Tag Archives: Hiring

How to Update Your Hiring Techniques to Attract Younger Sales Talent

The sales profession is changing, and unfortunately, it’s graying.  Statistics show that the average age of a professional salesperson now is 47.1 years old.  Fifteen years ago, that number was 42.  That means that our profession has aged five years in the last fifteen – and that’s unsustainable.  The sales profession needs new blood.

With millennials now making up the majority of the workforce and Gen Z close behind, you might need to evolve your hiring practices to continue attracting top young sales talent. The old way of hiring salespeople – putting out a basic job description and waiting for resumes to trickle in – just won’t cut it anymore for recruiting younger generations. I’ve seen this in working with my clients – and I’ve seen some new methods generate great results.  Sales managers need to take a more proactive and strategic approach to stand out and connect with qualified candidates. Here are five updated hiring techniques that have been shown to be successful in reaching younger sales professionals.

Showcase Your Company Culture:  “Culture” isn’t just a buzzword anymore. Today’s younger workforce values culture, flexibility, and purpose when job seeking. Showcase what makes your company culture, and your job opportunity, unique when recruiting. Highlight your culture on your careers page, company website, and job posts. Let candidates know if you offer benefits like remote work options (sales is well positioned for this in my opinion) and professional development programs– these attract young talent. Use images, videos, and employee spotlights so candidates can get a feel for your work environment. Culture can make or break whether you connect with younger applicants.  One key – whatever you do, it must be authentic.  Understand – even if you fake your culture, sites like Greendoor will very quickly let candidates know the truth.

Leverage Social Sourcing:  Younger generations live their lives online and on social media. You should incorporate social sourcing strategies into your hiring process to connect with talent where they already spend time. Strategically post job openings in relevant Facebook and LinkedIn groups in your industry. Share and engage with content from top performers and rising sales stars you’d like to recruit and connect with them. You can also identify passive candidates by searching profiles with relevant backgrounds or skills. Social recruiting allows you to grab the attention of talented individuals who aren’t actively job seeking.  This also means being innovative with respect to your recruiting message.  Don’t be afraid to step out of your lane and try things like a video job ad (keep it to 60 seconds or less) or memes (funny or serious).  Post not only to the “normal” mediums like LinkedIn and Facebook, but consider TikTok, YouTube Shorts, and Instagram.  Remember – you can’t hire them if they don’t know you are hiring.  Don’t be snobbish about the way you get your candidates.  Just get them.

Highlight Development Opportunities: Younger sales talent care about career growth and acquiring new skills. If your company lacks structured development programs, highlight other growth opportunities in your job posts and outreach.  Better yet, BUILD some structured development programs, starting with your 90 Day Onboarding program (you have one of those, right?). Mention if top performers have a chance to take on mentees, have access to skill-building resources, or can participate in stretch assignments. You want candidates to see that your company supports professional advancement so they envision future opportunities. Having one-on-one meetings with candidates to discuss career path trajectory is also powerful.

Showcase Tech Stack: Millennials and Gen-Z candidates expect companies to harness modern technologies and encourage innovation from employees. When recruiting, thoroughly describe your tech stack – like sales engagement platforms, LinkedIn integration, data analytics, and automation tools you leverage (and if you aren’t already, get comfortable with phrases like “tech stack”). Discuss how your sales team utilizes technology to enhance productivity. Today, you’d better be comfortable discussing AI as a sales tool. You want tech-savvy candidates to see you provide cutting-edge resources to drive results.  By the way – if you aren’t using tech to drive sales results, start doing it.  The sales profession isn’t going to be backtracking to a low-tech environment anytime soon.

Convey Company Mission & Impact: Younger people increasingly seek out purpose-driven work. When recruiting new team members, sales managers should communicate how their company mission makes a difference and highlight recent company impact metrics. For example, explain how your product or service tangibly helps customers.  If you have community involvement programs, those should be part of your messaging.  One fear I’ve heard is that sales managers are reluctant to get into politics with candidates.  That’s fine; you don’t need to.  Companies can be seen as positive without being seen as taking a particular political stance.

Respond Quickly:  Younger generations have been conditioned by social media to expect quick likes, comments, and attention.  If you want to succeed in hiring, get used to doing the same.  I used to recommend that managers collect resume’s for a week, then sort through, pick ones to call, and call.  Now the best practice is to receive a resume’, do a quick scan on it, and then call right then.  If your candidate doesn’t answer, you should also email and text.  You want the candidate to get that quick dopamine hit that comes with a quick response, and then give multiple ways to get back with you.

Never mistake this:  You are competing for talent in a highly competitive environment.  If some of the tactics above resemble ways that you’d compete for customers, that’s not an accident.  Compete for sales talent with the same intensity as you compete for customers, and you’ll have a great sales team.  And you’ll leave many of your competitors behind.

