Amity Business School

Sales Management
MKTG603
 Amity Business School

At the end of this session, you will be

able to identify:

• Significance of Successful Hiring

• Planning to Hire
• Conducting Job Analysis
• Writing Job Description
• Recruitment Process
 Amity Business School

Significance of Successful Hiring

• A quality & structured effort in recruitment &

selection is important.
• Hiring a wrong person incurs huge costs.
• Companies have realized that each competitive
advantage they have can be duplicated by their
competitors excluding just one attribute :
– High Performing Employees
 Contd… Amity Business School

A comprehensive recruitment & selection process consists of five

inter related steps :-
1. Determining the no. of salespeople needed
2. Identifying unique skills, knowledge & attitudes a salesperson
needs to do the job successfully
3. Attracting a sufficient pool of applicants to form a pool of
potential new hires
4. Conducting interviews for accurately assessing the
applicant’s qualification for the position
5. Offering a sales position to one or more applicants.
 Planning to Hire Amity Business School

Planning to hire involves three steps:-

➢ Calculating the turnover rate
➢ Conducting Job analysis
➢ Writing Job description
 Planning to Hire Amity Business School

• Presence of a sales opening should not be the only trigger to

kick start the selection process.
• Ideally a sales selection process should consider factors such
as firm’s strategy, predicted sales force turnover rate, growth
or shrinkage of new territories & promotion & retirement of
sales personnel
• The longer a territory goes without a salesperson the more
revenue the company stands to lose to its competitor.
• Sales is generally a profession marked by a high turnover rate,
that’s why recruitment should be an ongoing process.
 Turnover Rate Amity Business School

• A turnover rate is the annual percentage of salespeople that

leave the firm for both controllable & uncontrollable reasons.

Annual turnover rate = No. of salespeople that left the firm

during the year

Average sales force size during the year

•A high turnover rate or a very low turnover rate should be dealt

& handled seriously
 Contd… Amity Business School

• The reasons for the same should be jointly investigated by the

sales managers & HR personnel.
• A lot many times this analysis reveals unpleasant truths about
the organization. For eg : a high turnover rate with the newly
hired reps signifies the need for improving the initial training
or the need for mentors.
• If more senior salespeople are leaving, an alternate career plan
may be developed to encourage them to stay with the
organization.
• If people are opting out of sales profession only, then perhaps
the firm’s recruitment & selection process is not painting the
realistic view of sales job.
 Conducting Job Analysis Amity Business School

• Involves assessing personal characteristics or “objective

profile” should sales managers seek while looking for
candidates.

• A Job Analysis is an objective examination of duties, activities

& behaviors of people employed in sales position.

• A comprehensive sales position analysis provide the hiring

manager with the understanding-
▪ What a salesperson currently does on the job?
▪ How should he/she ideally spend his/her time?
 Writing Job Description Amity Business School

After conducting a comprehensive job analysis, a job description is prepared.

The same should address for a salesperson :

1. Nature of products/ services

2. Customer type (s) & frequency of customer visit
3. His specific tasks & responsibilities
4. Relationship b/w salesperson & other departments
5. Intellectual & physical demands of the job
6. Environmental factors affecting the sales position & lastly
7. Compensation method used.

➢ The initial stage of the process i.e. determining the qualifications of a new
hire is the most exacting part of the selection process
➢ Some firms hire only experienced applicants who have proven track record
whereas some hire sales “ neophytes”
 Finding & Recruiting
Applicants Amity Business School

• Recruitment is the process firms use to find & hire the best
qualified candidates for an open sales position.
• Planning Requirement Of Sales Representatives involves
two aspects
Quantitative Aspect : Determining The Sales Force Size
Qualitative Aspects :Job analysis, Job description, Job
qualifications
• Based upon accurate information gathered while forecasting
turnover, conducting job analysis & writing concise job
description
 Recruiting Process Amity Business School

A. Plan and coordinate sales recruiting

B. Use several recruiting sources

C. Select and train qualified recruiters

D. Review the recruiting programs

 Amity Business School

Plan And Coordinate Sales Recruiting

• Organization for recruiting & selection -

centralized/decentralized

• Sales managers must avoid crisis handling

• Sales process must be planned and organized

• A file should be maintained for all the applicants- pre

recruiting reservoir- volunteer walk- ins etc.
 Amity Business School

Use several recruiting sources

• Recruiting source evaluation

• Internal Sources
Company sales personnel
Internal transfers

• External Sources
Referrals- Networking
Advertisements- Blind Advertisements
Private Recruiters
Educational Institutions
Job career fairs/ trade shows
E- recruiting
 Amity Business School

Select and Train Qualified Recruiters

• Top management should stress effective recruiting to sales
managers.

• Recruiting staff should be thoroughly trained in recruiting

methods and what to look in for, in a sales applicant

• Recruiters must have knowledge and ability to discuss factors

associated with :-
➢ Job satisfaction
➢ Compensation
➢ Employee morale
➢ Training programs
➢ Internal communications
 Amity Business School

Review the Recruiting Programs

• Records should be kept of sales applicants that come from

various recruiting sources

• Offer rejection questionnaires, exit interviews and should be

analyzed and reported.
 Amity Business School

In this session, we have discussed:

• Significance of Successful Hiring

• Planning to Hire
• Conducting Job Analysis
• Writing Job Description
• Recruitment Process