Posted by Thomas Eorgan, SVP, Marketing
Would you hire this guy? Or THIS guy?
If you're a fan of The Office like we are, and you're looking for a hotshot new sales person for your company, you'll appreciate this campaign from CareerBuilder. You can vote for The Office character that you would most likely hire if you were required to pick from one of Dunder Mifflin's crack sales team.
Do you hire your sales force based on sales skills or soft skills? Do candidates with great personalities and a positive, winning demeanor appeal to you more than an industry performer with quantifiable results?
In our view, both types of personal skills can lead to great performers, with a little help. When we create sales enablement solutions for our customers, we first conduct interviews of top performers, middle of the road performers, and new, growing performers to discover their personal hurdles in the sales process. We've learned that often times the challenge isn't with the sales person's skills (soft or sales), but with the tools they are using to present to their customers and prospects. We've discovered that there is a general lack of understanding of products and services, and how offerings can be bundled for the greatest opportunity to make a 'solutions sell' vs. an individual product sell.
Through well designed and thoughtful sales enablement solutions, we are able to achieve wins for our customers through a more engaging presentation of offerings that elevates an entire sales team to top performer status. As a value add, these same tools can be used to impart product knowledge and training for new or existing sales professionals - same tool, same message, but for an entirely different need - sales training.
On our website, you can read about some recent successes with sales enablement solutions.
Meanwhile, sales enablement tools aside, who would you hire from Dunder Mifflin?