Before you hire a fractional sales leader, ask them ten questions. The answers tell you whether you are hiring someone who will lead your sales function or someone who will write you a report. We hear these questions in first calls at Sales Director Central, and we have written down how we answer each one, so you can compare.
A fractional sales leader is a senior sales director who works inside your business for the days the role needs rather than five days a week. The model works well when it is done properly. These questions are how you tell.
1. Have you led sales teams, or only sold?
Selling well and leading sellers are different jobs. Someone who was a great rep may never have run a sales meeting, built a forecast or managed an underperformer. Ask for the teams they have led, how large, and what changed under them.
Our answer. Every sales leader at Sales Director Central has led B2B sales teams for decades before they took on the fractional role. We personally certify each sales leader before they are able to be a Sales Director Central Mentor. Look for the micro-credential on their LinkedIn profile.
2. What framework will you use?
Without a framework the engagement rests on one person’s instincts, and when they leave, the instincts leave with them. Ask what the operating system is called, what it covers and whether your team keeps it.
Our answer. PAMICE. Planning, accountability, methodology, indicators, cadence and execution, built on one principle, that customers buy value, not features. Every one of our sales leaders is certified in it, so the framework is the same whoever is embedded in your business.
3. Will you stay to execute, or hand us a report?
This is the question that separates fractional leadership from consulting. A report is useful for about a week. A plan that someone runs with your team every week for a year changes the business.
Our answer. We stay. The first month is a review that produces a blueprint, a benchmark and a plan. From month two the sales director works inside the business, running the rhythm, until the cadence holds on its own.
4. Do you sell for us, or lead the people who sell?
Some providers are really outsourced sales teams. That can be the right answer for some businesses, but it is a different product and it leaves nothing behind.
Our answer. We lead the people who sell, because businesses get a better outcome when they own their sales team, including a better multiple when the business is valued. Your reps and your founder keep the customer relationships. We own the sales target with you, through the plan, the meetings, the pipeline and the coaching.
5. How much time will you spend with us, and how does that change as we grow?
Ask what drives it. A good answer starts from your team and the work to be done, not from a standard package.
Our answer. It depends on the size of the sales team and how much work there is to do, and we tailor it to each situation. The weekly sales meeting and deal reviews are the fixed points, and the rest goes where the blueprint says it is needed.
6. What happens in the first 30 days, and the first 90?
A good fractional sales leader can describe the first quarter before they have seen your business, because the shape is always the same even when the detail is not.
Our answer. Month one is the review, a 75 point diagnostic against PAMICE (a benchmark score), a blueprint and a plan. By day 90, clients typically have a structured, repeatable sales approach where there was none, are qualifying out the deals they cannot win, and can see their funnel clearly enough to forecast with confidence.
7. How will we know it is working?
Ask what gets measured and when. If the answer is only revenue, the measurement arrives too late to change anything.
Our answer. Indicators that lead revenue, not just the result. Pipeline coverage and quality, qualification discipline, forecast accuracy, activity that matters, and the benchmark from month one, re-done at six and twelve months.
8. What do we keep when you leave?
This is the question most founders forget to ask, and it is the one that matters most two years from now.
Our answer. A high performing sales team and new, consistent revenue, with the framework, the cadence and the pipeline discipline running on their own. That is the whole point of embedding a system rather than a person. You have an improved Sales DNA in the business.
9. How does it end, and what if we outgrow it?
Good news, in other words. Ask what happens when the business needs a full-time sales director.
Our answer. The minimum engagement to deliver change is six months. After that, clients keep us month to month for as long as we keep adding value, typically twelve to eighteen months. When a client grows big enough for a full-time role, we help recruit it and introduce the new hire to the operating system the team already runs.
10. Who exactly will be in our business?
Ask for the person, and what support they have in place. Their background, their references, and whether the sales leader has the capabilities to deliver on the sales promise. Have they run a sales team before, or just been a good sales rep? Do they bring a sales framework (operating system) with them, or is it just instinct driving them? What is behind that person? Are they distracted running their own business (finance, sales, invoicing), or do they have the right support behind them to enable them to focus on your business?
Our answer. Your first conversation may be with one of our founders or another sales leader. Whichever sales leader you talk to as part of the sales process will be a certified SDC sales mentor. We then work with you to ensure the right fit for your business. Behind every certified SDC sales mentor is our proven sales framework (PAMICE) and the SDC support team that allows your fractional sales leader to focus on you and your business.
How to run the conversation
Send the ten questions ahead of the call. Anyone serious will welcome them. Then listen for two things. Specifics, because real sales leaders talk in examples and numbers from their own teams. And a straight no, because the right fractional leader will tell you when the model is not the fit for your business, and we do.
If you would like to put the questions to us, book a 30 minute conversation with Paul or JD. Or start with the five minute self assessment, which shows you where your sales function sits before you talk to anyone.
Related reading. Hiring a sales leader vs hiring a fractional sales leader, and meet our sales leaders.
