Interview tips for sales and recruitment jobs.

soundb0y

soundb0y

soundb0y

Soldato
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Over the next week I have a number of job interviews lined up. The majority are for roles in sales or recruitment.

Besides the standard preparation I was just wondering if anyone worked in either of these jobs and had any hints and tips for interviews?

Thanks in advance.
 
My girlfriend recently went for an interview for a company based in C. London.

I am about to go out but i can provide a lot of information later on. :)

All i will say is that there are quite a few stages she had to go through.
 
Some kinds of recruitment shold be avoided. I can't say if it's still true today but I did it briefly in the 80s and was shocked by the racism of the employers and the stupidity and egos of the candidates. hated it.

As for sales, you need to be very careful about the projected salaries because they will all be on the basis of making your sales target which will be very hard to do.
 
I think if you generally swagger in and act like a complete **** with a huge ego they'll probably give you the job. Well that's basically what they're looking for (certainly in the types of recruitment places that look for people who are looking for general 'sales' jobs).

On the plus side you can earn a lot of money in these roles, on the downside there will likely be a reasonable amount of pressure(as you'd expect) and you'll likely have to feed people a lot of BS.

If they tell you the OTE is 100k the reality is that a couple of top sales people took home 100k or there about last year, a decent number of people probably haven't been there for a year, a number of people probably left within a year of starting and the others probably took home 30-60k.
 
I work in sales. What I belive you need to know is that their not always looking for a person with a sales background. They look for the ambition and drive. I went into my sales interview and held my hands up saying I have no background, but I also mentioned thats not a bad thing. You will not be bringing any bad habits to this new job and you will be pliable, so the manager of you can teach you the ways in which he wants you to work.

I find people who recuit sales people tend to look for:
drive
loves money
like the finer things in life
very goal orientated
ambition
competietive edge
listens
can articulate a conversation
doesnt see the job as a 9-5
wants a career
 
Thanks for the replies so far they are all helping.

I know about OTE but they all have respectable base salaries also.

Could anyone tell me anything about exactly what recruitment/sales jobs actually entail? This is something I need to understand and then apply my skill sets to. Is it just sitting in an office making calls all day or is there more to it?

cheers
 
oh, when lived in Brizzle went to work for recruitment agancy, ended up starting and running a different branch of it, over 8 offices. did 'bout 6 years, you burn out. Walked out one sunny day, when really had had enough.
From the employers side, I recruited 42 'consultants' and was on a massive basic, car, BUPA etc. The ordinary guys came and went within either 3 months ( obvious target fail) or one year ( alco drop outs, wifes didnt see them) but I can say earned big heaps ££, ignore target an triple it in yer head, and ask for the money. I asked for, and got, a raise every 3 months, but its soul destroying hard work, dont even think 9 to 5. Unless you want to be average. back in the day my basic was 7k, but i set myself 42k as basic living, and did it. From thence, empire...( oh, and employ own secretary, get stuff done on same day)
If you really want to know whats it like, the hours, the highs, the lows, then bell/email.
It can be extremely good, if you click right, but for most, and I mean most, its teetering on th edge of the quarterly target all the time.
if i hadnt been trained by yellow pages (3 years)before i went there, i would have failed on courage.
Do NOT start as a Vacancy Controller.
 
And i quote:

"Do not go into it unless you are ruthless, a background of sales and willing to work long hours".

She described the interview process as very long with lots of stages. The initial phone interview, a second interview at the company itself, a third interview with five stages with directors and finally a trial day. The five stages she had to go through in the single day lasted around 3 hours.

Also, it is important to note that there isn't a group environment and it is focused entirely on you and your performance. Therefore, there is a lot of stress and pressure. The majority of the time - she did a trial day - is spent on the phone and headhunting individuals.

Obviously the money is good and she would have been on £21k and would have risen to £35k within a year but she didn't feel up for the stress and pressure at all. And she was described as too nice. :p



Edit: Just saw your post. My girlfriend described her trial day as very long with few breaks. She spent the majority of the time uploading CVs to the website and being on the phone. She said she stresses that being on the phone is around 90% of the job. Bear in mind, this is for a C London based company.
 
Last edited:
Foxxy said:
I work in sales. What I belive you need to know is that their not always looking for a person with a sales background. They look for the ambition and drive. I went into my sales interview and held my hands up saying I have no background, but I also mentioned thats not a bad thing. You will not be bringing any bad habits to this new job and you will be pliable, so the manager of you can teach you the ways in which he wants you to work.

I find people who recuit sales people tend to look for:
drive
loves money
like the finer things in life
very goal orientated
ambition
competietive edge
listens
can articulate a conversation
doesnt see the job as a 9-5
wants a career
Click to expand...

Interesting that you don't mention the customer at all.

But I'm a Buyer and predisposed to dislike you on principal :)
 
I work in recruitment, apart from I do marketing for the company, so I am not one of the billers. Work in the right company and you will get a good return, be expected to put the hours in.

