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The Sales Evangelist

Christopher Croner, Donald Kelly, The Sales Evangelist,

Ever experienced hiring a bad salesperson? Or have you ever interviewed someone who turned out they were just faking the interview to land the job? 

Well, you need to be better in your hiring process when you’re applying and interviewing for companies. As well, hiring managers need to a better job as selecting better sales people too.

Today’s guest, Dr. Chris Croner, talks about his book, Never Hire a Bad Salesperson Again.

Here are the highlights of my conversation with Chris:

The Formula for Drive: Non-teachable Characteristics of High Performers

1.Need for achievement

The person wants to do well just for the sake of doing well. And the person who has a high need for this naturally wants to set the bar high, jump over that, and set the bar even higher the next time. They’re focused on producing excellence just for the sake of excellence.

2.Competitiveness

A competitive person wants to be the best among their peers and they want to win their customer over to their point of view. Psychologically, to them the sales is a contest.

3.Optimism

This is the person’s sense of certainty that they will succeed as well as their resiliency to hang in there when they face the inevitable rejection they have to deal with.

Process to Improve the Hiring Process:

  • Resume review
  • Online assessment – The Drive Test through “forced choice” questions
  • Behavioral interview questions – the interviewee is asked about previous examples of behaviors they’ve engaged in that are predictive of the types of characteristics they’re looking for.
  • Core skills (Confidence, Persuasion, Relationship Skills, Organizational Skills) – these are teachable

Tips During Interview:

Have your game plan ready.

Have your questions written out. Have your interview guide written out.

Mistakes when hiring people:

Not having a structured format to the interview process.

Hiring people who are just like you.

Common blind spots:

Find out whether or not the past success was related to brand recognition or was it really because of their own effort? This is a very important distinction many companies will miss.

Sample Interview Questions:

Need for achievement:

  • What is your greatest goal ever accomplished professionally and how do you intend to top it?
  • What are the sacrifices you had to make to be successful?

Competitiveness:

  • What does competition look like for you?
  • Where do you rank compared to your peers?

Optimism

Tell me about the time you remained persistent even though everyone else around you gave up. Tell me about it another time.

Who can benefit from The Drive Test

  • For “hunter” sales positions
  • This test uses a question format designed to eliminate faking, which is one of the greatest problems with sales assessments.
  • The test not only goes for the “drive” but also for the core skills.
  • You also get a developmental report which includes . pages of things you can do to mentor or motivate that person given their unique psychological profile.
  • This is helpful not only for onboarding but also for ongoing development.

What great salespersons do on a day to day basis:

Constant ongoing development

Chris’ Major Takeaway:

When hiring for a hunter, look for that non-teachable drive piece!

Episode Resources:

Get a free trial of The Drive Test

Check out the TSE Hustler’s League.

Tired of PowerPoint decks? Use Prezi Business and your presentations will never be the same.

About the Author The Sales Evangelist

Donald is the host of the popular sales podcast,"The Sales Evangelist". He is the founder of The Sales Evangelist Consulting Firm where he helps small companies develop killer sales process to scale their business and increase growth.

Donald is also an award-winning speaker, sales trainer, and coach. He's a big fan of traveling, South Florida staycations and high-quality family time. Donald has a belief that “anyone” can sell if they have the desire and receives the proper training.

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