Contrary to popular belief, company culture is not about the number of vacation days you get, catered lunches, or the “perks” offered by leadership. This article explains what company culture is and offers some insight into what questions you should be asking during the interview process to illuminate if a company’s culture is an environment you will excel in. Read on to find out.

As much as the interview process is about being assessed for your capabilities as a sales candidate, it’s also an opportunity for you to evaluate the fit for the company you will potentially work for. We have explained how to make your resume stand out, as well as how to properly prepare for an interview, but the path to employment is just as much about your view of a company as theirs is of you. Here, we explain what company culture is and the 5 ways you can determine if your potential employer is the right cultural fit for you to advance your sales career.

Understanding Company Culture

Company culture can be understood as the beliefs and behaviors that govern how a company’s employees and leadership team interact. Often, company culture is implied and not expressly defined and develops naturally over time from the cumulative traits of the people the company hires. Essentially, it is the values collectively identified by leadership, the mission and vision of the company, and the practices relied upon in hiring, firing, and promotion criteria. Experts have spent decades studying company culture, but ultimately the leadership of every company will decide what defines their company culture. It is alive and subject to transform over time.

In a study conducted at Duke’s Fuqua School of Business, 1,400 North American CEOs and CFOs were surveyed on workplace culture over 13 months and the results were clear. Over 90% of CEOs viewed workplace culture as an essential aspect of a thriving business. On the other side of the scale, only 15% felt that their corporate culture was where they needed it to be.

Such disparate statistics illuminate just how intangible corporate culture can be, making it that much more imperative to understand the right questions to ask throughout the interview process.

To help you determine company culture, ask the following 5 questions throughout the interview process:

1. What is the sales environment like and how does it fit in with the rest of the organization?

This question allows you to get an idea of what the leadership values in their work environment; specifically how it views the sales department. Since alignment with your leadership team is imperative for selling success, knowing what type of organizational selling approach is used – team based for example – will impact your ability to excel with the company.

Sales expert Mike Weinberg describes the healthiest team culture he’s ever seen, and it includes things like a laser focus on the strategy for success, open and immediate feedback, a competitive, self-policing team, ample doses of celebration, and an engaged, servant leadership team. Look for these attributes when listening to an interviewer’s response to this question.

As a salesperson, you want to know that the leadership recognizes that the entirety of the organization plays a role in sales. It should be a given that the leadership of a company sees value in acquiring new business – it’s much easier to close deals when you know the entire company is focussed on acquiring and retaining new business/customers.

2. How would you describe your company culture in three words?

This question is powerful because it forces the interviewer to get to the essential characteristics that define their company. It also allows you to evaluate how the interviewer responds, which may in fact be the most telling aspect of the answer. Do they tense up? Do they need to think about it?  If they are able to quickly and easily speak to the culture, it’s a sign that culture is something that is top of mind for the leadership team.

It’s also useful to ask potential colleagues this question if given the opportunity to speak to them (this often comes at later stages of interviewing, on the second or third visit to the office). See how closely their answers align to the interviewer you spoke with earlier. Divergent responses can mean a lack of cultural alignment.

3. How do people give and receive feedback at your company?

During the second or third interview is a good time to ask how a company manages feedback. Conflict management is one of the most telling ways to determine a company’s culture.  A Psychometric study on conflict in the workplace found that 59% of workplace conflict is due to clashing values, whereas warring egos and personality clashes comprise of 86% of conflict. Knowing how the company navigates feedback can lead you to a workplace most in line with your own values.

Some organizations prefer to document conflict and mistakes, reporting the minutiae of worker disagreement and error, while others prefer informal, frequent, and on-the-spot feedback. Being clear on the way the company handles feedback is necessary to know whether you will fit in and if this workplace will be an environment you will be comfortable in.  

