- December 8, 2014
- Posted by: Dave Kurlan
- Category: Understanding the Sales Force
I’m always amused when an email comes through with a message that says something like, “Maybe we should target candidates that aren’t recommended” or “Why do so many candidates lack Commitment?” or “Your assessments are only recommending 1 out of every 5 candidates!” or “The questions don’t fit the role!” or “Thanks for saving us so much time – we would have hired some of these losers last year!”
I can usually determine, just from the comment of the email, exactly who, by title, must have sent it to us. Here are some funny examples:
If it’s a comment about how few candidates are being recommended, then the message is probably from an internal or external recruiter.
All but the savviest of recruiters hate Objective Management Group (OMG) because we make their jobs more difficult. Their job is to find great sales or sales management candidates and OMG only recommends those who are most likely to succeed in the role so, from their perspective, we are “knocking out” too many of their “awesome” candidates. We do help them succeed at their jobs, but they must deliver more candidates than before to achieve that success.
A comment about how much time we have saved them is usually from the HR Director or VP. Those Individuals easily recognize how good the recommended candidates are and really appreciate how much time they saved by not having to engage with undesirable candidates. We make their jobs much easier!
When we read a comment about the assessment questions not fitting a sales role, the email is definitely from a candidate that is either a fish out of water, very inexperienced, or very misguided about professional selling. Good salespeople never have a problem with fit or context.
Sarcastic comments, like the one above about targeting ‘not recommended’ candidates, usually come from frustrated CEOs that haven’t met with enough good candidates. Of course, it’s easy to place the blame on OMG for quality of candidates because, well, who are they going to blame, their own people? The quality of the candidates is directly related to the effectiveness of their job posting, where they placed their ads, and how well those postings are working. OMG assessment recommendations essentially become the feedback on the quality of their sales candidate pool.
Testimonials often come from Sales VPs or Directors that have begun to hire great salespeople. They recognize how good the candidates have been, they have made their first hires, and the new salepeople that OMG recommended have gotten off to great starts.
Depending on their roles and whether or not achieving their goals has become easier or more difficult, everyone has a different context and perspective of the exact same instrument.
As of this writing, there are some indisputable conditions that everyone must contend with:
- There is a shortage of good candidates, but they do exist.
- The more difficult the role and the more capable and expert the salesperson must be, the harder it will be to find “the one”.
- It is taking between 60-90 days to complete the hiring process.
- The best job sites depend on a combination of geography and the desired capabilities of the salespeople you are hoping to hire.
- The best candidate, who I personally interviewed in the past 30 days, was sourced from Craigslist.
- The best overall candidates for a specific geography, that I interviewed in the past 90 days, were sourced from Indeed.
- The best overall candidates for a non-specific geography, that I interviewed in the past 90 days, were from LinkedIn.
- The best overall value for sourcing candidates was from ZipRecruiter.
- You may conduct 5-minute phone interviews with ONLY the candidates that were recommended for the role by the OMG Assessment.
- The percentage of candidates that are recommended varies according to the requirements for the role.
- You may interview only the best of those candidates from the phone interviews.
Managing your own expectations is key to making this process work. You must exercise:
- Patience. You may have to repeat the process several times to find who you are looking for.
- No Compromises. If you compromise, you’ll be starting all over again in 6 months.
- Discipline. Never consider a candidate that is not recommended by the OMG Sales Candidate Assessment regardless of fit.
- No Exceptions. Exceptions compromise the integrity of the sales recruiting process.
- Speed. Once you have identified a desirable candidate, act swiftly or you will lose that candidate! I interviewed a great candidate at 2PM on Thursday and recommended him to my client at 3 PM. At 5:45 PM I received a call and learned that my client had already contacted, met with, interviewed the candidate, and presented a job offer that the candidate accepted.
Finding, selecting, hiring and onboarding great salespeople is more difficult than at any time in the past 20 years. The only thing that will make it easier is something for which you absolutely won’t want to be wishing – a huge economic downturn. As long as the economy is growing and things are going relatively well, we can deal with it being more difficult to hire. After all, what good is a glut of candidates if you can’t afford to hire them?
Finally, don’t forget about EEOC Guidelines. if you are using OMG’s Sales Candidate Assessments, current guidelines require you to assess all of your candidates. Clients simply purchase a flat-fee license for unlimited use and send the link to every candidate that submits a resume. Easy! You’re EEOC compliant.
Want to hear more? Listen to this BizTalkRadio interview of me talking about getting sales selection right.