category: Understanding the Sales Force

    Unlike the made up fears that prevent salespeople from asking tough questions, qualifying more thoroughly, or picking up the phone and making a cold call, the fear of burning alive in a hotel fire seemed like a pretty justifiable one.

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