4. How does your company celebrate success? What do you use to motivate your employees?

Different employees are motivated by different rewards – but salespeople are universally motivated by money and recognition. Ask the interviewer how quota attainment is rewarded. Is there a multi-tiered target structure for specific milestones hit? Is there a quarterly bonus in addition to an annual one? Understanding how the company both motivates and rewards its employees is a way to understand its corporate culture.

Sales culture is directly tied to the results of the team, so having an engaged, pro-sales CEO and executive team who understand and respects the value of its sales team is proof that this an environment you as a salesperson want to be a part of.

5. What role would I play in the growth of this company?

While it may seem obvious what role a sales position will hold for an organization, titles and roles mean different things to different companies. How the interviewer answers this question illuminates how they view the sales force of their organization and how well they understand the function of sales within the company.

You want to hear the interviewer provide an answer that is specific, and includes tasks devoted to selling (as opposed to tasks that pull you away from your selling activities and make it more difficult to fulfill targets). A response that makes you feel like your duties and responsibilities are integral to the success of the company is a strong indication that the company understands sales–and that you will be a good fit.

Company Culture Impacts Your Selling Success:

Company culture is the beliefs and behaviors that govern how the leadership team and employees interact in an organization. The interview process measures your fit as an employee for a company, but it’s also an opportunity for you to evaluate the company’s fit for you. In the path to employment, knowing what questions to ask about a company’s culture is imperative to understanding if you will be a good long term fit. Ultimately, you want to know:

• If the company has a pro sales culture
• How the leadership understands and defines their culture
• What strategies are used to manage feedback
• How success is celebrated
• How sales is aligned with the rest of the organization

For more industry insights or to learn more about the landscape of B2B and enterprise sales, visit the Peak Sales Blog.

relpost-thumb-wrapper

close relpost-thumb-wrapper

• About
• Latest Posts

Eliot Burdett

Latest posts by Eliot Burdett (see all)

• 31 Must-Know Sales Follow-Up Statistics for 2024 Success – December 21, 2023
• 7 Success Characteristics That Define Top Performers – December 19, 2023
• 5 Reasons Your Top Employees Quit (Stop Doing This to Stop Them Leaving) – December 14, 2023

This article covers the top 10 things you need to do to prepare for your next sales interview. Specifically, it explains why you should:

• Come equipped with your selling numbers
• Be prepared to speak about specific wins
• Articulate ‘why’ and ‘how’ you win business

Like most aspects of business, the interviewing and hiring strategies companies use have evolved – they are now more rigorous and hyper personalized than ever, especially in sales. Because the best sales interview processes are structured to ensure consistency and objectivity in the hiring process, it is now that much more imperative for candidates to be prepared.

For example, at Peak, interview questions used to assess a potential sales representative are more in depth and role specific than simply ticking down a list of standard interview questions such as “tell me about your work experience” or “what interests you about this position?” World-class companies have eliminated these questions and evolved their interviewing and hiring practices to reflect the need to conduct structured interviews that eliminate subjectivity from the hiring process and expose average and below-average sellers.

As a top performer, you actually want to be faced with exacting and challenging questions, because it speaks to the standards and expectations your potential employer has aligned themselves with. If you do find yourself in a generic interview that doesn’t spark any thoughtful discussion or press into your ability to achieve your quotas, consider it a red flag; this is potentially in line with how the rest of the business is run.

Here is a list of the 10 most revealing questions interviewers ask salespeople, with insights into what these questions attempt to uncover about you:

1. Discuss your sales skills. What do you view as an area for improvement, and what are you doing to address the deficiency?

This question is asking about your:

•        Level of self awareness
•        Desire to achieve goals
•        Commitment to improve

Someone who is achievement oriented understands exactly what sales skills they need to improve, and have a strategy in place to achieve the next level of competency in their work.

Think through a specific area of your work (cold call to close ratios, up-selling and cross-selling of existing accounts, requesting referrals) and explain why and how you plan on improving this skill. Employers want salespeople who possess a natural desire to achieve; explaining the skill(s) you want to improve displays both a need for achievement and a self-awareness of your selling strengths and weaknesses.

