One of the biggest challenges for hiring managers is to build a scalable team from scratch with the right people, with the right culture fit, and with the right skill sets.
You’re probably thinking – where’s the problem? Simply check if they hit their quota in their past role…problem solved. Hire them.
Well, we know it’s not that simple, at least not if you’re planning on getting them to stick around if your sales ecosystem is bumpy, immature, unhealthy or still requires a lot of modifications or fine tuning.
Put simply, reps want to make money and fast. Great sales people know they can make it fast, they’ve got very little tolerance for roadblocks, friction or tedious processes. When you interview top reps, they are actually the one interviewing you (that’s the first signal you hit the jackpot).
As mentioned earlier, hiring revenue reps requires assessing two core parameters:
- Skillset, performance over time, competencies, etc.
- Behavioral Fit – agility, can they adapt to a new work environment? Segment? Market? Are they coachable? Or led by ego?
To achieve the second goal, HR usually steps in and does their magic.
However, in my experience, I have seen many cases where hiring managers take upon themselves the first initial steps of headhunting and contacting candidates and involving HR at later stages.
WHERE THE MAGIC BEGINS
For that reason, I am sharing herein a few tips to help hiring managers and HR to identify preliminary signals of coachable & agile rep- basically, all you have to do is correlate between the following attributes:
- How many years of experience does he/she have (with relevance to the required role to fulfil) ? – for example, 7 years as an AE
- Did she/he move from one segment to another? I.e. SMB > ENT
- Did she/he remain within the same market? Or did they hop from one to another? If so, why?
- How did she/her perform in every role?
- Don’t forget to apply common sense, ask before making any decision
Consider this as an example:
- John Doe has dedicated himself over the last 10 years to excel in selling in the CRM space.
- John switched employers three times but the bottom line – he sold the same product (CRM) to the same persona in a familiar space.
- John has been a constant top performer
- John has been selling to corporate businesses, never did he experience selling to smaller type of businesses in his entire career
Now ask yourself (or the hiring manager):
- Is John a good fit for our business?
- What will it take for John to step into a new space? Segment?
- Have we set the right expectations with John and with the hiring manager?
- What will it take for us to onboard John?
- Will his onboarding journey and time to first deal fit our transactional selling and sales cycle?
- Is John a Lone Wolf or a coachable type of person?
There’s no right or wrong, the answer resides within your business goals, enablement and sales readiness.
One thing has to be ticked off as early as possible – Is John Doe capable of adapting to a completely new game plan?
WHERE, HOW AND WHAT CAN ENABLEMENT DO TO HELP?
Playbooks !
You’re already using GTM Playbooks, onboarding & ongoing Playbooks, why not using a playbook prior to hiring them?
A Hiring Playbook needs to include the following:
- Introduction to the role and responsibilities, alignment with market standards, etc. For example, surprisingly there is still confusion around the R&Rs of SDR and BDR, the smaller the business -the higher the chances of expanding one’s role beyond the traditional market standard.
- Job description broken down in a way it explains the core requirements in a language HR can understand
- Interview questions – how and when to ask specific questions beyond the traditional HR scope of work
- How to identify misfits based on career history and accomplished performance
HIRING IS SIMILAR TO PROSPECTING
If your hiring process lingers, you’re feeling you’re not getting quality candidates, they go dark on you (yes! this happens too)…this is very much similar to a prospecting funnel – check your messaging, ICP and HOW questions are being asked with your candidates. Revisit your playbooks.
The most important component of all – FEEDBACK. Put simply – touch base with the hiring team on a regular basis during the interview process, fine-tune your playbook and help them to sharpen their tools accordingly.
If you find this useful and think others can benefit from this article – please share it. Feedback is appreciated.
