Between the mid-1800’s, when the game of baseball was invented, until about ten years ago, all position players stood in the same spot before every pitch. Of course, there was a little movement, but they were all within a few feet or inches of their regular spot.
Not today. As the position players are preparing for the pitch, their layout looks nothing like it used to. It’s possible to find all the position players on one side of the field. It’s common to see five or six of them to the right or left of second base. Technology, analytics, and artificial intelligence has turned baseball into an algorithm. Before a pitch is thrown, managers can make a high-probability guess of where the batter will hit the ball. In the next ten years, as machine-learning improves, and the old-school baseball people retire, it’s going to get even more extreme.
Most high-end, performance-based activities have become dominated by analytics: stock market decisions, life-and-death scenarios in emergency rooms, and recruitment of professional athletes. The human factor has been replaced with data that has been analyzed, punch-pressed, and delivered as predicted outcomes. The results speak for themselves. In all these world-class sectors, performance improvements are through the roof since data has made critical decisions objective.
Unfortunately, many companies have taken this commitment to predictive intelligence to an extreme in our businesses, and its damaging performance. One area in which I see business leaders struggling because of analytics is in recruiting and hiring sales people. They read articles about having the right people in the right seats. They listen to speakers preaching about DNA being the key to success, often using stories of NBA coaches, U.S. Army officers, and Hollywood directors to illustrate their points. They read posts on blogs like this one in which I’ve often stated that talent is more important than experience. Then they hire the candidates that demonstrate the most talent, regardless of all other attributes. If the personality test shows that a person has “got it”, they move forward… and they’re often looking for a replacement within twelve months.
When hiring sales people, don’t outsmart yourself.
As you might have read in previous posts, using profile testing and making your interview process as objective as possible are crucial steps to your successful hiring of sales people. However, you’re trying to hire a sales professional to sell your products or services in a specific market place. You’re not hiring the lead physicist on a team commissioned to discover cold fusion. When drafting a cornerback for an NFL team, talent matters before anything else. Attitude, intelligence, and past performance don’t matter at all if they can’t backpedal with the greatest wide receivers in the world. When hiring world-class performers, characteristics like work ethic, empathy, and persistence are bonuses. However, when hiring sales people, these features are critical.
In conclusion, use profiling tests as tools to your ultimate decision. Other tools include stimulating interview exercises, revealing questions, and a transparent due diligence process. Yes, talent matters. But if you give me a hungry, hard-working sales person with average talent, I’ll beat your superstar with average work ethic ten out of ten times. Remember, don’t outsmart yourself.