2. In your current/last role, where did you rank on the team?

This question is asking about your:

•         Previous work patterns (these will predict future work patterns)
•         Level of competitiveness

Great salespeople always know where they stand relative to their colleagues. Because they are competitive, they have a constant need to know where they rank in comparison to other reps. While you may not necessarily be the top sales rep every quarter, being able to accurately state where you ranked is an indication that you are cognizant of your standing and are working to improve your performance.

Eliot Burdett, CEO of Peak Sales Recruiting, explains that the most effective predictor of future behavior is to understand past behaviour.

Often, employees’ reasons for leaving a company each time are similar, so the best way to navigate this type of question is to be straightforward and proactive when explaining your work history.

Being evasive or indirect about reasons for leaving past roles comes across as suspicious to employers, and the more they know about your history, the more comfortable they’ll feel about hiring you. Even if your last job exit was due to family or personal needs, explain this in a fact-based way. Proactively addressing any gaps in your work history before they are brought up demonstrates that you have nothing to hide.  

3. Tell me about a time you failed or faced adversity.

This question is about:

• Understanding how you view and respond to failure
• Gaining insight to your self awareness

Often touted as one of the toughest questions to be faced with in an interview, understanding the nature of why this question is asked can help alleviate the anxiety that comes with formulating a response to it. Interviewers want to understand how you define success, failure, and everything in between. This question allows you to open up about your selling activities and behaviors, which illuminates for the interviewer how you measure and take risk.

This question is often used to calibrate whether or not you are risk averse and determines if you learned from the experience (hint: top performing salespeople take risks, they have experienced failure, and they have grown from it).

For example, perhaps you worked for a company that had a poor name in the market and you built relationships and established trust to restore the reputation of your company. Explaining how you repaired the reputation gives the interviewer a concrete example of your willingness to commit to an employer by establishing and building relationships – even when it’s not easy.

4. Why are you a great salesperson / why do you win business?

This question is about:

•      Gauging your self-awareness
•      Understanding your selling process

Great salespeople know why people buy from them and what triggers the response.  Brent Thompson, CSO of Peak Sales Recruiting, views this question as one of the most useful ways to test a salesperson’s selling ability. He explains, “if you provide a generic response (i.e. ‘people just like me’) it indicates you don’t really know what you are doing and lack a methodology to your selling process.” The best salespeople understand the why of people’s buying behavior and how their selling process influences and guides that behaviour.

5.  What have you done in the last thirty days to make yourself a better salesperson?

This question is about:

•         Gauging how you own your professional development
•         Understanding your learning style

This is a favoured question from sales management strategist Lee B. Salz, best-selling author of Hire Right Higher Profits. It is designed to provide the interviewer insight into how seriously you take your own professional development and how you go about making your career ambitions a reality.  

Whether you’ve read a great sales book recently or engage a sales mentor, competence and desire to learn are essential traits employers are looking for with this question.

To go above and beyond with your answer, describe the book or the mentor meeting. Explain what you implemented into your selling behavior afterward and how it’s made a positive impact. You show not only that you’re tactical, but that you can execute strategy as well.

6. Where do you see yourself in 3 and 5 years?

This question is about:

•         Understanding your career ambitions
•         Determining company fit

While this question may seem broad and/or vague, the interviewer is looking to see if you have a plan.  Great salespeople always have a plan. Everything is calculated, and if not, you can develop a plan very quickly. This is also a way for companies to determine if your career goals align with the company’s vision for you on a longer term basis.  It’s about being an appropriate fit with a company as much as it is about determining your specific career goals. Employers want to see that you have a clear path set out for yourself, and that you are willing to commit to an organization to make those goals a reality.

