Pre-employment tests plus other applicant evaluation methods help you select salesperson job applicants who will turn into highly productive, super-profitable sales reps. These applicant evaluation methods include pre-employment tests, intriguing bio-data, vague job interview questions, plus colorful role-plays. 1. Behavior or personality test 2. Mental abilities or intelligence-related test a. Interpersonal Skills – e.g., friendliness, assertiveness, and teamwork b. Personality Traits – e.g., poise under pressure, optimism, and action-orientation c. Motivations – e.g., if the sales applicant feels driven to earn incentive pay + learn – how to do your company’s sales job + think correctly – to solve problems encountered while selling your company’s products > favor job applicants who got same test scores as your company’s best sales reps > weed-out applicants whose test scores differed from your best sales reps’ scores > high scores on Friendliness > average scores on Assertiveness > average scores on Following Rules & Procedures > high scores on Poised Under Pressure > high scores on Optimism > Calm for inside sales reps – but Excitable for outside sales reps > high scores on Money Motivation > average scores on Intelligence or mental abilities Next time Method 2.
Hiring fantastic sales reps is crucial. As Henry Ford wisely observed, “Until someone sells something, no one else has a job.” A company with monstrously effective sales reps can grow and prosper. However, a company with wonderful products but lousy sales reps will wither away.
So, how can managers hire highly productive sales reps?
Here are four great methods you can start using immediately.
1st METHOD = PRE-EMPLOYMENT TESTS – CUSTOM-TAILORED FOR SALES REP HIRING
Use two pre-employment tests to evaluate sales rep applicants:
The behavior or personality test needs to forecast the applicant’s behavior in three key areas:
The mental abilities or intelligence tests forecast if the applicant has enough “brainpower” to
Importantly, before using personality and intelligence tests, you must conduct a benchmarking study. This custom-tailoring tells you specific test scores of your company’s best salespeople.
Then, when you test applicants, you quickly, easily and objectively can
Hundreds of pre-employment test benchmarking studies I have done – for many companies – often result
in this “benchmark” pattern of test scores gotten by the best, super-productive sales reps:
As such, pre-employment tests enable you to objectively – not subjectively – know if a sales rep applicant has crucial personality and intelligence qualities similar to your company’s best sales reps. That is the reason pre-employment tests tremendously help companies hire the best sales rep applicants.
Importantly, using pre-employment tests removes the tendency of managers to like applicants who con them through (a) charm in interviews or (b) semi-pseudo-relevant work histories. Pre-employment tests helps you avoid getting fooled again by a smooth talking sales applicant.
