1. Part IV SALES FORCE COMPETENCIES
Chapter 7:
Recruiting and Selecting Sales Personnel

2. Recruiting and Selecting Sales Personnel:

3. Learning Objectives: Discuss how to plan for recruiting and selection.
Identify relevant hiring criteria for sales jobs.
Identify the different sources of recruits.
Understanding the selection and validation process.

4. Chapter Outline: Planning Process. Recruiting. Selecting Prospects.
Validating the Hiring Process.

5. Chapter 7: Outline Recruitment And Selection Planning Recruit
Candidates
Select
Prospects
Validating
the Process

6. Planning Process: Personnel Needs. Company Culture. Job Analysis.
Job Qualifications.
Legality of Job Qualifications.

7. Personnel Needs: Sales growth targets. Distributions strategies.
Changes in sales force organization.
Sales force turnover.

8. Company Culture:
Develop a hiring process related to core company culture.

9. Job Analysis:
What is Job Analysis.
Job Description.

10. Job Qualifications: What is Job Qualifications. Buyer’s perspective.
Sales versus Technical skills.

11. Legality of Job Qualifications:
Employment discrimination.
Discrimination against qualified individuals with disabilities.

12. Recruiting: Classified Ads Present Employees
Reaches wide audience (trade publications may narrow the reach)
Used if high turnover
Tend to over-produce under-qualified candidates
Present Employees
Familiar w/ company products & procedures
Established job histories
Sales as a promotion
Over-rely on previous experience 3

13. Recruiting: Referrals/Networking Employment Agencies
Company executives understand needs, culture and potential fit for sales responsibilities
Employment Agencies
best if company pays
Schools & Colleges
Poised & easily trained
Lack experience & become bored
Customers, Suppliers & Competition
Good if need w/out much training
Legal & ethical issues
Common: insurance, stock broker, office equipment, clothing 4

14. Selecting Prospects: A Model for selecting sales people.
The selection process.

15. Figure 7-3: A Model for Selecting Salespeople
Direct recruit to control
location or phone number
Hiring
criteria
for
sales
jobs
used to
guide
selection
process
Complete application
blanks
Conduct screening
interviews
Check credit and
background
Complete psychological
and achievement tests
Secondary interviews
Make offer for sales
position
Physical exam
Modify hiring
criteria, tests or
Interview procedures
Measure subsequent
success on the job
Reject
Figure 7-3: A Model for Selecting Salespeople

16. The selection process:
Application Forms.
Personal Interviews.
Follow up.
Testing.
Physical Examination.

17. Application Forms: Why application forms.
What information does it have.

18. Personal Interviews: Primarily interview. The Main interview.
Patterned Interviews.
Semi-structured Interviews.
Field Observation.

19. Follow Up:
Background Check.
Credit Check.

20. Testing:
Intelligent Tests.
Personality Tests.
Aptitude Tests.

21. Physical Examination:
Why it is done?
Medical Examination?

22. Validating the Hiring Process:
Validating the relationship between the selection criteria used by the firm and job success.

23. RESUME ANALYSIS Account for all dates.
Examine the number of jobs and length of time spent on each job.
Reasons for leaving job.
Is there a pattern of growth?

24. QUESTIONS ABOUT INTERVIEWERS
What Research Shows
Does extensive interviewing experience help an interviewer to make better judgments?
Does pressure to recruit impair the judgment of experienced interviewers less than inexperienced interviewers?
When interviewing multiple recruits, do interviewers tend to use previous applicants as the standard of comparison for subsequent applicants?
Will the positive effects of good appearance offset an unfavorably rated personal history for a recruit?

25. QUESTIONS ABOUT INTERVIEWERS
What Research Shows
How much of the factual information presented in an interview will the interviewer remember immediately after a short interview if no notes are taken?
How will lack of notes and factual recall affect the interviewer’s rating of the recruits interviewed?
How reliably can a group of interviewers rate a recruit’s qualifications for a job?
How reliably can a group of interviewers rate future job performance by a recruit?

