Importance of Recruitment and Selection of Salespeople - Essay Example

?Importance of Recruitment and Selection of Salespeople Introduction The goal of any business organization is to make profit. This is achieved by means of producing certain good or service and exchanging it for monetary resources that make up the income and profit of the organization. This exchange process – sales transaction – makes organizations focused on their clients and making sure the end users are satisfied. However, the sales process itself is what establishes the connection between an organization and a customer. Salespeople, as those who run and manage and sales process, are, in some sense, a chain that connects the business with its external environment and, what is more important, generates sales and, therefore, profits for the company. For this reason recruitment and selection of salespeople is one of the very important aspects of organizational behaviour since effectiveness of recruitment and selection of sales representatives is a basis for future success and effectiveness of the overall sales process of the company. Furthermore, as Darmon outlines (1993, 17), selection of salespeople has a great influence on the performance and profits of the organization. Sales are a direct source of company’s profit. Therefore, since salespeople determine company’s sales, financial performance and profits, it can be said that salespeople are, actually, the tool that enables a commercial organization to fulfil its major goal of making profit. In addition, Slater and Olson (2000) point out that not only business performance, but the whole business strategy of an organization, is greatly impacted by sales force management (Slater and Olson 2000, 813). Therefore, effective recruitment and selection of salespeople has a direct influence on competitiveness of the business and, if implemented effectively, become a competitive advantage of an organization. Selecting Right People As it has been determined above, salespeople have a direct impact on financial performance, profits, and business strategy of an organization. So, if a salesperson fails in one’s efforts to sell the company’s product effectively, the company itself may fail as well. For that reason hiring right people for the sales positions is crucial and vital for business success and effectiveness. Correctly chosen employees add value to the employing organization and, according to some estimates, increase sales and productivity to between 6 to 20 percent (Cooper, Robertson, and Tinline 2003, 6). A correct match between the job and an employee benefits the company in terms of reduced absenteeism and employee turnover because of higher employee satisfaction rates, as well as employee’s commitment and loyalty towards the organization. Furthermore, a right choice of a salesperson has a great impact on the company’s overall sales performance. as Armstron et al. (2009, 444) outline, the best salespeople usually make up the top 30 percent of the company’s salesforce, and bring up to 60 percent of the overall sales Armstron et al (2009, 444). This idea is supported by Johnson, Hair and Boles (1989), who believe that “hiring the right individual for a sales position remains one of the most crucial aspects of a sales manager’s job” (Johnson, Hair, and Boles 1989, 53). The authors believe that a successful salesperson should have the following characteristics: enthusiasm, good organizational skills, persuasiveness, sales experience, ambition, ability to follow instructions, and sociability. However, while it is possible to identify these qualities when selecting and recruiting candidates, it might be more difficult to identify and recognize the qualities that might lead to a failure. Nevertheless, the very first task of a hiring manager is to identify the key characteristics of an ideal candidate for the position. Clear and precise specifications identified at the start of the selection and recruitment process will minimize the chance for a mistake at the stage of making a hiring decision (Roberts 1997, 4). The role a new employee is to uptake, as well as the competencies of an ideal candidate, should be clearly identified in order for a hiring manager to be able to effectively match a potential candidate and the role. Roberts (1997, 6), just like by Johnson, Hair and Boles (1989, 53), also stresses the importance of defining candidate’s characteristics that may lead to his or her failure in the new role. Determining the competencies that can underpin effective performance is important for distinguishing unsuitable candidates in the selection process. All the above mentioned actions refer to the job analysis stage of the overall hiring process (Havaldar and Cavale 2007, 5.16). This stage is particularly important because it helps the manager to construct a clear idea of what individual is to be hired, what his or her responsibilities will be, and what will be expected of a new salesperson. Furthermore, a well-conducted job analysis will be of a great help for creating a clear and precise job description. Hiring Mistakes The job description, being the first piece of communication between a prospect and the employer, should set clear expectations and precise duties of a candidate. If, however, the job description misses some essential information about the job, some misunderstandings may arise between a prospect and an employer due to different understanding of the role. A poor job description may lead to candidate’s unreal expectations regarding the job. As a result, the company may end up having high