Disclaimer: there are hundred ways to conduct and interview and ask questions. This list reflects my own experience and preferences and shouldn’t be taken as a “Bible” stricto sensu. English might not always be perfect neither, but I’m sure you’ll get the ideas.
Some best practices:
- Prefer open questions
- Prefer questions based on things that happened : tell me about a time… instead of what would you do if…
| Question | Role Types | Skills Category | Expected - Good Elements | Not Expected - Warnings |
|---|---|---|---|---|
Individual ContributorPrevious Sales Experience | Competitor | - Interviewee should be able to explain what were the objectives, how they were calculated - Good Sales are usually competitors and they know their objectives well in order to reach them | - Doesn’t know - Not able to answer precisely / unclear - Doesn’t use any numbers | |
Individual ContributorPrevious Sales Experience | Competitor | - Tells you how he/she ranked vs. others clearly - Mentions ups & downs → no one is always on the top. Don’t hesitate to ask about different periods (e.g. performance in ramp-up then over time) - Use numbers (percentile, % quota, etc.) - Knows why some people are better (if applicable) - a sign that they have studied better performers in order to beat them | - Unclear answer/doesn’t really answer precisely to the question - Justifies about reasons without self-awareness | |
Individual ContributorPrevious Sales Experience | Self-awareness | - Clear about what they do well - they should mention things like organization, negociation skills, prospection. Don’t hesitate to ask why they are good at each activity and ask examples. - Ideally they will not speak about weak points naturally if they want the job (they are Sales) but if they do that can mean either they have a high level of humility or that they can lack self-confidence, the later is an issue) | - Long list of strong points showing a lack of self-awareness - Not clear about what make them good | |
Individual ContributorPrevious Sales Experience | Growth Mindset | - Top performers are clear about what they want to improve - they try to constantly grow personnally and should answer easily - Is able to tell you HOW they work on the desired new skills : reading, listening to others calls, watching online resources, etc. They should have designed a routine to reach their goals. | - Vague / no clear answer - Answer nothing or micro topics that are showing a lack of humility | |
Individual ContributorPrevious Sales Experience | Hard SkillsSelf-awarenessGrowth Mindset | - Your objective is to ask as much questions as possible to understand as much aspects as possible of the deal - There is no good response because you will never be able to know all aspects of the deal and therefore the real reason why the deal failed but it allows you to see if the Sales has a good ability to look back and try to understand their mistakes. - Good Sales are always doing post-mortem and trying to understand what to improve. This is what the candidate should be able to demonstrate. - This question allows you to assess the hard sales skills of the candidate : does he/she follows a clear process, has an overall strategy, etc. | - Doesn’t have any good example with sufficient details - answer very briefly - Lack of ability to structure the answer and break it down into elements that are related to the Sales process (e.g. MEDDICC) | |
Individual ContributorPrevious Sales Experience | Hard SkillsGrowth MindsetSelf-awareness | - Candidate should show humility & ability to post-mortem lost deals - Candidate should be clear on the example provided | - Lack of precision would mean the candidate didn’t really try to understand the reason for the deal loss - Lack of humility / not comfortable to talk about mistakes / failures | |
Individual ContributorPrevious Sales Experience | CompetitorSelf-awareness | - Feels well about speaking about failure - Has analyzed failure reasons - Has built/executed a plan to be back on track | - Says it never happened (unlikely yet possible) - Poor analysis of what happened - No recovery plan | |
Individual ContributorPrevious Sales Experience | Self-awarenessCompetitor | - Self awareness about ups and downs - Has built personal methodology to overcome down periods - Shows self discipline | - Doesn’t seem to know him/herself - Doesn’t feel comfortable speaking about this | |
Individual ContributorPrevious Sales Experience | CompetitorDo-er | - The ideal candidate should easily find examples - The ideal candidate should ideally talk about collective wins but should be able comfortable explain his/her specific role - because the role of a Sales is to sell, and in this case sell him/herself to you | - Has trouble finding examples - implying the candidate is not a doer - Brags a lot and thinks he/she his only responsible for collective wins | |
Individual ContributorPrevious Sales Experience | Do-erHard Skills | - Should have called in the last days and easily remember - Can speak of tons of examples - Is able to explain in details the calling routines | - Hesitate / no clear answer - Doesn’t do phoning 😢 | |
Individual ContributorPrevious Sales Experience | CompetitorOrganization & AnalysisHard Skills | - Should know the numbers - Should be able to know how they compare to others - Should know why they are above or below others - Ideally will speak about sales cycle length on the same time naturally | - Doesn’t know the numbers - Not convincing in the answer | |
Individual ContributorManager | Hard SkillsOrganization & AnalysisCompetitor | - Clear time matrix - Dedicated time for TOFU - pipe generation (Individual Contributors) | - No clear time matrix - Not able to break down where he/she spends working time | |
