Why the diamond in the rough hardly gets chosen as your new sales colleague?

Based on their CV, they all look like diamonds...

When a company is in a growing phase, the quest for new sales colleagues typically brings in different candidates into interviews and panels. Typically this process starts with a shiny CV, in which personality and drive hardly can be untangled and past experience typically gets an extremely shiny touch (I was the best in..., the first to... my accomplishments... as a top...). At this stage, most candidates look like a diamond. Some of them will lose a little of their shine as they move along in the process, but most of them make quite far into the process looking like a diamond. Mostly a role play will make a difference where some will shine a little brighter than the others, but still... all will resemble to diamonds.

The rough diamond hardly ever gets chosen...

And then there is this candidate showing up, with a lot of passion and ambition, but no experience. The candidate will claim to be a diamond, but we might be disappointed because he or she doesn't shine. I mean, most of them shine from a personality and drive point of view, but due to lack of experience, having started in a different sector or past career directions, they will never shine as the other candidates.

A rough diamond needs additional work...

Of course the rough diamond will not become a diamond by itself. You'll need to work it , you'll need to cut off the rough edges (training and coaching) and polish it (make them experienced), but in the end they will shine and moreover, he or she will be a real diamond. A rough diamond has hidden exceptional characteristics and/or future potential, but currently lacks the final touches that would make him or her stand out from the crowd. This is were selection, coaching and management makes the difference.

Still we will mostly disregard the rough diamond...

For one reason or the other, we tend to be afraid of investing time into new sales colleagues. We want them to be up and running and productive the day before yesterday if possible. Therefore, we do not allow ourselves any gem that still needs more than a little polish. This is were we miss out. I have selected and coached a couple of new sales colleagues in the past. Most of them did not have the right experience or shine, but some of them made it, either as a complete out of the blue candidate or an internal candidate. Once the edges have been cut off and they have been polished, what do you get? A DIAMOND, precious, tough and unique. My personal feeling is that you can learn them some sales processes, but the personality, ease of social interaction and charm is built into the them. This is something you can't train, coach or learn. You either BE IT or not.

We wanted a diamond, but hired a MOISSANITE...

So what is moissanite? Moissanite, originally discovered in 1893 in a meteor crater, is a very rare and scarce mineral. Therefore, moissanite as we know it today is almost exclusively lab grown. It is actually more brilliant than a diamond and is harder than any other gem stone (apart from diamonds) and 15 to 20 times cheaper than diamonds. Throughout their career, these candidates have learned themselves to shine, formed themselves as true sales professionals, true winners, maybe not by nature, but by "experience". They will be good sales for sure, they will yield results on the short term, but one thing they will never be... a diamond by nature.

Diamonds are rare and rough diamonds are unattractive at first...

If you have the opportunity to meet a person in your life, that has the characteristics of a diamond in the rough, do not hesitate, invest in that person, coach ad train him or her, and in the end, you will a diamond in your organisation.