|
Susan Talent was hired away from a well-known Fortune 500
company. Her new
employer just acquired a new line of products and hiring
someone with Susan’s experience made a lot of sense.
After several months on the job, sales targets were missed
and it was apparent that forecasts would need to be
adjusted. Now
nearly two years later, it is the same old-same old.
Her manager, the Vice-President of Sales, is holding new
information that clearly demonstrates possible reasons why
Susan is not performing.
And based on this information it is clear that the
personal changes that she will be asked to make may extract a
physical and emotional toll on her. In fact, the physical
stress from already trying to fulfill what is expected and
what she can deliver is already noticeable.
In her former position, she sold the number one brand in
the industry. The
brand is a household name. Her new position
required her to break into new markets, gain market share,
without giving away the store to make the sale.
In her former position getting appointments with senior
level decision makers was easy. In her new position,
the only way to get their attention was
wining-dining-and-golfing them. Unfortunately, travel and
entertainment budgets were slashed and getting appointments
and fighting through voice mail had to be done the
old-fashioned way – call, call and call again.
At her former company, training was a high priority. The company had a
proven sales method and expected their salespeople to follow
it. At her new
company, there was no single sales process and Susan was
expected to customize each presentation to the needs of the
client. Susan was
uncomfortable improvising and had to be prepared before she’d
make any sales call or presentation
Her biggest challenge however came with prospecting and
closing the sale.
With her number-one-brand former employer, she
represented the name everyone wanted on his or her
shelves. With her
new company, prospects needed to be convinced that her new
brand would move off the shelves quicker and give better
margins.
With a number-one product, sales is more about managing the
account and keeping the customer happy. Opening new accounts
and breaking into new markets for her new company is about
getting appointments, asking for the order, negotiating the
sale (as opposed to making the sale but giving up all the
profits), and closing it.
Susan struggles miserably with the three areas of the sales
process that might involve confrontation or taking a “no” –
prospecting, negotiating and closing. And that is why Susan
is not meeting her or her company’s expectations. Think about
it. Her manager
certainly is. If
he knew then what he knows now, would the company have made
the decision to recruit and hire Susan? He doubts it.
So the next obvious questions come up. Susan is here now
and management would prefer to retain her.
-
But a better question is how long will Susan do it? And
that answer is based on case study after case study about
behaviors of effective and ineffective sales people in all
kinds of markets. Susan will likely revert back to her
natural tendencies as soon as she makes a few sales or burns
out and leaves the company, whichever comes first.
Certain personality traits and behavioral tendencies impact
the performance of people in specific jobs – sales,
management, front-line, professional. That’s a fact. So how can a manager use the
information from an assessment that clearly indicates a job
mis-match.
Assessments
like Managing for Success™ and TotalView™ Assessment Systems
offer much more than advice on hiring.
They include recommendations for managers
on how to motivate, manage, and coach an individual
and guide the employee through a Personal
Development or Action Plan to close any performance
gaps or to prepare for succession into a new
position.
To learn more about what assessments identify the behavioral
tendencies and personality traits of highly
effective salespeople and managers, click here.
Related Articles and Stories
Pre-cruitment Pre-sells Top
Job Prospect Business 2 Business - August
2002
Labor Storm Alert - August 2002
Test
for the Difference Between Average and Great
Performers - February 2002
Past Issues of The TotalView
Isn’t testing employees considered risky in
today’s litigious environment?
To the contrary. In fact, according to the Uniform
Guidelines on Employee Selection Procedures, any inventory or
procedure utilized during an employment decision is considered
a test. Much to the surprise of many managers, including human
resource professionals, the interview must meet the same
validity and reliability standards as personality tests,
ability tests, and even background checks and resume
evaluations.
Many managers, however, continue to
question the validity and reliability of testing and to trust
their gut and experience when it comes to selecting, coaching,
training and disciplining employees.
You have to worry about whether the results
from your gut and experience are reliable and consistent
whenever you use humans as a part of any evaluation
process. People
are notorious for their inconsistency. We all have different
interpretations of the same experiences. We are easily
distracted. We
get tired of doing repetitive tasks. We daydream. We
misinterpret. We
are interrupted. We each have our own unique viewpoints.
That
is why successful placement only occurs one out of seven times
when using the interview alone, while those organizations that
use appropriate behavioral, interests and personality test can
increase the chance of a successful placement to as high as
three out of four.
CriteriaOne is the Whole Person Approach
blueprint that is helping organizations to
acquire an unfair share of the best talent
in the labor market. The next Level
1 training workshop is scheduled for August
22-23, 2002. Learn when and how
to use first through sixth generation assessments.
For more information about CriteriaOne, see
below or click here.
Success Performance Solutions
works with businesses from the small employer
to the Fortune 500 and provides convenient,
cost-effective solutions that quickly and
effortlessly sifts out unqualified candidates
and matches, manages and motivates employees.
For
more information, click here. | 