Individual ContributorPrevious Sales Experience | Hard SkillsGrowth Mindset | 1/ Ask the candidate to do a simulation of cold/warm call or qualification with you It can be on their past experience or your product. 2/ Ask the candidate to self-debrief to see their ability to analyze their own performance 3/ Give your feedbacks and see if he/she is OK with them 4/ When they think it’s over, ask to do it again to see if they apply part of the feebdacks - they should at least integrate a portion of them | N/A | |
Individual ContributorPrevious Sales Experience | Hard Skills | - Mentions Excel (very often that’s actually the case) - Knows well competition and is able to summarize a battle card orally - Is able to tell about their strengths too and how to counter them on these aspects - Talks about value | - Weak knowledge of competition - Uses generic terms like : our UX is better - Doesn’t mention value to the customer | |
Individual ContributorPrevious Sales Experience | Hard Skills | - Demo itself shouldn’t be longer than 20/25 minutes (except maybe for very complex solution that include a Solution Consultant) - Demo meeting should start by an open discussion with the prospect to ensure qualification is accurate & still up-to-date - Candidate should mention leaving time for Q&A and next steps | - Very long demo > “5 mins of discussion then 55 mins of demo” - Not talking about qualification - Not talking about next steps | |
Individual Contributor | Hard SkillsOrganization & Analysis | - Knows the process perfectly - Is able to deep dive in any aspect / step of the process | - Unclear - Doesn’t follow a chronological order | |
Individual Contributor | Hard Skills | - Knows very well different objections encountered - Has a good answer to tackle the objection | - Unclear - Poor answers to the objection - not convincing | |
Individual Contributor | Hard Skills | - Talks about Value - Understands this is linked to a Qualification problem/early stage of the deal | - Not mentioning value/benefits for the customer - Doesn’t take responsibility for the lack of Qualification or talking about money early in the sales process | |
Manager | Hard SkillsCulture | - This can seem a very broad question but a strong Manager should be able to respond quite precisely - Clear about what he/she likes or dislikes | - Not able to answer precisely - Very broad answers e.g. “I like justice” | |
Manager | Performance ManagementHard Skills | - Revenue/Booking should be one of them - Mentions activity metrics - Mentions Pipe Generation & underlying criteria - Should be able to mention more than 3 easily | - Unclear answer - Troubles to list 3 metrics - Not able to explain how they are measured | |
Manager | Hard SkillsPerformance Management | - Has a clear methodology - Works with HR - Formalizes with e-mails / written feedback - Aims to make the plan a success & coach the employee - Timeline of ~3 months and not 9 months with frequent touchpoints - Understands that it doesn’t apply to employees in Trial Period | - No methodology - Nothing written - Very long Plan | |
Manager | Hard SkillsDo-er | - Should be on calls daily or almost (first line manager) - ⚠️ Shouldn’t keep the lead during the calls and leave his team do the job | - Not able to answer easily - Didn’t attend a client meeting for over a week & justifies it by other priorites | |
Manager | Hard SkillsCoaching | - Let his team do mistakes and doesn’t step-in to save the deal - Debrief and gives clear feedback to his team member after the call - Takes responsibilities on him : lack of training, preparation, or other | - Took-over the meeting to save it before it was too late - Refuses to take responsibility | |
Manager | Hard SkillsPerformance ManagementCoaching | - Should have examples (unless very young manager) if the candidate is a bar raiser - Knows very well what didn’t work out and why - Has setup a plan to improve the performances of the employee | - No experience doing such, can mean the manager lacks of experience or is not demanding - Not able to explain clearly - Not able to detail the process leading to the decision | |
Manager | Hard SkillsCoaching | - Easily finds examples of recent feedbacks - Knows how to do a feedback: has taken a dedicated time with the employee to do it, aimed to assist, backed with examples | - Feedback sandwitch / lack of managerial courage - Lack of methdology to provide feedback | |
Manager | Hard SkillsPerformance Management | - Knows top of mind the reasons - Is able to articulate the answer clearly and break it dosexplains why the person is good | - Doesn’t know who are the top performers and why - Doesn’t really know why they are better than the other | |
Manager | Hard SkillsPerformance Management | - Same as above - Has a clear plan for the person and already started to implement it - You can link the question to the feedback ones | - Not able to answer precisely - Hasn’t initiated any action to tackle the situation | |
Manager | Hard SkillsCultureAnimation | - Activity is a concern - Has methods to drive activity - Combines metrics management with other ways to drive activity such as animation / gamification - Participates in the activity - hands-on | - Doesn’t manage activity - Speaks only about metrics / KPIs and not how you make people do more | |
Manager | CultureHard Skills | - Has analyzed the reason for the departure of a strong element in the team - Takes responsibility for it - or at least able to question himself/herself | - Gives generic answers which are not true reasons : e.g. more money - Blame others : e.g. product, culture, etc. | |
Manager | Hard Skills | - Has a clear methodology for forecasting - Methodologies include for instance in/commit/best case or weighted pipeline | - Doesn’t answer clearly - No methodology - “Gut feeling” forecasting |