Research
Research is clear – “The best predictor of future behaviour is past or current behaviour”. Questions around “how would you deal with…” Or, “in your view…” generate a good conversation but are not the way to go if you want to select the best candidate.
Interviewing Sales Professionals
Conducting thorough and evidenced based interviews when recruiting sales people can be tough and sadly, most sales recruitment processes fail because managers often use the 3 least predictive processes for assessing candidate competence: 1) resume screen, 2) unstructured interview, and 3) unstructured reference check. Following this approach is leaving sales recruitment to chance.
Making sure you have the right person, in the right position, at the right time, takes much more than a crystal ball. It takes knowledge of effective interviewing skills, and the ability to implement them. Best Practice recognises that one of the most effective approaches for interviewing is Behavioral Interviewing. It works off the premise that future behavior is best predicted by past behavior. To be sure that a candidate has the capabilities needed to perform the job, you need some degree of proof that they have demonstrated these capabilities in the past. A behavioral interview is a series of open-ended questions that help you obtain a good picture of a person’s capabilities in previous positions.
Built of the back of Barrett’s Sales Competency Dictionary, we have developed a series of Behavioural Interview Questions for a variety of client facing roles including sales, customer service, sales management, leadership, client services, and allied roles.
Barrett Behavioural Interview Guides includes
- Competency Summary Definitions
- Behavioural Interview Questions
- Rating Scales
- Marker Behaviours: Positive & Negative
- Instructions & Guidelines
Speak to us about your assessment needs.
Talk to us, your selling better advisory team, and we’ll be able to advise you on the best training solution for your business.

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