In my sales management career, I would bet that I've seen about 5,000 resumes for salespeople. Yet, I still haven't seen one that shows someone who has achieved 40% of quota. Every single resume shows 100%, 200%, or 2,000,000% of goal. Where are all of the people who have had less-than-stellar sales performances? Did they all leave the sales profession? If all of the resumes that I saw truly represented the performance of the individual, the U.S. economy would be thriving, to say the least. Every company would be enjoying record revenue performances.
If you have read my past articles, you've felt my passion for creating sales marriages, those relationships whereby a mutually-beneficial relationship is formulated between a sales professional and a company based on synergistic matches of needs. This is not easy to do as, right off the bat, the relationship begins with a flawed tool: a resume. It is this tool, not necessarily the individual, that dupes, tricks, and stretches the truth of a person's pedigree. Yet, as an employer, that is what you have to work with when hiring a sales professional. You need to find a way to mine through the information in a quest for the complete truth.
There are also cases where the tool isn't at fault, but the truth has been stretched. I spend a tremendous amount of time preaching about the importance of honesty and integrity in sales. Those are two words that are not often associated with the profession. As such, I believe that the quest to find salespeople who represent a company's brand well starts with a thorough resume review. Plain and simple, dishonesty in a salesperson's resume means he or she doesn't play on my team. There are more than enough statistics to support the issue of what I call "resume inflation."
I can recall a time when I ran a sales organization in the employment screening industry, a company that provided pre-employment background screening for other companies. We made an offer to a sales candidate who had impressed everyone he met, including the CEO. When we ran his background check, our core business, we found that his claim to have worked for a company for two and a half years was actually two and a half months.
The funny part is that when we asked him about the discrepancy, he lied again and said his former employer made a mistake. Fifteen minutes later, he called back (I think he remembered that background screening was our core business) and confessed. Needless to say, we couldn't have this person selling our background screening services.
Think about this: If someone would apply for a sales job at a company whose core business was employment background screening and lie about his background, what candidates do you think you are seeing? Every day, new technologies are introduced to the marketplace to make the screening process better and easier for hiring managers. Yet, none of these technology companies advocates using their technology as a replacement for a strong screening process. Assessments, for example, serve as a tool for the process, but they do not replace the process itself. Thus, it all begins with a strong resume review.
The resume review should not occur for the first time with the candidate sitting in front of you. An effective interview requires preparation. As such, the resume should be studied and areas of questions identified so that questions can be asked of the candidate during the interview. What areas should be perused? Here are five areas of a sales resume that require detailed attention.
Accomplishments
In sales, there is an old expression that says if you can't prove it, don't say it. This usually refers to the dialogue between a salesperson and a prospect, but it is also applicable for a resume. As a hiring manager, you are well within your rights to ask candidates for documentation of the accomplishments they list on their resumes. If they don't have documentation, perhaps a request for a reference for that accomplishment is appropriate.
Checking every single accomplishment is over the top, but checking one or two accomplishments makes sense. I suggest those that seem the most impressive to you about the candidate be verified. If someone told me that they personally doubled the size of the company in one year, I would want to see proof of that!
Title
Salespeople have more titles than there are prospects in the world. I can't keep track of all of them anymore. However, those titles don't necessarily correspond to responsibility. A small company may call their only salesperson a vice president, while a large company may call a person performing the exact same role a sales representative. While reviewing the resume, don't limit your perusal to the title. Dig a bit into the responsibilities that the individual had. During the interview process, ask questions to understand the role and responsibility that goes with the title.
Where some companies get into trouble is when they look to hire a senior salesperson and don't consider candidates with higher-level (vice president, for example) titles. Analyze the responsibilities that the individual had in his or her capacity to see if this individual matches your needs, regardless of what you call this role. If the resume is unclear about this, ask the candidate for details.
Employer Dates
If a salesperson has a gap, or gaps, in his employment, meaning he did not leave one job and go directly to another one, he will show years of employment, but not months. This creates the illusion of continuous employment. If you background screen as part of your hiring process and employment verification is part of that scope, this will be identified at that time. However, that takes time and dollars. (If you haven't seen my white paper titled, "Are There Criminals on Your Sales Team?" send me an email for your copy.)
But, why wait until the end of the process to learn something you can know now? When you see years on a resume, ask the candidate to provide months of employment, too. Ask questions to understand the gaps. You may still elect to hire the person, based on the explanation. At least you get the complete picture.
Training Programs
Many salespeople list the training programs that they have completed on their resume, but no one verifies that. When hiring IT professionals, it is common to check training and certification completion. Not so with salespeople. So, the salesperson has no risk by stating that he has completed the "Miller-Heiman Strategic Selling" course on his resume. Ask for a copy of his completion certificate. If he has truly taken the course, you will see a confident reaction. If he has only read the book, or perhaps not even that, you will see him squirm in his seat.
College Degree
When I look at the education section on a resume, I expect to see college name, degree completed, and graduation date. However, I regularly see that degree or graduation date or both are omitted. Red flag! Sure, a background check will expose that too, but why wait until post-offer to find out?
When you see missing information on the resume, ask candidates point-blank if they graduated college, what year, and with what major? Some omit their graduation year to hide their age, but others do it to create the illusion of degree completion. Unfortunately, you will find many salespeople who list a college and year, hoping you won't ask any other questions.
I don't believe that most salespeople intend to dupe their potential employer, but I've also been around the block long enough to know that the percentage that "inflate" is high enough to warrant a circumspect analysis of the resume.