I'm helping a company hire and ramp up a bunch of new sales reps, and asked the VP of Sales if I could talk to his best rep to gain a better understanding of how he or she works. He told me that he fired his best rep a few weeks ago. I was shocked. "Why the hell d'ya fire your best rep?"
To make a long story short, last year the company launched a couple new products that are now the main focus for the company, and they're quickly retiring their legacy products that are very expensive to service and support. This rep was really good at selling one of the legacy products, and despite changes to the comp plan and strict orders from management, he just kept selling that old product.
Needless to say, we need to take this into account in the profile for hiring new salespeople. When I asked the VP for the key requirements for the new hires, he gave me the traditional baseline requirements...someone who's sold this type of product, for a company like A, B, or C, who's got a track record of exceeding quota.
So I pushed him on the importance of finding sales candidates who are a strong fit for the sales culture he's trying to create. But how do you assess cultural fit from a paper resume? You can't. So what are we doing? We're having candidates create short videos of their responses to three key questions, one of which is "What is an ideal sales environment for you to work in, and why?" It's amazing how quickly this allows you to weed out the people who wouldn't last long in your sales organization, and focus your live interviews on the right candidates.
