Tool Box
Issue No. 41 - June/July 2008
Don’t hire without the three Cs
by Craig Stubing
Recently a business owner asked me the question, ‘What should I look for in an applicant when I’m hiring a new salesperson? I want good people, not duds’.
This was not the first time I had been asked a question like this. In answering the question I told the business owner about my three C’s for sales success.
To explain: over time I have come to the view that a candidate with the three C’s has a good chance of success; a candidate without the three C’s ¬- and I mean, all of them - has no chance.
To go one step further; over the long haul, all the patter and presentation in the world will not compensate for the lack of any of these attributes. Their presence, however, will make up for a lot of shortcomings in
other areas.
My three C’s are Coachability, Courage and Commitment to success in selling.
Let’s consider them in more detail.
Coachability
It is essential that salespeople be provided with a system and some team rules. Coachability, therefore, is about willingness to learn, to follow the system and to play by the team rules.
A candidate who is prepared to do this has potential; a candidate who isn’t will disappoint eventually.
One of the downsides of hiring experienced salespeople is that they often come with bad habits and resist change. The key here is to recognise that likelihood and to make it clear during the recruiting process that you have a system and you want it adhered to.
The analogy might be: ‘If you want to work in my restaurant, you cook the burgers my way’.
Courage
This is about the right sort of courage. It is one thing to not feel fear; it is another to feel fear and master it. The right sort of courage is the sort that enables us to feel the fear but go on anyway.
It is perfectly natural for a salesperson to feel fear during the sales process. The challenge is in how the salesperson deals with the feeling of fear....
