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Hiring manager reviewing candidate results with the message that broad personality tests do not reliably predict sales performance.
Sales Assessments

Why Personality Tests Often Fail at Sales Hiring (And What to Use Instead)

Personality tests like DISC and Myers-Briggs fail at sales hiring because they measure broad traits — communication style, temperament, how someone interacts with others — instead of the traits that actually drive revenue. They’re also self-reported, which means candidates can answer the way they think you want to see rather than how they actually behave. What actually predicts sales success is Drive: the combination of Need for Achievement, Competitiveness, and Optimism. Drive shows up in behavior — consistent follow-up, persistence through rejection, initiative — which makes it harder to fake than a personality questionnaire. I’ve spent over twenty years building
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Sales assessment tools comparison graphic for hiring salespeople in 2026, showing a laptop with an assessment comparison chart for evaluating tool categories, strengths, and best-fit sales hiring use cases.
Sales Assessments

The Best Sales Assessment Tools for Hiring [2026 Comparison]

The Best Sales Assessment Tool Depends on What You Need to Measure Most companies do not fail at sales hiring because they use no assessment at all. They fail because they choose an assessment without first asking the harder question: What exactly are we trying to measure? A salesperson hired to generate new pipeline does not need the same evaluation as someone hired to manage existing accounts. A sales manager does not need the same assessment as an SDR. A relationship-driven account manager may succeed with a very different profile than a high-intensity new business hunter. And while many platforms
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Infographic showing how hiring based on polished résumés, strong interviews, and confidence can lead to an empty funnel, thin pipeline, slipping forecasts, and missed revenue.
Sales Assessments

Why Companies Hire Bad Salespeople — and How to Stop It

Most companies do not hire bad salespeople because they are careless. They hire bad salespeople because their hiring process rewards the wrong evidence. A résumé looks strong. The candidate sounds confident on the phone. The interview feels comfortable. The hiring manager likes them. The company needs the seat filled. Then three months later, nothing is happening. The pipeline is thin. Activity is inconsistent. Forecasts keep slipping. The manager is spending too much time coaching effort instead of skill. Eventually, the company admits what was becoming obvious: this person is not going to produce. That mistake can easily cost $50,000, $100,000,
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Sales Assessments

Are Great Salespeople Born or Made? The Truth About Sales Talent

Are Great Salespeople Born or Made? Most sales leaders do not ask whether great salespeople are born or made because they are curious. They ask because they have been burned. They hired the candidate who looked fantastic in the interview. Polished. Confident. Likable. Maybe even experienced. Everyone left the room thinking, “This is the one!” Then the real job started. Prospecting slowed down. Rejection became a problem. Follow-up got inconsistent. The manager coached, encouraged, trained, and pushed. And after months of effort, the uncomfortable truth became clear: this “stellar candidate” may have had sales knowledge, but they did not have
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Sales Assessments

How Sales Managers Can Use Assessments to Improve Sales Team Performance

You know the feeling. You look at your sales dashboard and see two reps with identical activity levels but vastly different results. One is closing deal after deal, while the other is struggling to get past the initial discovery call. Your gut tells you it might be a confidence issue, or maybe they just “don’t want it bad enough.” But in sales management, gut instinct is often an expensive advisor. When you rely on intuition alone, you risk misdiagnosing the problem. You might send a low-Drive rep to a closing seminar when what they really lack is the resilience to
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Businessman working on a laptop with various digital icons representing ROI, financial strategies, sales, and hiring efficiency
Sales Assessments

The ROI of Using a Sales Aptitude Test Before You Hire

Let’s face it: hiring salespeople is terrifying. It is easily the highest-stakes gambling a business does. You’re looking for a rainmaker who can push the company forward, but the risk of a bad hire is massive. We’ve all seen the stats—a single failed sales hire can cost a company upwards of $240,000. Why does it happen so often? Because traditional interviews are a trap. Salespeople are professional communicators; they are literally trained to sell you during interviews. It is remarkably easy to confuse a candidate who is good at selling themselves with one who is good at selling your product.
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