My last company was a morgue compared to the company I work at now - its basically a call centre. Weekly target meetings, day plans, call time (i.e. there are set hours - 10 - 12 and 2 - 4pm where you have to be on the phone to candidates/clients constantly). Call time and cvs sent to clients are measured. Best people of the month get cash incentives. Bill over £250k a year and you get a Rolex.... Qtrly trips abroad (last one was skiiing) for the top 10 billers. Lots of client and candidate meetings... staying late, getting in early.

Really hard work - I couldn't do it, you get to a point where you want a work/life balance....You also need a thick skin.

BB x
 
I've been doing recruitment for about 4 years now, started off in IT recruitment which looking back now is probably the most stressful job I have ever had. Targets are very high, most of the time you are cold calling, you have to act like a back stabbing loner to get anywhere and I burned out after almost 2 years.

Changed industries and have been doing media recruitment for the past 2 years and I can honestly say if you find the right organisation and you actually enjoy the recruitment part (finding someone a job they love, I am now friends with a select few of my candidates as well as clients and have met some really good people in the industry) then it's a job that can offer very big rewards in the long run and I do mean long run. There are a 100 small agencies offering £100k OTE's etc.. All I can say is that you will only earn that if you give up your life and even then its usually never enough.

My advice would be to go into a sector you are interested in as that will make the difference, if you don't have an interest in the industry then you have no chance of enjoying the job nor being any good which is the reason why so many people hate recruiters, the majority tend to be rubbish and have no idea about the sector or industry they work in.

If you don't want hardcore sales environment with a revolving door mentality then stay clear of sales recruitment, IT recruitment, finance recruitment and construction.

If you need any more advice or help give me a shout.
 
Scientific said:
My advice would be to go into a sector you are interested in as that will make the difference, if you don't have an interest in the industry then you have no chance of enjoying the job nor being any good which is the reason why so many people hate recruiters, the majority tend to be rubbish and have no idea about the sector or industry they work in.

If you don't want hardcore sales environment with a revolving door mentality then stay clear of sales recruitment, IT recruitment, finance recruitment and construction.
Click to expand...

^^^ all excellent advice. There are good rec cons out there and bloody awful ones too... The girl who got me my current job hassled me every week till I finished my notice (to make sure I didn't change my mind/get counter offered) and I haven't heard from her since then - no call on my first day/week/month. I'm actually thinking of giving her a call to give her a piece of my mind... the thing that annoys me the most is that my CV clearly states I work in recruitment!

BB x
 
Thanks for all the replies they are all very helpful.

To be honest this has made me question whether it is even a sector I want to work in. I say to myself the hours etc wouldnt bother me as long as the £££ was good, but I don't tend to work well with large amounts of stress or take rejection well.

The recruitment job is indeed IT recruitment, and the sales are mostly IT sales.
 
soundb0y said:
I don't tend to work well with large amounts of stress or take rejection well
Click to expand...

Not looking to put you off (I've never worked in sales/recruitment) but a recurring theme I keep hearing is the need to be 'thick-skinned'. It seems to me with these sort of jobs you just need to be detached from the whole emotion of it (dealing with people all the time), you just aim for your targets and move on to the next thing regardless following every success or failure. You play the numbers game, get people's hopes up, and most importantly make efficient use of your time - never pickup the phone unless it will make you money now or in the future.
 
I agree and after speaking to numerous people it seems to be the case. To be honest I have never really had to test myself under these circumstances so don't really know how I would fare.

I am willing to give it a shot though.
 
[FnG]magnolia;16659923 said:
Interesting that you don't mention the customer at all.

But I'm a Buyer and predisposed to dislike you on principal :)
Click to expand...

Lol, I said Listens :P

Narr what I mean is at this stage if your new to it all you wont have a huge amount of customer skills. These get taught through trainings, its all stuff that the business can add to you. What the business cant give you is the motivation and drive.

Luckily for me I deal with B2B sales, so I never have any customers raging down the phone at me.

Regarding the interview process, I only had 2 interview and 1 psychometric test. 1 initial interview to see if I would work within the business, the second with the head of my sector. Then the test so see if I had any major flaws anywhere.

Is your interview with an agency, like pareto? Or with the actual business?
 
If it's IT Recruitment then I would agree with most of the comments above about you needing to be detached from people, numbers focused and only picking the phone up when its in your best interest.

However most of the horror stories you will hear from people who have done sales or recruitment will be the ones of people who went in to the job not fully prepared or going into the wrong industry which I mention above, they then get put on a stupid target to meet without any recruitment training or experience and within 3 months are stressed to the point of quitting.

If recruitment or sales is what you want maybe do a bit of research into some companies who you have heard about or want to work for and get a bit more info before taking the next step, possibly look into The Times top 100 companies as well, again this isn't a sure fire way of finding a decent company but it's a start.
 
I have my questions sorted for them.

One of the possible questions that may come up is,

"Why do you want to work in an office and make phone calls all day?"

Try as I might I can not think of a clever answer for this apart from, if thats what the path to financial reward is then I have no issue.
 
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