• Great Example of Why Sales Success Is Not Always Transferable

    • April 24, 2018
    • Posted by: Dave Kurlan
    • Category: Understanding the Sales Force

    Would a NFL Quarterback make a good MLB pitcher?  Would a star MLB hitter be a great Pro Golfer?  Would an all-star NBA Center be an effective Lacrosse player?

    Right now, an event is occurring on the world stage that shows, in a very persuasive way, why success in sales isn’t always transferrable from one company, industry or role to another.

    For example, a startup storage technology company hired all the salespeople they could get from the most well-known and well-respected company in their space.  The leadership team expected that these experienced and credible salespeople would leverage the new company’s great new technology and cause sales to take off like a rocket for Storageville (made up name).  It didn’t happen.

    Another company hired a Sales VP from a well-known Fortune 1000 company and believed that his experience would make it easy for him to build a top-performing sales organization like the one he ran at Fortuneville (made up name).  It didn’t happen.

    These two examples aren’t exceptions to the rule.  They are the rule.  But the rule to what?  I’ll explain the context for the rule and explain the event that serves as such a great example.

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  • Compromises in Sales Candidate Assessments Compromise Revenue

    • September 19, 2012
    • Posted by: Dave Kurlan
    • Category: Understanding the Sales Force

    Experience has demonstrated that there are three areas where companies tend to compromise with sales candidate assessments and those compromises always lead to revenue shortages:

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  • More Sales Assessment Imposters Exposed

    • May 29, 2012
    • Posted by: Dave Kurlan
    • Category: Understanding the Sales Force

    Assessments can have a huge impact on selection, diagnosis and development of the sales organization.  However, if you choose the wrong assessments – imposters – you won’t receive any of the powerful intelligence or predictive benefits that OMG provides its users.  

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  • Another Sales Assessment Takes on OMG – What Does it Reveal?

    • April 4, 2012
    • Posted by: Dave Kurlan
    • Category: Understanding the Sales Force

    I received an email asking if I could explain why OMG’s assessment said “Not Recommended” and the SalesAP said “Highly Recommended”.  In general terms, SalesAP, like all personality assessments, makes assumptions about its sales findings. 

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  • Call Reluctance in Salespeople – Causes, Factors, and Predictors

    • April 15, 2010
    • Posted by: Dave Kurlan
    • Category: Understanding the Sales Force

    Objective Management Group (OMG) has always been able to accurately (to 95%) predict whether a salesperson would succeed and provide conditions for employment. Over the years, we’ve been able to fine tune our accuracy even more as we incorporated some additional non-sales factors that made strong salespeople poor candidates for a particular role or company.  Three of the most important, recent factors were:

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