Stop Interviewing Potential Agents
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There’s no question that an important key to business success is building a
productive team of agents or advisors. This, in fact, is a three-step process.
The first step is to find good candidates to begin with, the second step is to
properly select the candidates who are most likely to succeed, and the third
step is to effectively train these new agents and get them into a
business-owner’s mindset. One area in which many managers often miss the mark is
in the selection process.
Effective recruiting is an ongoing effort. If you’ve been following me and my
philosophies on recruiting, you already know that I’m a big advocate of “Active”
recruiting and a basher of “Passive” recruiting. In discussing these methods
with managers around the country, there is universal agreement that candidates
found through Active methods have far better potential than those found through
Passive methods. They generally tend to be better-suited to the life of an
independent agent/advisor, they learn faster, produce more, are more responsive
and are more loyal. Regardless of how a candidate comes to us however, we need
to decide whether this person is a good fit for this business, as well as a fit
for us and our operation. This effort turns out to be harder than it seems.
Think about it. How often have we selected someone who we “knew” would become
a superstar, only to have them end up in mediocrity or worse – drop out of the
program? Or conversely, how often have you decided to bring someone on board
“against your better judgment”, only to find them out-pacing the rest of your
team? The truth is that identifying a candidate that has the “ability” to
succeed besides having the “potential” to succeed is a bit of a challenge. And I
believe that most managers go about this selection process wrong. Most managers
“interview” their candidates and that just doesn’t work.
When a manager “interviews” a candidate, they typically conduct a variation
of a “JOB INTERVIEW”! When someone interviews a potential agent or advisor, they
review their resume as if they were considering them for a job and they ask the
typical job-oriented questions. The problem with this approach is fairly
obvious. We’re not looking for employees; we’re looking for potential business
owners! When we select a potential agent as if we were selecting a new employee,
guess what we end up with? A new employee! The key then is to stop interviewing
potential agents and to start evaluating potential business owners.
Think about how you review a person’s resume. Most people look over a
candidate’s resume with the eye of an employer. They look for job stability,
positions held, and accomplishments. While these considerations do provide valid
information, they miss the point of reviewing the resume. For example, one might
feel that job stability is a reflection of the candidate’s loyalty and
persistence. You might conclude that if a person has a stable job history they
themselves will be stable. And those conclusions may be true. However, I could
easily make the argument that if a person has regularly changed jobs, it
demonstrates that he or she has been dissatisfied in the job world and would
flourish in the world of the entrepreneur. Or conversely, if a person shows
strong stability in his or her work history, it could suggest that they make a
better employee than they do a business owner. How do you decide which is the
reality for this person? How can you determine whether job stability is a good
thing or a bad thing with respect to this candidate? That is an art in and of
itself. It requires mastery of the art of asking questions as well as mastering
the art of listening. A good portion of these arts lies in understanding the
motivations behind an individual’s actions and decisions.
Let’s examine the pitfalls of the typical interview question process. Think
of the questions a person asks during a job interview. They might ask about why
they left a particular job. They might ask about what goals a person has. They
might ask the candidate to describe their present job. Maybe an interviewer will
even ask what they liked best about each of their positions. They might ask why
the candidate is considering this new position or opportunity. These are all
good questions, but not very useful for our purposes. Think about it. When
someone goes for a job interview, they are (or should be) prepared to
effectively answer those questions. Everyone knows the kinds of questions
they’ll be asked in a job interview and they prepare answers for them. People
can pretty well guess what kind of answer you’re looking for in an interview.
The key then, is to approach question-asking from a different perspective; a
perspective which helps you uncover a person’s motivations and their true
nature. One of the challenges to uncovering who a person really is, is that
often they don’t really know who they are themselves. To reveal a person often
requires reading between the lines and seeing what isn’t there. Again, there is
an art to this process.
Although we aren’t able to delve into the details of what to look for when
evaluating a candidate within the scope of this article, suffice it to say that
it begins with an understanding of exactly what traits and competencies a
successful agent/advisor should possess. Once we have a clear picture of what
those traits and competencies are, we need to understand how to determine
whether a candidate has them. Some of them can be determined from properly
reviewing a resume. Some of them can only be determined from interacting with
them. But there are a number of traits and competencies which can’t be
determined from a resume nor by spending time with them. Certain traits can only
be demonstrated.
The bottom line is that if you are in the mode of “interviewing” candidate
agents or advisors, then you’re missing the boat in the selection process. You
won’t have determined whether they have the traits and competencies necessary
for success in our business, and you’ll unintentionally have recruited an
employee.
Stop interviewing candidates and start evaluating business owners.
About the Author
Written by Michael Beck, “The Insurance & Advisor Coach”. Michael, an
Executive Coach and Recruiting Activist, helps insurance and financial
professionals succeed faster and easier. He can be reached at 866-385-8751 or
mbeck@theinsurancecoach.com
Visit www.TheInsuranceCoach.com
to learn more. Permission to reprint with full attribution. © 2007 Exceptional
Leadership, Inc.
