9. Selection Process

I. INTRODUCTION 

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Selection systems for sales personnel range from simple one step systems consisting of nothing more than an informal personal interview, to complex multiple-step systems incorporating diverse mechanisms designed to gather information about applicants for sales jobs. A selection system is a set of successive “screens”, at any of which an applicant may be dropped from further consideration.

I. INTRODUCTION 

A selection system fulfills its main mission if it improves management’s ability to estimate success and failure probabilities. Management, in other words, because has available the information gathered through the selection system, makes more accurate estimates of the chances that a particular applicant will succeed a company sales position.

Steps in Selection Process Step 1 – Pre – Interview Screening Step 2 – Formal Application Step 3 - Interview Step 4 - References Step 5 – Employment Tests Step 6 – Physical Examinations

II. Steps in Selection Process 1. Pre – Interview Screening • Preinterview screening is for the purpose of eliminating obviously unqualified applicants, thus saving the time of interviewers and applicants. •

The applicant is provided information about the company and general details about selling positions in it a well prepared recruiting brochure does this effectively and does not require an employee’s time for anything other than to hand it to the applicant.

II. Steps in Selection Process 1. Pre – Interview Screening •

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The preliminary interview is short, perhaps no more than twenty minutes. Questions about the company and the job are answered while the company employee determines whether the applicant meets minimum qualifications. If this hurdle is passed and the applicant expresses interest, he or she is asked to fill out a formal application form, and an appointment is made for one or more formal interviews.

II. Steps in the Selection Process 2. Formal Application • The formal application form serves as a central record for all pertinent information collected during the selection process. • A formal application is filled out after a preliminary interview indicates that a job candidate has promise as a company salesperson. • The application form may be filled out by the applicant personally or by an interviewer who records the applicant’s responses. • Sometimes, section are reserved for later recording of the results of such selection steps as reference and credit checks, testing, and physical examination.

II. Steps in Selection Process 3. The Interview • The interview is the most widely used selection step and in some companies it comprises the entire selection system. • Some personnel experts criticize the interview as an unreliable tool, but it is an effective way to obtain certain information. • No other method is quite so satisfactory in judging an individual as to ability in oral communication, personal appearance and manners, attitude toward selling and the life in general, reaction to obstacles presented face to face, and personal impact upon others.

II. Steps in Selection Process 3. The Interview •

Good interviewers avoid covering the same ground as other selection devices. The interviewer reviews the completed application form before the interview and refrains from asking questions already answered.

II. Steps in Selection Process 3. The Interview •

Questions during interviewing: The questions asked to the applicant should reflect the following: o o o o o o o

Attitude Motivation Initiative Stability Planning Insight Social skills

II. Steps in the Selection Process 3. The Interview There are different ways to do interviewing techniques and they are as follows :• Patterned Interview : Here a interviewer uses a prepared outline of questions to elicit a basic core of information. The interviewer may directly work from the outline, recording answers as they are given, but this may make the conversation suited and the applicant nervous. • Nondirective Interview : In this technique the applicant is encouraged to talk freely about his or her experience, training, and future plans. The interviewer asks a few direct questions and says only enough to keep the interviewee talking.

II. Steps in the Selection Process •

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Interaction (Stress) Interview : The interaction interview stimulates and stresses the applicant that would meet in actual selling & provides way to observe the applicant’s reaction to them. This interviewing technique has long been used by sales executives who, in interviewing prospective sales personnel, hand the applicant an Ashtray or other object and say “ Here, sell this to me”. Rating Scale : One shortcoming of personal interview is its tendency to lack objectivity, a defect that is reduced through rating scales. These are so constructed that interviewers ratings are channeled into a limited choice of responses. In evaluating an applicants general appearance, for e.g., one much –used form forces an interviewer to choose one of five descriptive phrases: very neat, nicely dressed, presentable, untidy, slovenly.

II. Steps in the Selection Process 4. References • References provide information on the applicants not available from other sources. Some employers deny the value of references saying that references hesitate to criticize personal friends, ex-employees. But the experienced employers reads between the lines, and sees where, for example, the weak candidate is not praised. •

Personal contact is best way to obtain information from references, since facial expressions and voice intonations reveal a great deal, and most people are more frank orally than in writing.

II. Steps in the Selection Process 4. References • Credit Check : Many companies run credit checks on applicants for sales positions. When a heavy burden of personal debt is found, it may indicate financial worries interfering with productivity, motivating factor serving to spur productivity to determine which requires further investigation.

II. Steps in the Selection Process 5. Employment Tests • The purpose of testing is to determine whether applicants have the traits the company feels leads to selling successfully. In turn, this results in Advantages such as lower turnover and increased performance. • Types of Tests: Four types of psychological tests are used in selection system for sales personnel: • Tests of ability measure how well a person can perform particular tasks with maximum motivation (tests for best performance).

II. Steps in the Selection Process Tests of habitual characteristics gauge how prospective employees at in their daily work normally (tests of typical performance). • Interest test measures an individuals interest in a particular type of job. • Achievement tests measure how much individuals have learned from their experiences, training, or education. Effective sales executives recognize that psychological testing, although capable of making valuable contribution, is 1 step in selection system •

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II. Steps in the Selection Process 6. Physical Examination • Since good health is important to a salespersons success, most companies require physical examination. • Because of the relatively high cost, the physical examination generally is one of the last step.

III. Conclusion •

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Appropriate selection procedures, and their skillful execution, result in greater selling efficiency. A higher- grade salesperson is produced, and the advantage of having such employees make impressive list- better work quality improved market coverage, superior customer relations, and a lower ratio of selling expense to sales. Thus, good selection fits the right person to the right job, thereby increasing job satisfaction and reducing the cost of personnel turnover.