Building a good sales team – It might not be a task as difficult as you think

Sales teams primitively serve as a major part of companies. A company with an efficient sales team is of utmost necessity as growth begins from this department. Dealing with high attrition and continuous requirement of workforce in building a good sales team is a well-known cliché. This poses a challenging concern for companies as a result of soaring demand for sales executives and managers from plenty of startups, small & medium businesses mushrooming every day.

The unending process of sales personnel hiring can be tamed to some extent with preparation in selecting such candidates while building a good sales team.

Hiring adaptive candidates – Technologies keep displaying continuous updates and upgrades in frequent short periods. Brands launch products one after another and competitors keep innovating. In such a phase, candidates should acclimate to such rapidly changing environments to face the market challenges. Thus choosing a candidate who is adaptable to be trained in regular periods is desirable.

Patience – Testing patience is a famous yesteryear trick which has been used since a long time in building a good sales team. Some of the tricks to test patience are through monitoring the candidate’s activities while waiting for an interview or posing an obviously annoying question in the interview. Why is this necessary? Sales executives are often subjected to situations when they have to wait for a long time in a client’s place or handle short tempered/ abusive unhappy clients. Only if patience is aplenty, it would help them stay composed in such rage provoking situations too. If adverse, impatience will surely lead to a tussle that could end up tarnishing the brand’s image ultimately.

Travel – Travelling is a stress buster to many, but this could also get monotonous with subsequent trips, especially on work related tours. Travelling locally/domestically/ internationally is an intrinsic part of sales profiles in general and candidates have to be passionate about the profile to beat any travelling woes. Thus, a check on this characteristic stands essential for all sales profiles.

Communication – While building a good sales team, considering communication as a crucial parameter is sure intelligence. Communicating in good English while reaching out to corporates/ being strong in regional communication to deal with regional markets/ both of these – are vital traits to be successful in a sales domain. Communicating precisely yet clearly is a persona that could make a huge difference in a person’s sales aptitude and performance.

Passion – Ideally “passion” should be the first of all parameters. Being passionate about what one does is essential for committed work. Finding the right person for a Sales position is absolutely not a cakewalk. The challenge in hiring for a sales position is that the candidate’s passion cannot be assessed through a mere CV, to shortlist from a job seeker database. A face-to-face interaction is utmost necessary for even a basic reviewing of the candidate. Highly passionate personnel are crucial for success of sales crew.

Convincing aptitude – Sales people do not necessarily need to be extroverts to perform well. Every organization would have a set of introverts too who achieve targets with amazing ease. Though in general, we could observe that extroversion can clinch deals in comfort, it is certainly not a necessity if a candidate could convince clients even being an introvert. The reason for success could be the mere pleasing attitude that they possess or complete domain knowledge to put forth solid logical points or anything that could put the customer in comfort. Thus an able decision maker could identify this “convincing” potential in ambiverts or introverts too in the process of building a good sales team.

Network – Try to understand candidate’s network in your domain of business or the lines of your clientele. Known sources who could refer to prospects or those who are potential clients themselves could help strike deals without much effort due to the trust and sense of connect associated with the relationship. Thus networks play quite an important role in success of sales profiles.

Talent focused hiring in sales involves a unique flow process for every kind of vacancy. In the process of building a good sales team, HRs have been continuously encountering conditions of addressing high attrition and constant requirement of candidates willing to take up sales. Sales team building should no more be a herculean task considering the recruitment tidbits shared above.

Happy sales team building!