26. COMMON INTERVIEWER MISTAKES
Failure to establish rapport
Lack of plan
Insufficient time
Not listening
Personal bias
Questions
First impressions

27. TYPICAL INTERVIEW QUESTIONS
What is interviewer trying to determine?
What was the most monotonous job you ever had to do?
What are your values and general orientation in life?
How creative were you in eliminating boredom? 8

28. TYPICAL INTERVIEW QUESTIONS
In thinking about people you like, what is it you most like about them?
Reflects what person is and desires to become
Up to this point in your life, what do you consider to be your biggest disappointment?
Have you done anything? -- more active = more disappointments
How willing are you to relocate? To what extent are you willing to travel?
Motivation in wanting job -- involves travel 9

29. TYPICAL INTERVIEW QUESTIONS
5. How do you feel about the way your previous employer treated you?
How you react to supervision & organizational cultures
6. What are your long-term financial objectives and how do you intend to achieve them?
Are you realistic & mature?
Will this company enable you to achieve these goals?
7. What was the most difficult decision you ever had to make as a leader?
Were the leadership positions in your resume demanding or ceremonial in nature?
What is your leadership style & philosophy? 10

30. TYPICAL INTERVIEW QUESTIONS
8. Why should we hire you?
How badly do you want the job?
What do you think of yourself?
Do you believe in yourself?
9. Sell me this pen.
Do you really know how to make a sales presentation?
Did you mention the main product benefits?
Did you ask for the order? 11

31. ASKING THE RIGHT QUESTIONS
About two weeks after starting a new job, doubts creep into your mind. The gap between what you were told and what’s actually happening gets wider by the day. When you’re on the job for three weeks, you say to yourself, “I think I made a mistake.” One way to avoid making a costly mistake like this is to ask the right questions when interviewing. What questions would you ask when applying for a field sales position to avoid accepting the wrong job?

32. ASKING THE RIGHT QUESTIONS
1. May I look at your resume?
2. Where will I get my leads?
3. May I review your sales literature?
4. When are your slow times?
5. May I go with you on a sales call?
6. May I visit your marketing department? 12

33. PREVIOUS EMPLOYER REFERENCE CHECK QUESTIONS
Dates of Employment?
What was the Job?
What type of selling was involved?
How did the applicant get along with his/her manager? Customers? Fellow salespeople?
How did his/her job performance compare others?
Applicants strongest points? Weaknesses we should help him/her overcome?
Why did s/he leave your company?
Would you rehire the applicant? Why? 13

34. WHAT MAKES A SUPER SALESPERSON?
Personal Computer
Manufacturer
Photographic Equipment Manufacturer
Threshold Competencies
Communication
Decisiveness
*Information Collection
Personal Sensitivity
*Organizational Awareness
*Relationship-building
Technical knowledge
Systematic thinking
Differentiator Competencies
Concern for personal impact
*Focused achievement
Interpersonal diagnosis
Initiative
Job commitment
*Organizational awareness
Persistence
Personal time-planning
Presentation skills
Quick thinking
Stress tolerance
Targeted persuasion
*Use of influence strategies
* These traits were found in salespeople at both companies.

35. Table 7-5 Typical Interview Questions
Why should we hire you?
Regardless of the company and type of sales position for which you may interview, there are some interview questions that are typically asked. You may not be asked each of these questions in every interview, but you should be prepared to answer them all. After reading each question, think about what the interviewer’s purpose may be in asking the question. What is he or she trying to determine? What should your response be to each question?

36. Table 7-5 Typical Interview Questions
Why should we hire you?
What was the most monotonous job you ever had to do?
In thinking about the people you like, what is it you like most about them?
Up to this point in your life, what do you consider to be your biggest disappointment?
How willing are you to relocate? To what extent are you willing to travel?
How do you feel about the way your previous employer treated you?
What are your long-term financial objectives, and how do you propose to achieve them?
What was the most difficult decision you ever had to make as a leader?
Sell me this pen.

37. JOB DESCRIPTION FACTORS
Selling Requirements
New vs. established account selling
Selling through distributors
Entertaining customers
Level of buying authority
Physical activity required
Technical knowledge
Relocation
Written proposals
Individual vs. team selling
One time vs. systems selling
Type of prospects/customers
One-on-one vs. group selling
Travel: how much & what kind
Program or concept selling
Nonselling Tasks
Reports to management
Customer service and training
Sales promotion
Educational seminars
Collecting receivables
Marketing plans
Degree of Responsibility
Negotiations of pricing
Travel and entertainment
Career Paths
Compensation plan
Promotion timing
Earnings potential
Promotion leaders
Performance Expectations
Activity level requirements
Minimum sales volume or profits