NEW Sales Competence Assessments

Today's webinar is a little different from the usual as we are excited to be launching an entirely new tool in our FinxS online platform, the sales competence questionnaire. We will introduce the assessment and some of the features in the development report before talking through some frequently asked questions. We will then open up the chat and answer any questions from you watching. 

After hearing for the past couple of weeks about this new tool, I'm sure a lot of you are probably wondering how this new sales tool is different from our current sales assessments. So, I'll hand it over to Kelly to give you a brief introduction to the sales tool. 

When we first introduced FinxS in 2012, we wanted to tailor Extended DISC reports to different situations, whether recruitment, leadership, or sales. We also wanted to be able to build additional tools that could measure other aspects of behaviour. FinxS competence assessments are a completely new tool available through the FinxS platform allowing us to measure an individual's self-perception in different business areas. The launch of this new tool brings an impressive sales assessment to the table, and it's available in various formats, including recruitment and development. The FinxS sales competence assessments are not based on the DISC methodology. Instead, they measure 18 different behavioural competencies or skills critical to sales success. These assessments also measure a person's mindsets towards sales and include an excuse index. We will go through that a little bit later. We'll also talk about another report today, the FinxS Sales 18, which we are also launching. This is a DISC based report. However, it makes a clear connection between individuals DISC personality type and their sales competence results. While consultants can use the two assessments independently, they were designed to be used together as it allows us to understand how a person's style may affect certain aspects of the sales role. 

So, Kelly, does this new tool use the same questionnaire as the Extended DISC Behavioural assessment or is it something completely different?

It's completely different from the Extended DISC assessments. However, the process of sending out invitations is very similar to the Extended DISC questionnaire. We provide them with the same links and a different access code. So, the participant will log in, and the first thing they will see is the instructions. They will type in their details and follow similar instructions to the DISC questionnaire. 

This questionnaire consists of 99 questions. Each question has two answers, and the candidate used to choose which one describes them better. The questionnaire takes roughly 20 to 30 minutes to complete, just as with the Extended DISC questionnaire, candidates must not be interrupted or have input from others. There are no good or bad answers. The ideal report will be determined by the type of sales role the candidate is currently in and the most important competencies for their job.

Kelly, can you tell us a little bit more about the 18 different competencies the assessment measures? 

The sales competence assessment measures a person's self-perception against the 18 different sales competencies. This allows us to measure the candidate's present competency level, and we can also use this to measure progress. So when the candidate retakes the questionnaire six months to a year down the track, they may have different scores, and hopefully, we'll see areas of improvement as they have worked hard to develop. It's a zero-sum game. Some areas might improve, but some might decline as a result. Their 18 competencies measured are clearly defined in the report, so there's no misunderstanding about what we are measuring. We'll put some samples up on the VIP pages after the webinar so you can read more and what these eighteen sales competencies mean. An executive summary of the candidates score against these 18 competencies is available at the start of the recruitment and development reports. They are straightforward to interpret, as you can see on screen (4:31). The competencies are measured on a hundred point scale. The higher the score, the higher the competency level. The lower the score, the lower the competency level. For example, this particular candidate scored 86 out of a hundred in critical thinking, which is a strong competency. It's effortless to identify the strengths in the development areas. 

Kelly, can someone with years of experience in sales score a hundred per cent on all of the competencies, or will we expect to see some who score low or some who score high? 

Good question, Courtney. The short answer is no. We believe there's always room for improvement, and these scores are dependent on the job role itself. Some competencies will be highly critical to a particular position, and others won't. Having a low score does not necessarily mean it's a bad thing. It indicates where you might need to develop this area further. 

So to reiterate, that was the overall executive summary. Kelly, can you explain to us how we break down these competencies?

In the next section of the report are the individual scores. Here we want to create a better understanding for the manager and the sales coach as to what this means for the individual. We do this by defining what a high score and a low score might look like. For example, this particular candidate scored 67 on building rapport. So while it's not a particularly low score, there's room for improvement. If you look at the definitions of this person, they are more like a farmer than a hunter. They prefer to wait for opportunities to show up rather an actively pursuing new business. 

