How To Attract and Retain Sales and Customer Service People Using In-depth Work Style Personality Testing Part 2

How do you build up your sales and customer service force in a down economy? In part one of this article, we talked about some ways to attract and retain your sales and customer service people. Below are additional ways to use personality testing in the workplace to help attract and retain sales and customer service people:

1. Treat co-workers the way they want to be treated. In today’s fast-paced world of business, there is little time to get to know many of your co-workers. Using personality assessments as the basis for team building exercises can quickly get everyone to have a healthier respect for other ways of seeing the world.

2. Get everybody to play nice. Sales and IT, customer service and marketing, operations and financial people have to interact to make the company run smoothly. Too many employees get frustrated with other co-workers and just wonder why everyone doesn’t act like them. Through the use of personality profiles, managers can coach employees on how to interact better with peers.

3. Make managers better leaders.  The days of seat of the pants leadership are over.  When sales and customer service managers understand what makes their people tick, then they can be better leaders.   Knowing personality traits can help with motivating teams, communicating change and delegating authority.

4. Pick better teams. Today so much work is done by ad hoc teams that come together for a specific purpose.  Before you assemble a sales or customer service team it pays to know the strengths and weaknesses of the team members.  Sometimes this can be the difference between a productive team that gets the job done and one that pulls apart at the seams.

5. Set people up for success.  Sometimes we hire the right employee and put them in the wrong job.  Understanding preferred work styles and where a person would be happiest goes a long way to improving retention and productivity.

While in-depth work style & personality testing can be a valuable resource before you hire sales and customer service people, perhaps the true value of any assessment comes in using the insights it provides along the entire spectrum of employment. Personality assessments lend objectivity to decisions that may otherwise be largely subjective.

If this was helpful to you then it will be helpful to others. Consider passing it along to your team, emailing it to your network or updating  your status on Linkedin. Helping others is always a good thing.

Remember, it is not how many great people you hire. The true measure is how many great people you keep! For more information, please visit our Web site , www.lighthouseconsulting.com to sign up for our Open Line webinars and monthly articles.

You can download the recording from our radio show on Retaining Top Talent with Non-Monetary Rewards and Recognition. This is a two part series. CLICK HERE to download.

Join our Linkedin group Hiring and Retaining Top Talent. Lots of discussions and articles on this topic. CLICK HERE to join.

Author Bio

Dana Borowka, MA, CEO of Lighthouse Consulting Services, LLC has over 25 years experience in the area of business consulting and helping organizations both nationally and internationally in raising the hiring bar through using in-depth work style assessments. Lighthouse Consulting Services, LLC provides a variety of services, including in-depth work style assessments for new hires & staff development, team building, interpersonal & communication training, career guidance & transition, conflict management, workshops, and executive & employee coaching.  To order the book, “Cracking the Personality Code” please go to www.crackingthepersonalitycode.com.

Related posts:

1. How To Attract and Retain Sales and Customer Service People Using In-depth Work Style & Personality Testing – Part 1
2. Optimize Your Staffing Decisions by Using In-depth Work Style and Personality Assessment Tools; Part 2
3. Optimize Your Staffing Decisions by Using In-depth Work Style and Personality Assessment Tools