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Competition to attract the best sales staff has always been fierce. But increasingly the ability to attract, hire and retain the cream of the sales crop is proving a competitive advantage.
At Salesforce, we’re continually focussed on building and bettering our sales team. So, we’ve asked our global sales leaders to share their secrets on how they hire and retain the best sales staff.
Over his career, Mike Wolff, Senior Vice President of Commercial Sales at Salesforce, has hired more than 1,000 Account Executives. “And not just your average AE,” he says. “But people who went on to become extremely successful in our organisation.”
His advice is to develop a successful interviewing process — and stick with it for every candidate. From initial screens and chronological interviews to candidate presentations and reference checks, Wolff’s strategy is based on consistency, enabling him to accurately compare candidates.
There’s only so much you can interpret from a CV. And even with the interview, it’s hard to cover everything in an hour or less — especially on an emotional intelligence level.
“Fortunately, in recent years, many clever interviewing strategies have emerged, designed to improve our ability to identify A-players,” says David Priemer, former Vice President of Commercial Sales at Salesforce, and now with Influitive.
Interview questions such as “What’s your superpower?” or “How do you avoid ‘just checking in’ syndrome?” are some of Priemer’s favourites. They provide an insightful glance into a candidate’s emotional intelligence, which is critical for sales success.
“Some of our best software reps had never sold software before joining us,” says Dan Ross, Senior Vice President of Commercial Sales at Salesforce. “In fact, some of our best closers had never closed a deal before working here. What these individuals may have lacked in traditional sales experience, they more than compensated for with core qualities.”
Throughout the hiring process, it’s important to look for sales skills that can’t be taught, such as curiosity, drive, resilience and integrity. Hiring people with these qualities goes a long way to building a robust sales team.
According to Ross, it’s also important to evaluate what can be easily taught to potential new hires, even if a specific skill isn’t apparent in the interview or on their CV.
“If candidates lack the unteachable qualities, they won’t be successful and we have to consider a different role for them. But if they have the unteachable qualities, that’s great news, because everything else – from closing deals to business and sales acumen – they can absolutely learn.”
Successful growth planning brings a myriad of factors together. According to Adam Gilberd, Senior Vice President of Commercial Sales at Salesforce, a 25% to 30% company growth rate requires the same distribution capacity and salespeople to be added every year.
“That means we have to create room for all those new people and have their territories ready, so that when they’re hired, there’s somewhere for them to move into,” Gilberd says. “Before the year starts, we look ahead and cut up all the territories we are going to need for the entirety of the year, even if we don’t need them on day one. To cover the new territories, our existing Account Executives are assigned their main patch, plus a little bit more. We know that as we hire new salespeople, the new patches will be assigned to them.”
It’s one thing to hire for a clear-cut role. But what if you’re embarking on an entirely new project or way of selling? Anne DelSanto, Executive Vice President of Solution Engineering and Solution Sales at Salesforce, discovered the need to mix up her hiring strategy when she approached transformational (instead of transactional) selling for the first time.
“I knew I needed to hire differently to sell in this new way,” DelSanto says. “I wanted Sales Architects and Engineers with technical depth. I also wanted visionaries and dreamers. I started to mix in people with an eye for user experience, MBAs who were more business-focussed and even McKinsey alums.”
It’s unproductive to be hiring all of the time, which means staff retention is crucial. So how do you keep your best sales staff once you’ve hired them?
“A key part of sales leadership is ensuring that employees feel they’re highly valued, can be successful in their roles and can grow their careers,” says Brian Millham, President of Sales for North America and Marketing Cloud, Salesforce. “This is true regardless of where in a company you work. For sales leaders, it’s easy to get very focussed on the near-term – what’s happening this month, this quarter – without thinking about the long-term, which is all about development of your people.
“Just as customer success can drive great outcomes for your company, so can the success of each individual in your sales organisation,” he explains. “This is one of the things I enjoy most as a sales leader. It’s how you build loyalty and longevity into your team, and ultimately scale your business.”
Find out how the best global sales leaders are creating high-performing sales teams, download the State of Sales report.