So, the report clearly defines and measures these 18 sales competencies. However, it also identifies what we call mindsets.  Kelly, could you explain a little bit about what these mindsets are?

Again the sales mindsets are very clearly defined in the report. They describe the way you will naturally approach sales. They're more permanent and spontaneous and likely to be emphasised when you're under pressure. Sales mindsets are also affected by your sales experience, attitudes, current sales environment and sales skills. The mindsets help us to identify self-defeating beliefs. Some beliefs can help us to become more successful, whereas other beliefs can hold us back. We want to understand what self-defeating beliefs are, and we can do that by calculating the mindsets scores. The mindsets are the building blocks of sales competency scores. If we look at the mindset summary table, we can identify 18 competency scores. Underneath, we can see the mindset scores. Each of the competence scores consists of one to three mindsets.

For example, we can see that this person is not so good at qualifying, but they have identified this is an area they want to improve. So if we focus on the mindset scores and the hunter mindset, we can see this is quite low. The coach or the manager might want to discuss them with the individual and identify what it is about that the hunter mindset they might be uncomfortable with, and why that self-defeating belief is creating a challenge. This would be one of the areas we would want to bring in the sales FinxS 18 report, which is a new DISC assessment so we can look at how a person's natural hardwired behaviour might also affect or make it more challenging to develop certain areas. Using these tools together, we can focus on how exactly we need to develop these mindsets. This report is available and can be added to your FinxS account today. You can produce existing DISC results against this report. 

Yes, so after the webinar, if you want access to that report, email us, and we'll add it for you. So Kelly, now that we have gathered all this information, what exactly can we do with it?

Ultimately we want to create a sales development plan. When we look at the 12 mindset score and the 18 sales competencies, we get six different scenarios calculated from the different score combinations. We can look at competencies that we need to use now, and when we have a high competence score and a high mindset score, this is a strength. We want to ensure the salesperson is fully utilising this now if it is relevant to their role. We may need to forget other competencies at present, as developing these might take too much time. There may be other more important competencies to that person's sales role that will not take as much time to develop, which we need to focus on first. 

We have reading guides that make it easy to create a development plan, so these will be up on the VIP pages. 

Now, Kelly, there is an excellent feature in the reports called an Excuse Index. Can you tell us a little more about that? 

The concept of an Excuse Index also adds another dimension to interpret the results. It does not focus on whether someone has the competence but more on how willing they are to commit to sales. We find things challenging or tedious in everyday life, and we don't want to do them. We make excuses, and we put these off until we need to do them. The same goes for sales. We can make excuses, and the Excuse Index indicates how much time a person dedicates to sales tasks. For example, someone with an Excuse Index of 25% means this person is likely to be dedicating 75% of their time to activities that directly produce sales outcomes. This is one of those areas where we want to see a low score as this tells us a person is dedicating a lot of time to its sales tasks. 

I heard a great tip from one of our overseas partners the other day. If you collate the excuse and vehicles from all the sales professionals in your sales team and calculate an average. You can identify the excuse index of your entire sales team. So this can help indicate how well your sales team is performing. You would differently be looking for the lower scores, and if you did see high scores, you would probably want to take action to ensure the team is on task. Using a team analysis could help in this situation as there could be other issues increasing the team's Excuse Index. So this assessment, like the DISC profile report, provides a starting point for development. So now that we know who we are, where we go from here? 

Is there anything in the reports that can help us with the following steps, Kelly?

Yes, of course. The next section of the report is the development plan. There are 18 pages, one for each of the competencies defining the competence and the person's sales score. More importantly, the development plan gives us an overview of the current competencies score in practice. This text is dynamic. If someone scores low in a particular competency, the text will differ from someone who receives a medium or a high score. We also provide specific tips for development. These are unique to the salesperson's competence score. If you look at the tips on the screen, you will see that building rapport is a strength for the candidate, and they should not become overly confident in their ability.