7.  How will you sell our offering?

This question is about:

• Your selling approach
• Your preparedness

Asking the “how” of getting the offering to the consumer illuminates your communication style and certain components of your drive. Examples of this include:

• How many times do you follow up with qualified leads?
• What percentage of your business is hunted versus referral based?
• What is your preferred selling methodology?

It also examines how well you did your research on the company prior to the interview. Being able to speak to the offering the company sells, key markets, purchasing stakeholders, and buyer groups demonstrates that you are prepared for the interaction and understand what it takes to instill confidence into a sell.

An inability to answer this question tells the employer that you may go into a pitch or a prospect call with the same lack of preparation about the company you are selling to – a major red flag and not something that top performers do.

8. What is your least favorite aspect of the process of sales?

This question is about:

• Your personality
• Your behavioral competencies

This type of question is telling to the employer because it alludes to your selling personality. If you point to cold calling as your least favorite aspect of the sales process, you likely don’t possess the drive, determination, and resilience required to excel in a true hunter role. If cold calling is one of your preferred activities, it speaks to the fact that you possess high levels of aggression and enjoy the persistence required to close a lead.

9. Who do you enjoy selling to the most and why?

This question is about:

•  Your selling comfort zone
• The length of sales cycle you are most successful with

Your answer will likely include a description of your ideal prospect, and employers will be listening for the type of buyer you are most attracted to: is it a company looking for a complex, enterprise solution that has a long sales cycle and involves multiple stakeholders? Or, is the client you describe a transactional buyer, with minimal lead up to the sale? Depending on the company you are interviewing with, more transactional selling preferences will be a red flag because you don’t have experience with the consultative nature of complex selling.

10. Tell me about yourself.

This question is about your:

•         Ability to speak confidently and convincingly
•         Demeanor and how you will culturally fit with the company

Most often, this question is the first one asked by the interviewer: it’s meant to break the ice, get the conversation going, and allow them to have a general picture of who they are speaking to. If you are able to easily and comfortably speak about yourself, both personally and professionally, it indicates that you are comfortable in your skin and will have the same demeanor with clients that you have not necessarily established a rapport with.

In your sales interview, remember to:

Be prepared to answer open-ended questions. The best candidate devotes time thinking about specific instances in response to the questions outlined above and are ready to provide precise figures where necessary. For example, being prepared with a response that includes exact numbers of how much you sold over quota and what percentage of that was net new business versus recurring will distinguish you as someone who is both organized and achievement oriented.

Often, you will be asked proof questions such as “what did you do in the past” instead of theoretical questions such as “what would you do in the future.” Arming yourself with the best of your past numbers and quotas will alleviate the stress of coming up with information on the spot.

Ultimately, employers want to learn the intangibles of your work history, so come ready to provide that to them and the rest will speak for itself. While the evolution of interviewing and hiring practices can make preparing for a sales interview feel daunting, coming equipped with numbers, having specific examples prepared, and understanding the “why’s” of your selling methodology will ultimately be your keys to hiring success.

For a comprehensive checklist of everything you need to know before a sales interview, fill out the form below:

Interested in more industry insights and the most up-to-date sales career resources and tools? Visit the Peak Sales Blog.

relpost-thumb-wrapper

close relpost-thumb-wrapper

• About
• Latest Posts

Eliot Burdett

Latest posts by Eliot Burdett (see all)

• 31 Must-Know Sales Follow-Up Statistics for 2024 Success – December 21, 2023
• 7 Success Characteristics That Define Top Performers – December 19, 2023
• 5 Reasons Your Top Employees Quit (Stop Doing This to Stop Them Leaving) – December 14, 2023

You aced the interview and got the offer of employment. Now comes the part 59% of candidates dread and 20% of candidates completely avoid – negotiating your starting base salary with your prospective employer.

It can be agreed that everyone wants a higher base salary, but, how many have the knowledge and skills to make that happen? According to research from Linda Babcock’s book, Women Don’t Ask, only 57% of men and 7% of women successfully negotiate their starting salaries with new employers.

