Are you hiring sales underdogs?

Maybe you went to one extreme of salespeople hiring strategies – where your goal was to hire for experience, those who have the natural and developed skills that will help your company generate a lot of revenue.

But then you found that what comes with that experience is typically a narrow, fixed mindset. A “I don’t need your script, process, system, coaching – I know how to sell, so just let me sell” attitude and response to leadership.

Swinging the Hiring Pendulum

So you go to the other end of the scale – “let’s hire people with very little sales experience and train, coach, and raise them the way we want them to be as a salesperson for us.”

But that doesn’t seem to be getting you the results you wanted either.

What is missing? What is the right focus for hiring and training?

Well when you hire the sales underdogs – those people who aren’t coming to as a sales killer, then you have to keep one very key item in mind…there is a good chance they don’t like sales.

Why Sales Underdogs Might Not Like Sales

Yes – I know, they applied for and got hired for a sales job. Their goal is most likely (and hopefully!) to make more money than just a base pay/salary.

So why wouldn’t they like sales?

Check out this article [LINK] – it will explain it.

It’s also important to check out the leadership blog from this week about how to help any of the reps who are in this category [https://go.sellingeffectiveness.com/LI.12.17.PM].

What To Do From a Hiring Standpoint

In this article I want to share what to do from a hiring standpoint.

The key would be in the job post as well as the interview process.

What message are you sending out into the world to attract the kind of people you want? Both in the experience category as well as mindset?

What questions are you asking to help identify the best fit for a candidate?

Most likely what you are looking for is someone who cares about people, wants to help people buy the right things, and will be motivated and driven to make that happen.

You don’t want Order Takers, so you have to be careful to ask the right questions in the right ways to identify any deep-seated sales “trauma” that will get in their way as a salesperson.

You are looking for a gem in the ground, covered in dirt…that just needs the right attention, focus, and support to help become the amazing salesperson that the world is really looking for.

Conclusion

As a self-labeled life-long underdog, I am always in support of helping the underdogs win their game. In sales, I think this group – as long as they have the open, curious mindset that will facilitate growth – makes for great salespeople who will be both effective and compliant with your requests and needs as a business.

Just make sure that you are giving them the right training, coaching, and leadership and that you don’t give up on them and try to swing the pendulum too far the other way back to experienced, hard to manage salespeople.