The report also provides development questions for each of the 18 competencies. Again, these are unique to each person. Someone who has a medium score in a particular area will receive a different set of questions compared to someone with a high score. These questions can be used by the sales coach or a sales manager as they can provide discussion starters in coaching sessions for the individual and coach to work through. 

So now that we've heard about the sales competence assessments, can we have a bit of an overview of the FinxS Sales 18 assessment?

The FinxS Sales 18 assessment is a new DISC behavioural analysis we are introducing into our range of reports. The FinxS Sales 18 identifies a sales professional's natural hardwired behaviours and behavioural tendencies in the same competencies measured by the Sales Competency Assessment. The Sales 18 assessment covers the similarities and differences between their natural behavioural style and the current level of competence. Each of the 18 competencies is deconstructed into individual behavioural competencies to allow for a very clear identification of an individual's unique sales strengths and development areas. Flexibility Diamonds also visually represent the required behaviours to succeed in each of the 18 competencies and compare this to an individual's natural flexibility zones. In addition, the FinxS Sales 18 very clearly identifies if a sales professional is performing better than their natural styles products or if they are not fully utilising potential. 

Now that we've heard about the different reports available, Kelly, can you tell us how much these cost?

This is the best part! The Sales Competency Assessments consume only seven points to generate the report. As with other reports, once the candidate completes the questionnaire and receives the initial report, we can generate the results against an additional report for no extra cost. So the result might automatically be pulled off the server in the recruitment format. However, once you have hired that person, you might want to go back and generate a development report as this help the manager understand where they might need more support. Generating additional reports will not consume any additional points. 

If you want to understand better how an individual's behavioural style might impact the competencies, you will also want to complete the sales FinxS 18 report. This behavioural assessment would consume 10 points. 

I like the look of this report Kelly, can I start selling it immediately, or would you recommend I attend a sales competence accreditation training first?

You can very easily interpret it at the basic level, which includes understanding your competence and mindset scores. However, we do recommend attending training to make sure you can accurately understand and debrief the reports. There are other sections in both the development and recruitment versions that require training to understand the report and fully utilise the benefits and insights that this report has to offer. We'll be running training regularly so you can talk to your FinxS provider if you would like to be trained in this product 

What are the uses of the reports? 

Primarily you can use them for sales recruitment or development to understand what type of seller a person is and in which areas they might need additional development. Sales coaches can use them as a part of the training process and in personalised development plans. Sales managers can use them to identify strengths and development areas of the sales team and assign the team members to relevant roles and provide support where needed. We need to emphasise that someone with sales experience should use these reports. Many questions can be pretty tough for someone to answer if they haven't had sales experience. 

Alright, so now we're opening up the questions to you. If you would like something in more detail or you have a question we have not answered, please type them into the chat box now. You can find this on the toolbar, which should be located to the right of your screen. If you're on a mobile, it's on the bottom of your screen. 

Ok, one of the frequently asked questions we had was how do you get access to these reports, and how do you start sending them out to candidates?

If you want access to these, email us at info@hrprofiling.com or email your FinxS provider, and they can give you access to the new tool and FinxS Sales 18 report.

Kelly, what can they do if they want to start sending these out to clients? How does that process work? 

The process is the same as with a behavioural analysis report. You would set up a Project, create an access code and select the report that you would like to come off the server. You would then send an email invite to your client to instruct them how to complete the questionnaire, and the report will be sent to your email within minutes of the candidate completing the questions. Suppose you want to reorder the results against another report, for example, the development report or the recruitment report. In that case, it's the same again, just going into the database and reordering results using the 'Print PDF' function. 

Thanks, Kelly. Another question that we've had quite frequently is, what is the difference between these two tools?

So at the basic level, the difference is that the behavioural analysis uses DISC methodology, whereas the sales competency assessment doesn't use DISC methodology at all. So just assessing a person's competency level in 18 different competencies, there's no DISC methodology involved.

Thank you all for joining us!