A Don Doesn’t Wear Shorts.

I loved the HBO show, The Sopranos.  I’m a bit of a Mafia aficionado; I’ve been fascinated with that culture ever since my grandmother (!) gave me a book by Jimmy “The Weasel” Fratianno to read when I was 16.  In an early episode of The Sopranos, James Gandolfini, playing Tony Soprano (the main character and the leader or “Don” of the Soprano mob) was hosting a barbecue in his back yard for other mobsters.  Tony manned the grill while wearing Bermuda shorts, and this prompted a visit the next week.

As Gandolfini told the story, at a shoot the next week on location in New Jersey, he was approached by a man that was obviously a real-deal mobster.  The man walked up to Gandolfini and said that he loved the show, “But Jimmy,” the man said, looking dead into James’ eyes, “Dons don’t wear shorts.”  Gandolfini took it to heart, and Tony Soprano never wore shorts again in a Mob gathering.  In fact, this became part of a Sopranos episode later when Tony was reproached by a boss for the shorts.  What the mobster meant, of course, is that when you have that kind of a leadership position, you can’t afford to look too casual to those that you are supposed to be leading.  It’s a lesson that’s often forgotten.

I thought about this recently when watching a Zoom sales meeting.  Zoom has been a great tool that has enhanced the capabilities of managers and sales reps alike – but it’s also, in my opinion, contributed to a loosening of standards that isn’t healthy for sales managers or salespeople.  In this meeting, the sales manager had 20 sales reps on the line, all were ready and able to hear what he had to say.

The problem was that the manager, attempting to be too cute by half, had employed one of those digital backgrounds on his screen.  Those backgrounds suck up bandwidth, so instead of being a clear communicator, his image was pixelating, his voice was cutting in and out, and he was virtually unwatchable.  In fact, the only clearly visible image was the background itself, and when the manager attempted to share his PowerPoint presentation on his screen, the entire screen locked up.  What ensued was ten minutes of the manager attempting to get rid of the background, then logging off, and finally being able to get back onto the meeting – by which point he had lost his audience, in attention of not reality.

The manager forgot that Dons don’t wear shorts.  He had important information to convey, but lost his chance to make it impactful because he was trying to take a too-cool, too-casual approach to the meeting.  How often have you seen this since last year?  I’ve experienced it myself, many times.  During a Hiring Assistance program, there was the guy who logged onto a Zoom job interview for a sales position (he was the applicant) in a T-shirt and ball cap, for example.

Video calling is here to stay.  I do not expect it to replace face-to-face selling (we human beings crave actual human contact), but the skills and technology will be part of our repertoire going forward, so we might as well do it right.  The key to remember is that Zoom is merely another way to communicate messages – and your message should be the star, not the tech!  Whether you’re a manager addressing your team, or a salesperson making a sales presentation, there are a few fundamental best practices you should employ:

  1. Forget the silly backgrounds. Yes, these platforms allow you to use a lot of cool backgrounds.  When you use one, in many cases, the background itself becomes the star and you’re just in the way – or worse, the background eats up your bandwidth.  Stick with a stationary background.  Even a blank wall is fine, or your office, or whatever.  If you want your company branding in it, make up a banner for a backdrop and use it, but the background should be a physical background and not an electronic one.
  2. Dress like a pro. Casualness is the enemy of persuasion; when you are presenting, you should look and dress the part.  Dress and prep the same as you would for a live meeting or sales call.
  3. Get the camera at eye level. Looking down at the screen makes you look amateurish – whether you’re using a phone or a laptop, position it so that you are looking directly into the camera lens while looking straight ahead.
  4. Look into the camera lens, not the screen. This is the hardest to master, but very important.  When you’re speaking, you should be looking at the camera lens – that means that you’re making eye contact with your recipient.  Peripheral vision is a wonderful thing; you can always see their movements and expressions out of the corner of your eye even when you’re looking at the lens.
  5. Get good sound. If they can’t hear you, they can’t buy from you.  Make sure that you have a good microphone setup, if your device doesn’t already have a good microphone.  Lavaliere or USB microphones are less than $100, which is a cheap investment.
  6. The best way to get good at anything is to practice, and presentations are no different.  Practice, practice, practice, until you know the tech, you know how to quickly share your screen without fumbling, and you are able to handle all other aspects of the technological platform you’re using.

Remember – you want your video presentation to be just as professional as, if not more so than, your live presentation.  Dons don’t wear shorts.  Be a Don.

Three Interview Questions You Must Ask Salespeople

In my career, I have interviewed thousands of salespeople.  Some interviews were great, some were good, and let’s be honest, some were really bad.  When you do that much of anything, you tend to get pretty good at it.  That’s how I developed these three interview questions.

