Selecting Good Sales People

The same mistakes are continually being made when judging sales people. The main issue is to ensure that you do not allow your personal feelings for, or against, any of the salespeople to cloud your judgement. This is an issue that people attending management training courses want to improve. Try to avoid falling into any of these categories when deciding on the best candidate.

The Halo Effect:

People who form their whole opinion of someone else on the basis of one (usually striking) characteristic. You may conclude that somebody who appears attractive therefore must also be intelligent, outgoing and successful, this could mean you are falling into the halo trap.

Prejudice:

If people have sympathetic feelings for or have antipathy for somebody quickly. Factors which influence your judgement are things like clothing, hairstyle, eye contact, way of speaking, handshake and gestures. Lots of people conclude from the fact that someone has long hair, for example, that they are, therefore, unreliable.

Centrist Tendencies:

People who tend to shy away from extremes. This is a phenomenon with which many teachers, who neither award very good or very bad marks, are familiar. Assessments are near the middle and are scattered. You can avoid this mistake in two ways: 1. Choose a broad assessment scale with six or eight categories. 2. Proceed with the evaluation on the premise of what the sales person's work should be.

Both excessive expectations and fear of a negative classification lead to false judgements.

Being too strict:

Many people are too critical in their assessment of others' behaviour. For example, a sales manager who places a great deal of emphasis on polite, reserved manners, judges a client's acceptance of a casual, unconventional sales representative in a worse light than is objectively the case. Sales managers attending management training courses have often admitted they are overly strict when they expect excessive requirements from their sales people.

Being too lenient:

Many sales managers shy away from giving sales representatives a negative classification. The sales managers who make this mistake are those who are unsure of their own judgement or who fear that they will not be able to justify their judgement in an interview with the applicant.

The contact mistake:

Liking engenders contact - contact engenders liking. This is one of the social psychological principles. A sales person appears more likeable if the manager feels emotionally attached to that person. This closeness initially comes about through frequent contact. Do not, therefore, give too much of your time to any one sales representative. Do not exceed the set interview time of 30 to 40 minutes per sales representative.

Short-termism:

Your most recent perceptions and impressions are those which are utmost in your mind and are judged more important than previous impressions. One way of eliminating short-termism is to make a note of all the observations you make and impressions you gain during the course of the interview and refer back when you have the opportunity to examine them more objectively. In order to develop skills to assess employees, you can attend a management training programme.


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Richard Stone (richard.stone@spearhead-training.co.uk) is a Director for Spearhead Training Limited that provides management training courses aimed to improve business performance. You can view more techniques to motivate a sales force at =>
http://www.spearhead-training.co.uk/FreeTrainingMaterials/articles-section.php