That is why we created the infographic below with the 5 proven steps you need to get a higher base salary at your new sales job:

relpost-thumb-wrapper

close relpost-thumb-wrapper

• About
• Latest Posts

Eliot Burdett

Latest posts by Eliot Burdett (see all)

• 20 Gifts for Sales Reps to Boost Productivity and Engagement – February 6, 2024
• 5 Ways To Improve How You Train Sales Teams in Your Company – January 4, 2024
• How to Use Conferences to Get Hot Leads – January 3, 2024

It takes a mere 6 seconds for a recruiter to decide if you are qualified for a job or not. This article explains the top six ways you can get your sales resume to the “yes” pile. It includes how to properly exhibit your sales numbers; how to make accolades an asset; the importance of getting specific about your skill set; how to leverage previous job titles; the necessity of highlighting past companies; and eliminating entry-level skills and ‘fluff’.

It’s no secret that Hiring Managers want standout salespeople. Because they are seeking the best of the best, their ideal candidates are usually gainfully employed and passive – not actively exploring the job market. If you are an active job seeker, you need to position yourself as someone potential employers need to connect with. While sales related occupations are projected to grow at a rate of approximately 5 percent between 2014-2018, sales jobs remain one of the most competitive and difficult positions to fill. This article will break down the latest research on what makes a sales resume stand out and reveal exactly what you need to do to position yourself as a top performer in your job search.

On average, there are over 250 resumes received for every job posted in corporate America.

As we explain in Sales Recruiting 2.0, Hiring Managers have gotten smarter and more methodical at screening resumes. This is because on average there are over 250 resumes received for every job posted in corporate America (although this varies based on company and industry). The result is that your sales resume is one among hundreds for review—not necessarily a formula for success.

Recruiters and Hiring Managers look for specific things when screening your resume, so pay attention to how you present information. Primarily, resume reviewers will look at the these 5 data points:

Your sales resume will end up in a “fit/no fit” pile after being viewed for an average of six seconds, so it’s exceedingly important to be strategic in how you present your work history. This is explained by research led by The Ladders, who conducted a study that relied on “gaze tracking,” a perception tool used to track where eyes hover the longest and most frequently when viewing resumes. The study explains that recruiters spend 80% of their time looking at these six data points:

• Name
• Current title and company
• Previous title and company
• Current position start date
• Previous position start and end dates
• Education

With this in mind, here are 6 things you should think carefully about when writing your sales resume so that it stands out among the crowd:

1. Highlight Your Sales Numbers

The best salespeople understand that their job is ultimately about numbers — from lead generation ratios and closing averages to quota achievement success rates, numbers govern how salespeople will be judged by prospective employers. With this in mind, showcase your accomplishments with precise figures and quantifiable results. Recruiters and Hiring Managers want to see these numbers quickly and clearly, so make your resume visually simple and this information easy to spot.

As an example, stating “reached stretch quotas for over a year” is less impactful than “reached 110% of $50,000 quarterly quotas over five consecutive quarters.” The second statement gives a clearer picture of your selling capacity and showcases your scope of deal size. The more quantifiable information you can provide that supports why you are an exceptional salesperson, the more likely you are to get a response.   

Adding additional details to any number you provide also makes your resume standout: stating you met your monthly target doesn’t contextualize how big each deal size was, what the average numbers were amongst your peers, or how many team members you were compared against.

Today’s selling market is more competitive than it has ever been, so you need to position yourself as a top performer who has consistently excelled in unique selling environments. The experience that matters to prospective employers is what your selling approach is, how you sell, and what makes people buy from you, and how your drive to be the best has positively impacted your ability to drive profitable revenue. Be specific.

2. Make Sales Accolades Your Asset

Highlighting accolades on your sales resume is the easiest way to demonstrate exceptional sales experience. This is because Hiring Managers know that one of the best ways to predict future productivity in employees is to look at their past productivity.