I discovered a long time ago that some of the most important traits for salespeople could be discovered with three quick questions that opened the interview, and that’s what this video is all about.

I should not that I’m not talking about things like lateness (don’t EVER interview a salesperson who shows up late), improper dress, bad manners, etc.  Those things really go without saying.  But, there are deeper characteristics that you need to discover, and with three interview questions, you can find some of the most important ones.

One final note here.  It’s been said that how someone behaves on an interview is a reflection of how they will behave on a sales call.  NOPE.  It’s a reflection of the BEST CASE SCENARIO of how they will behave on a sales call.  And that’s where these three interview questions come in.

Oh, and if you’re hiring, you might want to watch this video about onboarding, as well.

How to Onboard Salespeople in 3 Steps

How to Onboard Salespeople in 3 Steps

Onboarding salespeople is one of those activities where “act in haste; repent in leisure” certainly applies.  There’s a big difference between “doing it” and “doing it right.” If you rush onboarding now to get them out in the field quickly, you’ll probably regret it later.  This also goes, by the way, for industry experience hires, as I explain in this video.

In this video, I explain how to build a 90-day, three-step process for successfully onboarding salespeople so that they succeed now and later.  Make no mistake – a great onboarding process results in more successful salespeople AND greater sales longevity.

Want my help? I can help you build a great onboarding program as part of one of my Hiring Assistance programs.

“Untrainable” is a Decision

Recently, I participated in a panel discussion at a convention where I heard the most amazing statement I’ve ever heard at one of these events.  A fellow panelist looked at the audience and said, “What you have to face is that 70% of your sales reps are incapable of growing your companies.  They’re untrainable, they’re gray, and they’re incapable of learning new technologies that will drive this business into the future.  23% are acceptable and 7% are elite.”

Wow.  My mind locked – as everyone else’s did – on that “untrainable” comment.  Asked to clarify, he explained that the industry in question had an aging sales force that was incapable of learning new technologies.  By this point, you might be expecting this comment to come from someone in his 20s or 30s, correct?  You’d be wrong.  I don’t know exactly how old the man was – I didn’t ask and he didn’t volunteer – but he couldn’t have been a day under 60, and therein lies a number of interesting points.

As much as I disliked what he said (and frankly, him), he wasn’t totally wrong.  I encounter people in the sales and sales management world every day who have picked a date where their learning and evolution simply stopped, and they won’t learn any more.  Put new technology in front of them, and they simply shake their heads in refusal.  They have an unshakable belief in their old people skills, and they think that’s enough.

I see the same thing in training sales techniques; many more seasoned salespeople simply refuse, during training, to even entertain the thought of learning new ideas, skills, or approaches.

I see it in managers who won’t update their hiring techniques and methods, even though hiring has experienced several sea changes in environments from regulatory to the technical tools we can bring to the table.

And yet…..

I see sales reps in their 60s who use LinkedIn more effectively than reps 40 years their junior.  They’re a whiz at CRM, know how to use it to enhance every sales call, and only gripe if for some reason they can’t pull up the customer’s most recent activity in the car, on their smartphone, before walking in.

I see sales reps in their 40s, 50s, and greater who can’t wait to learn new sales approaches and techniques so they can integrate them with the hard-earned skills of a long career.

I see senior managers who are constantly researching new ways of hiring, leading, and coaching their employees to better results.

When I was in my 20s, I used to hear about ‘age discrimination’ in the workplace and thought it was something imaginary.  After all, who wouldn’t want someone with a 20-year track record over someone newer to the workforce?  Now I know better.  I talk to salespeople, and managers, in their 40s and upward who have been pushed out by youth movements (which sometimes are cost reductions), and have difficulty being hired.

Here’s the problem that I have:  I don’t think, for a moment, that 70% of the sales reps in that industry, or any other industry, are untrainable (and I said so in the discussion).  If I did, I’d probably get out of the sales training business.

What I do believe is that too many people render themselves untrainable by a simple refusal to update.  If your evolution stopped in 2000, 2005, or 2010, you’re behind the curve, and you have a lot of ground to make up if you want to stay vital.  That’s on YOU.

I do believe that one reason that many managers find more senior reps to be ‘untrainable’ is that they simply haven’t tried, or haven’t tried very hard.  I didn’t get a chance to ask my follow-up question at the discussion:  “How many of you have given a strong effort to train senior reps in new technology or skill – and failed?”  I have a feeling that the number of those who have tried would be small, and the failures would be smaller still.

If you’re managing a ‘graying’ sales force, I think you owe it to yourself, and to them, to give them every opportunity to succeed in today’s technology and Internet driven sales environment before simply casting them aside (as the other consultant was advocating).

And finally, if you’re hiring salespeople, don’t overlook this demographic.  I’ve helped my clients make hires in this space in the last five years, and some are setting records now.