Issue link: https://www.e-digitaleditions.com/i/447632
12 FEDA News & Views extensive interviewing process that exposes the finalists to a variety of issues and challenges. The easiest way to gain this insight is to make sure multiple people from your company (or team) individually interview each potential candidate before making your final selection. You also want to be sure and vary the tone and focus of each interview. Look at the insights you'll gain if a candidate has to demonstrate their persua- siveness and ability to handle pressure interviews that are rushed, hassled or outright challenging. Selling is not an easy job and any sales person hired will face chal- lenging and stressful sales calls working for you and your company. Wouldn't it be best to find out in a d v a n c e how they are likely to handle c h a l l e n g i n g situations before you make them a job offer? Mistake #3 You don't check resumes and back- grounds before making a job offer We're in a tough job market where candidates are fighting for the opportunity to interview… and be hired by solid companies such as yours. Today's hyper-competitive and aggressive market has caused a lot of other- wise honest candidates to exaggerate or to outright lie about their education, military experience or prior job time frames and responsibilities. Various studies have identified as many as three out of every All sales managers eventually wind up needing to invest time and effort interviewing, hiring and training new members of their sales team. How effective are your interviewing skills and efforts? The majority of sales managers don't interview and hire new salespeople on a regular basis so their inter- viewing skills tend to be weak or "underdevel- oped." Below are four common mistakes often made during the questioning phase. What can you do to avoid making these mistakes? Mistake #1 You do the majority of the talking How much time do you spend talking vs. listening when you're interviewing potential sales- people? As dumb as it sounds, the majority of sales man- agers tend to do most of the talking! Due to a lack of training on effective interviewing skills, they "wing it" and spend so much time "selling" the candidate on the benefits of working there, they have no time left to hear from the candidate. What can you do to ensure you do more lis- tening than talking the next time you interview someone? Mistake #2 You are the only one interviewing potential sales candidates The goal of your interviewing process is to learn as much as possible about poten- tial candidates as well as assess how they'll integrate and work within your selling culture. The best way to fully assess a candi- date's strengths as well as their weaknesses is to conduct an 12 FEDA News & Views before making your final selection. You also want to be sure and vary the tone and focus of each interview. Look at the insights you'll gain if a candidate has to demonstrate their persua- siveness and ability to handle pressure interviews that are rushed, hassled or outright challenging. Selling is not an easy job and any sales person hired will face chal- lenging and stressful sales calls working for you and your company. Wouldn't it be best to find out in a d v a n c e how they are likely to handle c h a l l e n g i n g situations before you make them a job offer? Mistake #3 You don't check resumes and back- resumes and back- resumes and back grounds before making a job offer We're in a tough job market where candidates are fighting for the opportunity to interview… and be hired by solid companies such as yours. Today's hyper-competitive and aggressive market has caused a lot of other- aggressive market has caused a lot of other- aggressive market has caused a lot of other wise honest candidates to exaggerate or to outright lie about their education, military experience or prior job time frames and responsibilities. Various studies have identified as many as three out of every and hire new salespeople on a regular basis so their inter viewing skills tend to be weak or "underdevel- oped." Below are four common mistakes often made during the questioning phase. What can you do to avoid making these mistakes? Mistake #1 You do the majority of the talking How much time do you spend talking vs. listening when you're interviewing potential sales- people? As dumb as it sounds, the majority of sales man- agers tend to do most of the talking! Due to a lack of training on effective interviewing skills, they "wing it" and spend so much time "selling" the candidate on the benefits of working there, they have no time left to hear from the candidate. What can you do to ensure you do more lis- tening than talking the next time you interview someone? Mistake #2 You are the only one interviewing potential sales candidates The goal of your interviewing process is to learn as much as possible about poten- tial candidates as well as assess how they'll integrate and work within your selling culture. The best way to fully assess a candi- date's strengths as well as their weaknesses is to conduct an Improve Your Team Hiring by Asking Stronger Interviewing Questions By Jim Pancero jim@pancero.com continued on page 14