Prominently display any awards and accolades you have received for work done in the past, such as President’s Club, Winner’s Circle, Top Revenue Generator Award, and Rookie of the Year. This positions you as a candidate who is committed to excellence which will pique the interest of potential employers. Additionally, you can tell stories with your sales experience that allow you to explain not only the “how” but the “why” of your work history, adding additional impact to the presentation of your skills and experience.

For example, if you have an exceptional story about how you attained a now longstanding client that consistently generates recurring business for you, tell this story on your resume. Be concise and unexpected, and you will captivate the recruiter’s attention with your ability to engage them, while showcasing your prospecting, presentation, and closing abilities.  

3. Rely on Specificity Over Generalizations

It is important to be specific about the industries and types of organizations you’ve worked for in the past—and even more important to get specific about past job titles. Hiring Managers can read through resume ‘fluff’ (the inflated, cushy version of what selling activities you’re actually doing) so when you explain that you “make cold calls on a daily basis” this does nothing to impress potential employers. Why? Because performing this task is a basic function of your job. Instead, if you have an exceptionally high cold-call-to-lead ratio, explain this as well as the strategies used to gain this ratio in your resume.

4. Leverage Previous Job Titles

It’s crucial to state job titles clearly, with an explanation if necessary. This is especially true given the increasingly obtuse way salespeople’s job titles have come to be labelled in the workforce. Business developers, customer success agents, and account representatives each may or may not serve the same functions. Job titles alone no longer provide much context in terms of actual level of responsibility. Be specific about your accountabilities and who you directly report to or manage in order to accurately portray your position with past organizations.

Some common job titles we see on sales resumes include:

• Account Manager
• Account Executive
• Client Relationship Manager
• Business Development Associate
• Consultant
• Sales Associate
• Territory Manager
• Client Advisor

This is far from an exhaustive list, but it serves to demonstrates how difficult it can be to determine what the responsibilities are in your sales title for recruiters and hiring managers.

5. Your Past Company Matters

The importance of your job title is underscored by the fact that the company you previously worked for matters to employers. For example, if you served as a sales representative who consistently beat their stretch targets, but did so at IBM, future employers will question whether it’s your selling capabilities or IBM’s well known brand that’s influencing the purchasing decision. You need to be proactive and articulate exactly how you’ve succeeded in leveraging a well known brand you’ve represented to generate net new business.

6. Eliminate “Foundational Skills”

As important as it is to get the right information onto your resume, it’s equally important to keep irrelevant or redundant information out. Known as “foundational skills,” these bullet points are common basic skillsets of any employee in a sales position. They don’t add anything to make you exceptional for a role. In fact, listing such abilities as “top skills” may create the impression that you are a subpar candidate and do not have the aptitude of a top performer. It can work against you to list foundational skills.  

There is an anatomy of a terrible sales resume, and it will work in your best interest to be just as strategic about what you leave out as you are about what you put in. Be honest and specific, because 53% of resumes contain false information. Hiring Managers are adept at getting to the core of the information you provide; it’s unprofessional and an unnecessary risk to falsify information about your past employment.

Companies spend 41 days trying to fill technical sales jobs, while the national average for all jobs is 33 days (Wall Street Journal, 2015).

There is a challenge across all industries in filling sales roles quickly and effectively. The resume is  your very first point of contact with a potential employer, so setting yourself up as a stand out candidate is the number one thing you can do to get noticed—and get hired.

relpost-thumb-wrapper

close relpost-thumb-wrapper

• About
• Latest Posts

Eliot Burdett

Latest posts by Eliot Burdett (see all)

• 31 Must-Know Sales Follow-Up Statistics for 2024 Success – December 21, 2023
• 7 Success Characteristics That Define Top Performers – December 19, 2023
• 5 Reasons Your Top Employees Quit (Stop Doing This to Stop Them Leaving) – December 14, 2023