The Hire Sense
A business blog dedicated to all topics pertaining to successful sales recruiting, hiring, managing and retaining in today's evolving market.
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Impulse Drive
No, I’m not talking about Star Trek but rather a common drive amongst leaders that can get them in trouble. I’ve seen this drive recently in a couple of different business-owning customers. My definition of it is a fast-acting, emotionally-driven decision. I think there is some value to it especially in the early, entrepreneurial stages of a company. Start-ups certainly need to be nimble to compete against larger, established competitors with deeper pockets. However, the impulse drive... |
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Take This Job And
shove it…apparently. The Herman Trend offers up some stats that may catch you by surprise (emphasis mine): It is interesting to note that in the United States more people quit their jobs in the last three months than those who lost their jobs. After 15 straight months of time in which layoffs exceeded voluntary departures, it appears that the job market is finally shifting. … In a related development, one-quarter of our business community’s most promising employees are increasingly... |
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Social Skills vs. Sales Skills
If you’re talking you’re not selling. That is an old axiom I learned early in my sales career and it is always true. Talking does not equal selling. Unfortunately, people not experienced in sales hiring often have the opposite view. Their stereotypical belief is that the best salespeople are the ones who are perceived to be the best talkers. This misguided view often leads to bad hires. Here is where the mistake occurs – hiring managers assume that social skills are equivalent to... |
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Fundamental Attribution Error
Warning – psychology babble coming your way from Fast Company. I encounter this effect often with clients: That judgment is what’s called, in psychology, the Fundamental Attribution Error. Meaning that we tend to attribute people’s behavior to their core character rather than to their situation. So when somebody cuts you off in traffic, you think, “What a jerk!” You don’t think, “I wonder situation he’s in that’s causing him to drive so crazy.” Even though in those times... |
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Employment Still Lagging
The latest employment numbers are out and it doesn’t look good (emphasis mine). US employers added 430,000 jobs to nonfarm payrolls in May, but 411,000 of those were temporary census workers. That number was also well short of the more than 500,000 economists had expected. The unemployment rate, however, fell to 9.7 percent from 9.9 percent in April. I still don’t expect to see significant hiring gains until Q4 of this year at the earliest. My highly non-scientific polling (talking to customers)... |
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Hiring Stunts
Here is a quick read from Yahoo Hot Jobs about desperate hiring moves from candidates. The examples are entertaining – I suggest you read the article to see the different extremes some candidates will go to for a job. My favorite line from the article (emphasis mine): Career coach Bettina Seidman advises sending little “extras” when they are relevant to the job: “If a graphic designer sends a fabulous storyboard or another example of his or her work along with a resume, then... |
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Getting Back To The Basics
I’ve been assessing many existing salespeople over the past couple weeks and have seen many different levels of abilities. The ones that stick in my mind are the salespeople who are presently struggling with their revenue production. Sales is one of, if not the most stressful positions within any company. The overt issue with a lack of sales performance is that everyone in the company can see it. The numbers are very visible. One underperforming salesperson I talked to recently has hit... |
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Sales Departure Time
I do think there is an impending, colossal jump of sales talent in the very near future. The Herman Trend Alert speaks to this potential in their latest report: According to a new CareerBuilder survey, more than one-quarter (28 percent) of sales employers are concerned about losing their high performing workers in the second quarter, while more than one-third (35 percent) of sales workers said it is likely they will start looking for a new job when the economy picks up. And here is why: Increased... |