In Part 1 and Part 2, we discussed why hiring salespeople is so difficult, and what to look for when reviewing a sales resume. Here, I’ll share with you the “rubber meeting the road” part of the process - the interview.
Sales interviews are a challenge to run if you’re not sure what to ask. That’s why I recommend coming armed with [...]
“How do I get better at hiring?” That’s the question I’m most often asked. Here are five suggestions that will dramatically improve your hiring skills:
Practice! Do more interviews. Interviewing is a skill, and the only proven way to improve a skill is through practice, practice, and more practice. Don’t expect to make a quantum leap in your hiring [...]
It’s a widely accepted maxim of the business world: Great companies begin with great people. When you have the benefit of top-shelf talent at all levels of your organization, then the possibilities are limitless. There’s just one small problem - great people don’t just show up in your lobby, ready to get the job done. You have [...]
You’ve just completed an exhaustive interview process with your candidate - a telephone screen, two personal interviews, reference checks, and the 30-60-90 day plan. You talked to the candidate on Friday, and they verbally accepted the position. “That all sounds great,” they said after hearing your verbal offer, “I look forward to reviewing your offer over the [...]
I think I’ve finally found a “foolproof” way to size up a potential employee. Matter of fact, I think this is a sure-fire way to size up just about anyone. Several leading business thinkers have written on this topic, including the great Jim Collins - so I’m in no way claiming ownership of this process [...]
The final step in the selection process has finally arrived. After conducting your final round of in-person interview and scoring the results, you either have a clear front-runner candidate for the position, or have ruled out all candidates for the role and are beginning your search again from scratch. When you have a clear front-runner, [...]
Now that we’ve talked about preparing for the in-person round of candidate interviews, let’s take a look at the actual interview script, and a a subset of the questions contained within. In this post, I’ll walk you through the high-level topical questions that you’ll want to ask a candidate on an in-person interview. These questions should be [...]
The first interview is all about the candidate’s job history. The second interview is where we attempt to poke around inside the candidate’s head and find out what makes them tick.
After completing the first round by interviewing a minimum of 3-5 candidates, you’re in a position to carry forward the best 2-3 candidates for the 2nd and final round. [...]
In a previous post, I’ve discussed that the goal of the phone interview is to make a go/no-go decision on your candidate. It’s not to decide whether or not to hire them, no matter how tempting that approach may be. Here we’ll discuss the next step in the process - the face-to-face interview.
The goal of a face-to-face [...]