employee turnover rates. This, of course, has a negative impact on company’s performance and profits since, firstly, the hiring process involves additional spending and, secondly, onboarding and training of new employees, takes additional time and money that could, otherwise, be invested into other areas of the business. The cost of finding and training of a new employee, together with the cost of lost sales, may be very high and, in addition, combined with lower productivity of the sales team (Armstron et al. 2009, 444). A study conducted by Mathews and Redman (2001) has discovered that job descriptions and job advertisements have a great impact on the pool of candidates for the position being advertised. Poorly constructed job descriptions that do not catch attention and interest of qualified candidates lead to company’s ending up with a great number of applications from unqualified and relatively inexperienced candidates. As a result, the company has nothing else to do that hire a less qualified candidate and, as a result, have a poorer sales team (Mathews and Redman 2001, 541). So, incorrectly built selection and recruitment processes lead to company’s losing money (Kurtz 2010, 581). At the same time, careful selection of people for sales positions is, according to Kurtz (2010, 581), very important for two reasons. Firstly, the selection and recruitment processes call for company’s substantial time and money investments. Secondly, “hiring mistakes can damage relationships with customers and overall performance, and are costly to correct” (Kurtz 2010, 581). In order to avoid such hiring mistakes companies are encouraged to follow definite and specific processes for selecting and hiring salespeople: application screening, phone interview, in-depth interview, testing, checking references, physical examination (if needed), and, finally, making hiring decision. In order for the initial assessment of a prospect to be effective and correct, some companies even use special assessment centres. Though it does cost additional money, the future benefit of hiring the right person outweighs the initial spending. For instance, in comparison to using traditional rating system, British police gained a net benefit of ?800,000 when using assessment centres (Cooper, Robertson, and Tinline 2003, 4). In addition, assessment centres that employ professional interviewers and evaluators who use clearly defined screening procedures and assessment techniques have shown to be the most effective and efficient tool for evaluating potential employees (Randall, Cooke, and Smith 1985, 52). Situational exercises, in-basket exercises, leaderless group discussions, and various job simulations conducted by an assessment centre enable the company to see what particular skills and abilities the prospect really possesses, as well as how one acts in real-life settings and situations. Randall (1990, 25) outlines that though using the service of assessment centres means additional spending for the company, the benefit is that an assessment centre is more likely to determine whether a particular individual will be successful in the specified position. Conclusion The processes of recruitment and selection of salespeople are the basis for further effective performance of a commercial organization. Salespeople, being a link between a company and a customer, fulfil several tasks: represent the company, support and promote the brand, generate sales and, thus, profits for the business. Consequently, success or failure of salespeople has a direct impact on the success or failure of the company. For that reason each business should devote much attention to recruitment and selection of right candidates for the sales positions, because hiring mistakes in this area of organizational performance might have very negative results. First of all, poor recruitment and selection practices lead to hiring less qualified salespeople. This lowers the sales potential of the business. Secondly, hiring mistakes may lead to low employee satisfaction and, consequently, high retention rates. These processes have a negative impact on business-customer relations and, as a result, decrease sales and profits. In addition, high employee retention costs companies additional resources for hiring and training of new salespeople. References Armstrong, G., M. Harker, P. Kotler, and R. Brennan. 2009. Marketing: An Introduction. Pearson Education. Cooper, D., I. Robertson, and G. Tinline. 2003. Recruitment and selection: a framework for success. Cengage Learning EMEA. Darmon, R. 1993. “Where Do the Best Sales Force Profit Producers Come From?” Journal of Personal Selling and Sales Management 3(Summer): 17. Havaldar, K. and V. Cavale. 2007. Sales and Distribution Management: Text and Cases. Tata McGraw-Hill Education. Johnson, M., J. Hair, and J. Boles. 1989. “Why Do Salespeople Fail?” Journal of Personal Selling and Sales Management 9(3): 53-58. Mathews, B., and T. Redman. 2001. “Recruiting the Wrong Salespeople: Are the Job Ads to Blame?” Industrial Marketing Management 30(7): 541-550. Randall, J. 1990. Selecting that successful salesperson. Review of Business 12(1): 19-30. Randall, J., E. Cooke, and L.Smith. 1985 "A Successful Application of the Assessment Center Concept to the Salesperson Selection Process" Journal of Personal Selling and Sales Management 5(Winter): 52-61. Roberts, G. 1997. Recruitment and selection: a competency approach. CIPD Publishing. Slater, Stanley F. and Olson, Eric M 2000 “The Influence of Sales Force Management” Strategic Management Journal 21 (8): 813-829. Read More