Hiring a sales person can be stressful. Not only does the hiring process take you away from your day-to-day responsibilities, but it also creates another level of anxiety: if you don’t choose the right person for the job, your team could take a hit in decreased sales and lower morale. Fortunately, there are specific things you can do to take the stress out of hiring a sales person. 

Hire Some Help

You have a lot on your plate, and delegating some or all of the hiring process can make a huge difference in your daily schedule and your overall stress. Hiring a sales person is a lengthy and involved process, and you can significantly cut down on the time you put into it by delegating. For example, you could hire a recruiting company to handle the screening process for you. In this way, you can skip all the reading of resumes and first rounds of interviews and just get involved when the field is narrowed for you.

Use Your Online Network

Consider reversing the hiring process by going out and finding the person you want to hire. This can be easy to do when you use your online network. With sites like LinkedIn, you can look at resumes, experience, and career achievements and find people who would be good candidates for your sales opening. Approach the best candidates, and talk to them about what your company has to offer that they may not be getting in their current position. This method of hiring a sales person is less time-intensive for you, and it can help you to find just the person you’re looking for.

Ask Your Other Sales People for Referrals

Your current sales people can really help you with hiring a sales person, especially because they have friends and former co-workers in the local industry. You can encourage your employees to give referrals by offering bonuses for successful hires they refer. Like the strategy using your online network, using referrals can reduce your stress by helping you to weed through a bunch of ill-qualified resumes.

Improve Your Interviewing Skills

If the thought of interviewing candidates makes you feel ill at ease, brush up on your skills. Learn to ask questions that allow you to get a good feel for how a potential sales person would react in difficult situations, how motivated the person is, and what qualities he or she could bring to your organization. Keep control of the interview, and don’t let interviews consume too much of your day.

Know What You Want

Perhaps the most important thing you can do when hiring a sales person is to know what you want. When you post a job opening, you’ll probably receive a landslide of resumes and applications, and it’s easy to get overwhelmed with the variety of people and skills you’ll read about on these applications. Before you even begin hiring a sales person, make a list of your desired qualifications and use this list to prioritize the applications. This will keep you focused and help you with hiring a sales person who will truly meet your needs.

Hiring a sales person doesn’t have to be stressful. You can keep this task manageable by getting some help, using your online network, asking your current employees for referrals, improving your interviewing skills, and knowing what you want before you ever start reading applications. By doing these things, you’ll find the person you’re looking for without sacrificing your day-to-day operations.