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Stop Hiring Poor Performers
February 25, 2008
An HR blueprint for snaring sales superstars
By Keith Winfree
Ronald Reagan once said, "Surround yourself with the best people you can find, delegate authority and don't interfere as long as the policy you've decided upon is being carried out."
Most businesses would agree with those words, recognizing that companies with the most talented salespeople, administrators and support personnel will have the most income, the best working environment and the most satisfied customers.
Unfortunately, while all sales managers are aware of the need to hire quality workers, many consistently end up hiring second-rate employees. And needless to say, in an area that's as crucial to your bottom line as sales, continuously hiring poor performers can only lead to disaster.
For the busy sales manager, delegating the hiring of salespeople to the human resources department can be a valuable timesaver—so long as the HR director is properly educated on what to look for in a candidate. Hiring top sales performers is not the same as hiring employees in IT, management or even marketing, so be sure to give the HR team the input they need to identify the proper candidates.
When evaluating which people will become tomorrow's top sales performers, there are six major steps every HR director should be following:
1. Defining the culture of the company.
2. Establishing detailed job descriptions.
3. Creating an employment behavioral contract.
4. Developing a screening process.
5. Developing an interview process.
6. Testing and verifying the prospect's skill sets.
With these six steps in place, HR directors will have established standards with which they can determine the quality of potential employees. Consequently, they will have a higher percentage of qualified employees who fit the culture of their company.
The first step to effective recruiting and hiring is developing a cultural statement. The culture of a company is defined from the top down. Therefore, the company's cultural statement should be based upon management's values, goals, needs and expectations.
A cultural statement provides all current employees with a foundation of what is expected of them and of the type of environment in which they are working. Expectations should be specified for the following areas: Conduct, work ethic, client/team member interaction, accountability to management and management's responsibilities to/support of the employee. Equally important, a cultural statement provides a prospective hire with insight into the expectations of his potential position.
The second step is writing detailed job descriptions. In order to evaluate and hire someone who's the right "fit" for a position within a company, the HR director must be able to identify the core components of the position and see if those components match the skill sets of the potential employee. "Key performance factors" is another name for the tasks, skill sets and functions that a position requires of an employee, which enables him to be successful in achieving the mutual goals of both the company and the employee. Identifying key performance factors and then using them as the base criteria to examine a prospective hire's capabilities to fit the position helps eliminate wasted time, effort and financial drain.
The third step in effective recruiting and hiring requires HR directors to create an employment behavioral contract. This combines the mission, culture and job description requirements that need to be met if the sales representative will be successful within the organization. The employment behavioral contract also outlines mutual responsibilities of both the employer and the employee, and it defines the activities, behaviors and production requirements necessary for success. As such, the behavioral contract further defines the mutual expectations of the company and the employee. It also provides a form of reference in sales management and reduces financial exposure and risk if the hire does not perform as expected.
The fourth step is the screening process. There are a number of different areas that need to be tested in order to determine if a salesperson is the right fit for a company. "Spirit testing" focuses on one of the most important attributes of a successful sales representative: attitude. A successful salesperson takes full responsibility for his actions and results, whether those actions and results are positive or negative. A sales position is a series of roles with activities attached. It is those activities that need to be examined and changed if the planned results are to be achieved. Instead of making excuses, a good salesperson will review and examine his role in the decline of profitability, and then adapt accordingly.
Inseparably connected to a salesperson's attitude are his core values. Consequently, it is important to test these to ensure they will sustain the salesperson when his attitude is assaulted by the pressures and negativity inherent to selling. HR should also test a salesperson's ability to sell. An experienced salesperson should be able to effectively prospect, generate leads, qualify potential clients, present presentations and close sales. HR should require candidates to complete a DISC personality profile test, which helps determine if there is a natural fit between the candidate and the open position. Typically, the natural-born salesman will have a high DISC score in the "dominant" and "influencer" categories.
The fifth step of recruiting and hiring is the interview process. When establishing an interview process, HR directors must develop specific guidelines that will effectively detail and capture the important steps of an interview. In any interview process, there must first be initial contact, which is typically a screening call. After the initial screen, an e-mail should be sent, which will serve as a second screen because it will require the candidate to complete a bit of information that will help the business owner pre-qualify the candidate.
After sending an e-mail, the candidate will need to complete a DISC test, which usually takes two phone calls: The first call is for setting up the DISC test, and the second is for reviewing the results of the test and scheduling a face-to-face interview. The latter should last one to two hours, and will enable the HR director to discern the commitment level of the candidate.
After the initial face-to-face interview, the candidate must meet and (if appropriate) be interviewed by the following: the sales team, the administrator, the sales manager and the final decision-maker. Next, the HR director and the candidate must review the behavioral contract, affirm the joint match, close the agreement and set the agenda for the next meeting.
The last step of recruiting and hiring is "final testing." Before the final decision, the prospect will need to be tested to verify the accuracy of the candidate's claims and establish his ability to excel in the workplace. The final testing will model the selling process, requiring the candidate to role-play and answer questions about the sales process.
All parties involved must remember to be unemotionally involved in the hiring process. The pressures of production goals must not influence the six-step plan detailed herein. Searching for the right candidate should be a continuous and ongoing pursuit of new talent, because the creation of a "legendary" company is partially dependent upon having the ability to replace non-performers. Unfortunately, many companies only seek new talent after receiving notice that an employee is leaving. But the greatest cost to a business is not losing a key salesperson—it's a failure to continually hire successful salespeople.
Keith Winfree, PhD, CFE, CBI, is the president and founder of Winfree Systems, LLC. For more information, please visit www.winfree.org.
Sales & Marketing Management Magazine
This article is brought to you by Sales & Marketing Management, the leading authority for executives in the sales and marketing field.
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