5 Rules for Interviewing Inside Sales Reps?

Trish Bertuzzi’s recent post, Interviewing Inside Sales Reps:  5 Rules, has a few points that I agree with, and some that I don’t.  I agree with her that hiring mistakes can be costly (which is why you should use a headhunter),  and I also agree that it is helpful to determine those key characteristics that make for a successful clinical sales rep, and then hire accordingly.  (I even wrote a post on that very subject.)

Her 5 Rules (and my 2 cents):

1)  Always do your first interview over the phone.  I agree - that way you can jump off as soon as you know that they’re a “no”. No obligatory hour interview.  I know candidates won’t like to hear this, but sometimes it’s just not a fit.

TWO)  Hire someone who has the experience to sell what you sell.  Not always.  There are fantastic reps out there that have not sold your particular product or even used your selling system, but who would still be a great addition to your team and to your numbers.  I have placed many candidates with revenue experience, but no experience in medical sales, into a wide variety of pharmaceutical revenue positions:  laboratory sales, pathology equipment sales, clinical revenue, and many other areas of healthcare sales.  They’ve been very successful.

3)  Have a well-defined interview process.  This is great - have to see more of this.

4)  Ask the candidate to send you an e-mail recapping their impressions of your interview process.  Interesting.  I have had clients use other tests in the process to evaluate it- I guess this is the same.

5)  Ask for last year’s W2.  I think that asking for the W2 for last year seems out of line.  For some reason, this seems like an encroachment on privacy to me.  Does anyone know of a company that does this? Any opinions?  Known facts about this?

Article courtesy of  Peggy McKee - Owner / Senior Recruiter at the nationally
recognized medical and pharmaceutical sales recruiting team of PHC Consulting.
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