A Square Peg In a Round Hole?

A Square Peg In a Round Hole?
Behavioral Fit

And, speaking of all of these 8 elements working in sync to yield a solid, consistent superior sales effort, are you looking at the importance of a sales person’s “fit” with the sales role in your firm? The success of three elements covered above — Sales Talent, Sales Support and Sales Compensation — are dependent on how well you hire and motivate people.

Behavioral interviewing and assessment is crucial to ensuring the long-run success of any candidate for sales rep or sales support roles. How someone will fit and be motivated within your unique culture needs to be determined before the hire is made. “Topgrading”, by Dr. Bradford Smart, estimates a cost of twenty times salary for a bad hire. That’s a lot of money when you don’t get it right the first time!

Behavioral assessment can be helpful with current employees as well — in all roles, not just within the sales organization. Do you have employees who are ill suited for a particular role and are experiencing the difficulties, lost productivity and stress that results? Do some employees exhibit behaviors that are chronically at odds with management’s expectations for the role?

Behavioral fit is key to increasing productivity, ROI, communication and revenue. What does it entail?

Behavioral approach includes the four P’s:

When our natural styles clash with the expectations of the job, significant stress can arise. Studies show that people don’t last in a role more than 24 months when they are ill fit. Our own experiences with our clients prove that this is accurate more often than not.

It is imperative to spend time ensuring you are bringing the right person into your organization in the first place. It’s just as imperative to ensure that they are a fit for what they are doing and can be a happy, contributing employee as a result. The Collaborative has successfully used the DISC behavioral tool for both hiring and increasing communication and productivity within a variety of firms. Please talk with us if you think you have an ill-fit with an existing employee or you want to avoid the cost of making a wrong hire in the first place!