How To Quickly Integrate A New Salesperson Into Your IT Company, Part 2

By Dennis O’Connell, Business Development Manager, HTG Peer Groups

Read Part 1

In the first part of this series, I shared some strategies around onboarding a salesperson into a new industry.  This article will focus on the second question of how to immerse a new hire in your company culture and expectations.

I was asked by one of our peer group members to provide some advice as it related to the hiring and onboarding of a new sales person who did not have an IT industry background.

There is no better way to learn how to sell than to listen to a sale being made. Start taking the new salesperson along on all your sales calls as a silent observer.  This includes any meetings or phone calls you have over the next two months. Go through your calendar and invite the new hire now.

Somewhere along the way, the new salesperson will start to have confidence in what he or she is selling. Gradually change the new hire’s role in meetings:

• no participation
• adding a few comments here and there prompted by you
• Leading the meeting, providing 50 percent of the content
• Leading  the meeting with you providing backup as needed
• Owning the meeting with very minimal participation from you

This process could take anywhere from 30 to 90 days depending on how quickly the new hire learns.

Please log in or register below to read the full article.