By Michelle Richardson – Vice President of Sales Performance Research, The Brooks Group
As a sales leader, there’s a lot riding on your hiring decisions. You know good hiring practices do far more than simply evaluate an applicant’s selling skills —they give you the insight to hire great salespeople.
No doubt you’ve learned the hard way that, when you lose a sales professional, it can cost you as much as 150% of their annual salary and benefits, plus lost sales and missed opportunities.
Odds are, you didn’t let your last employee go because they lacked the skills to do the job; it may have been for a lack of personal skills or a mismatch with your organization. This common situation has led to the maxim, “Hire for attitude, train for skill.”
While most sales managers believe in the importance of “attitude,” they often ignore it during the screening process. They want someone up and running quickly, don’t have time to train, and often choose someone with a solid track record from a competitor.
Most sales professionals are hired based on their prior work experience with a specific industry, market, or product line. The hiring manager assumes that the individual’s past work experience was positive, and that the person is available because of circumstances over which they had no control, rather than because of average or below-average performance.
This certainly doesn’t guarantee the individual has the drive to succeed and the right attitude to reach sales targets in a new position—or that they’re the right fit for your organization.
The Importance of Identifying Attitude
You can think of attitude as showing your “true colors”—personal qualities that are always present but most observable when the going gets tough, such as accountability, resilience, results orientation, and work ethic.