Good gravy. I swear. I think I am just getting sick of posting jobs. All jobs. Do you as a hiring manager feel this way? Do you wonder what in the world even prompted candidates to apply for your job? I often times sit back and just laugh. I mean, do the candidates really feel like they can do the job? Do they have the skills to do the job?
No, they don’t have the skills. Yes, they do believe they can do the job.
Some applicants are great. Most applications, however, are really poor. So, where do you get the right salespeople for the job? You need them yesterday, right? You aren’t going to hit your goals and numbers without them, right?
If recruiting were an easy job everyone would do it for a living. It isn’t easy. Recruiting is a highly skilled job. I know a lot of applicants and job seekers will read this in addition to hiring managers, so I want to be cognizant of that fact.
A recruiter’s job is to find the best of the best. Our job is to sort through the mud and the muck and find the needle in the haystack. Finding a sales candidate has been documented as one of the toughest jobs to fill for organizations, yet it is the one role that nearly every organization needs to fill at some point in the year. A salesperson can determine success or failure of the company’s quarter or even year!
If applicants don’t provide the right candidate flow, where in the world would you find the right hire? Simply posting to your LinkedIn network will not drive the results, I promise. You see, Bulls Eye Recruiting wants to not only find the right candidates, but get them hired. Finding candidates is difficult enough, but bringing them across the finish line and on boarded to your organization is a completely different skill set. Once they are on boarded, you want candidates that will stay with your organization for a while.
The first thing you need to do when hiring sales people is find people who have had success. Success means longevity. Success means that they have over achieved quota. Success means they have gone to President’s club. Success does not mean you have changed a job after 18 months. If you have left a job after 18 months and gone to another job, you have failed. Not all applicants, but a majority of applicants have stints with jobs of 18 months or less.
Employers, you want someone with a proven track record. How does a recruiter find out if you are successful? We talk to everyone. We ask who the best in the industry is. We confirm with multiple sources. We scour the internet and read about everything you have ever done. We talk to the competitors. We ask the hiring managers what their dream candidate would look like and go find them. We look for people with swagger. We do much more than look at a LinkedIn profile. Some sales people haven’t updated their LinkedIn profile in years because they haven’t needed to do so.
Once we identify who the right people are we need to talk to fill the role, we are relentless. Recruiters need a story to tell. They need to understand why you came to work at XYZ Company. Sales people want to be sold. Why would John Doe come work at your organization when they are highly successful and well compensated in their current role? THAT is the art. THAT is why recruiting is difficult. THAT is why you need a good recruiter to help you fill the role.
You see, you don’t want the applicant. I hired 20 sales people last year and all of them were highly successful. Only one of them came from an applicant. That person is no longer with the company. It can happen, but it is highly unlikely.