doggyhead2

SDR

Bringing up numbers in an interview

I always see people advocating for bringing up their past accomplishments and goals they hit. "Hit 120% quota Q2" etc. How is this even verified as a hiring manager? Does everybody slightly embellish their goals? Who is gonna be honest and say they haven't been hitting quota?

💡 Education/Resources

😳 Ethics

27 comments

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mitts2

Politicker

Account Executive

I'm not a hiring manager but I do interview a lot of candidates. I don't care about performance numbers. Can you speak to your process? Can you provide specific examples of how you did stuff? Are you coachable? Will I enjoy working with you? Can I learn something from you?

Answers to those questions are far more important to me that your % to Goal

CuriousFox

WR Officer

🦊

Yes. I want to hear step by step about your biggest deal from start to finish. I can read you and tell if you are being honest.

mitts2

Politicker

Account Executive

Lol thats the first question I ask everybody. Walk me through your favorite deal.

UrAssIsSaaS

Arsonist

SaaS Eater

Yup I love asking this, every.single.interview

MCP

Valued Contributor

Sales Director

And the one that got away. Why, what did you learn and how did that help you down the line to bounce back & win more?

Jbeans

Opinionated

Director of Sales

Great question

Jbeans

Opinionated

Director of Sales

So true. I’m like 🤨 when things are to good to be true.

UrAssIsSaaS

Arsonist

SaaS Eater

From the other side of the table I put very little weight into what a candidate says their past performance was. I can cross check that when I talk to their references. What I care more about in an interview is your ability to speak to your process, is it repeatable, do you know it like the back of your hand, and can you walk me through it in the context of a recent deal you closed.

There is too much noise around performance metrics that I am not aware of as a hiring manager so I dont put much weight on them in the interview.

MCP

Valued Contributor

Sales Director

Funny thing is, during the screening they ask what quotas and attainments were. They also ask about ASP or ARR/MRR. I don’t care for the quota/attainment question, most businesses fuck quota up so bad it becomes irrelevant.

AIDA

Executive

Business Development Manager

When I was a sales recruiter I never once checked to see if the numbers were true.
I think only one client ever asked for verification of those numbers

ColdCallFartBoy

Celebrated Contributor

Business Development Representative

I agree, I recently ran an interview to screen a new SDR at my company and all he could talk about was his numbers at his current company which sells completely different products into a different field so it really didn't mean much to me

Diablo

Politicker

Sr. AE

I'm not sure who is honest but the hiring company might want to measure your potential and not your past performance as they will measure you in their company.

jefe

Arsonist

🍁

I've usually done this when I have demonstrable successes, like President's Club.

Or an ex-manager that has my back and will verify.

Not sure if there's much of a downside....

buckets1

Politicker

This one’s a head scratcher for me as well. Can’t imagine a scenario I’d leave my current company while I’m consistently hitting quota. Territories get chopped in half, I get assigned Nebraska or some shit sure I’d leave. Not sure what I’d do in the interviews when performance comes up.

jefe

Arsonist

🍁

There's definitely a few. As they say, people often leave the manager not the job.

Some places are toxic as hell.

Sunbunny31

Arsonist

Sr Sales Executive 🐰

I had all up/overachieving years until the strategy changed at my long term company. It all came from one manager hired at the end of my last awesome year. It went downhill from there, and I'm glad I left. Loved the company, couldn't stand what was happening in my part of it. Left because of the plan and the manager. Were my last two years my best? Absolutely not. I could no longer afford to wait for brighter days and better managers. Did any of that come up in my interviews? Nope. I mentioned that I was interested in making a change, that the opportunity excited me, and I was interested in joining the company I'm at. My numbers never came up.

jefe

Arsonist

🍁

Very true. I was the top producer of the entire company at a spot I was at a few years ago. They released a new version, rebranded, increased prices by 40% with less features.

Features that were required by legislation and state contracts to be present in the solutions I was selling to schoolboards.

Somehow that new VP stuck around for several months after I left, though kept reducing and reducing the company's expected new biz revenues.

Thankfully they've recovered and it's a great product, but such a shame as I loved the place, the people, and was killing it until they shot us all in the foot.

Sunbunny31

Arsonist

Sr Sales Executive 🐰

If only they'd let us make the rules and the plans.

buckets1

Politicker

@jefe that's a good point. I was thinking more about the scenario of leaving somewhere I'm doing well for the promise of a higher OTE. Not worth the financial risk of smoke screen OTEs to me. But yeah -- if the place was toxic I'd leave.

jefe

Arsonist

🍁

OTE is like PTO - they can put whatever they want in the description, but reality seldom aligns with 'what's possible!'

Never checked out RepVue, will have to at some point. But I've definitely been burned by some BS OTE stuff. Or 'we have more leads than we can handle!' type nonsense.

Live and learn

Or learn from fellow savages...

jefe

Arsonist

🍁

@Sunbunny31 RIGHT!?

Sunbunny31

Arsonist

Sr Sales Executive 🐰

@jefe I can't imagine how there would be any problems whatsoever with letting a bunch of half-feral sales savages be in control.

buckets1

Politicker

Haha @jefe"more leads than we can handle" = we don't have the data to differentiate a shit lead from a good one. Check out RepVue for sure! Much better than Glassdoor.

cw95

Politicker

Head of SDR

Nah, stats are good but equally, stats are right half the time.

cw95

Politicker

Head of SDR

I’m always sceptical about this as how would one know? I could make up that I hit 150% in one month but who would know?

ChumpChange

Politicker

Channel Manager

Numbers don't really mean anything since there's no realistic way of validating that information. I'm more concerned with methodology, strategy, business acumen, and overall conversation skills.

saaskicker

Tycoon

Enterprise AE

Find other stats that are more broad, i harp on average deal size, average days to close, close rate and rankings amongst peers vs. quota attainment.