Why Predictive Simulations Enable Better Sales Hiring Decisions

Personality assessments. Cognitive tests. Skill-based tests. You’ve probably had candidates complete hundreds of these over the years. The goal, of course, is to find out who is the right fit for the job—and that is always tricky. Since these tests are the well-accepted tools everyone uses to predict a good or bad sales hire, you continue to use them. Here’s a question, though:  

Isn’t there more to predicting sales performance?

Afterall, none of these tests look like the job you’re hiring someone to do–you’re not hiring someone to tell you which emotion is most like them, or which number comes next in a series.  You’re hoping that you’ll be able to predict their performance based on how someone answers those questions.

And another thing–your candidates don’t like taking these tests.

• They’re time-consuming.
• They’re repetitive.
• They take a long time.
• They feel like mind games.

Sometimes the best candidates won’t even bother–they know they’re in demand. They’ll go work for your competitor. 

There must be a better way to find out which of your candidates will knock their quota out of the park, and at the same time sell them on working for your organization. 

Enter Predictive Simulations.

Predictive Simulation: Predicting Performance, Not Just Behaviors

At Sciolytix, we’ve always considered ourselves to be innovators and pioneers when it comes to providing simulations to develop salespeople. So what if we applied that same simulation concept to hiring and more accurately predicting future performance? And what if we told you your candidates would enjoy it?  With a predictive simulation:

• The top talent recognize your company as a place they want to work.
• Candidates don’t feel like you’re wasting their time.
• They know you’re using something cutting-edge and relevant.
• You get to make a hiring decision based on actual selling performance.

For years, our sales simulations have helped salespeople learn how to sell better.  Salespeople interact with a computer-controlled avatar in a dozen unique sales environments–including prospecting, negotiating, closing a deal, and answering objections. There’s no learning curve to using the simulations, and salespeople practice their skills in a safe, private, non-judgmental environment. When they’re out in the real world, they are confident and sharp, and all of their skills have been grooved into natural behaviors.

With our new predictive simulations, we’re expanding beyond training salespeople and into the area of evaluating sales candidates. The same way a pilot proves they can fly in a flight simulator, your candidates prove they can sell in a sales simulator.  There are no mind games, and no tricks–just a pure measure of selling performance.

Predictive simulations enhance your hiring process in a number of ways:

1. You measure sales performance directly, by letting candidates show off their skills.
2. It’s objective–every candidate gets to perform in the same scenario.
3. It reduces bias by allowing sales performance to guide your hiring decision.
4. It’s nearly impossible to fake–the only way to do well is to know how to sell.
5. Performance in the simulation is tied directly to your real-world KPIs.

That last one is critically important. We don’t just tell you how well a candidate did in the sims.  We give you a direct measure of quota attainment–essentially, what percent of quota will this person hit if you put them in the job.  And we can adapt our scoring to whatever KPI is most important to you (e.g. appointments, calls, pipeline flow, etc.).

If you’d like to learn more, please listen to our Disruptors & Innovators podcast. We are revolutionizing the way organizations hire, onboard, and develop talent. Predictive simulations are the latest enhancement we’re adding to that arsenal of products. And we guarantee you won’t be disappointed.