Black Sales Journal

Terminations – No one wants to think about it, yet it happens.  It does not end your quest to support your family and to move forward so think about it as what it is… a part of life.  How you handle it will be the key to what happens in your next position.

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Terminations happen in all occupations.  Most of what is said here in this journal applies to more than the sales profession, but the situation of a job not working out transcends sales as an occupation.

Once a termination does happen, your future is not terminated, just the relationship with that employer.  You will be seeking gainful employment in a sales position again, and your level of comfort dealing with the termination of employment from your last employer will certainly be tested, and sometimes spotlighted.

The question is simple:  Should you hide a termination from a prospective Employer?  The Answer is simple: No!

The Truth Will Set You Free

If you have read Black Sales Journal, you will remember one of my favorite suggestions:“Always tell the truth!” The key in this situation is not to focus on it.

Terminations happen and there is nothing pleasing about them.  What you don’t want to do is to relive bitterness and the trauma of a termination while you are in an interview looking for a fresh start.  One simple reason to tell the truth is that it is easier to remember.  The other is that you need to start this new relationship off on the firm footing of the truth.  In the world of sales professionals, many have had terminations for legitimate reasons, even though they endeavored to make it work.  Terminations do happen.

This is the information age and that gives prospective employers an ability to “uncover” you previous work history cheaply and fairly easy.  Note, that finding your history does not mean that a prospective employer would be uncovering the facts and details of what happened such as what your reasons for leaving.  Any hiring manager knows that a sales job followed by a prolonged absence of several months may well denote that a job action took place.

If you have been let go from your previous job because of performance issues, you need to be prepared to discuss reasonable reasons why you parted company.

Your resume needs to match up with any job history investigation that an employer can conduct.  The prospective employer checks this information through a service, such as Equifax, or other services, and certainly with any on-line information that you might post such as LinkedIn.

Consistency eliminates questions and doubts.

What Should You Say?

There are sales jobs (and any other jobs) that just do not work out.  Your objective is to be able to tell the story in a cogent fashion.  There should be no accusations or disparaging remarks, but a clear story of why selling widgets for ABC Company in Columbus, Ohio did not work and resulted in you leaving after fifteen months.

Cover the issue of what the problem was.  Whether that was pricing, marketing support, sales support, a problematic territory, or a product that was inferior.  Do it in a professional manner, and always cite what actions you took to improve your fate.  If you do not have a solid and believable story, it may appear that you just cannot sell.

If you are a sales professional selling widgets and in your last job you were terminated because you did not meet your quota/goals, you need to own up to the fact that you were terminated.  I give below an example:

“I was let go because of not meeting the quarterly sales targets in two consecutive quarter.”  You can then give clarification of the most important issues (an example)… “I had difficulty meeting the goals as we promised delivery dates that were 4 weeks to a month longer than our other competitors.”

Places You Should Never Go!

You never want to go into an interview saying that your previous employer (or any employer you have had) is prejudice or discriminatory, even if you believe it to be true.   This is a sure way not to get a second interview and a possible hire.

The “well” will be poisoned if you make statements that allude to disparate treatment, as a prospective employer will immediately put themselves in the position of the previous employers.  Remember, they do not know you!

Instead, compliment the best aspects of the previous employer as difficult as it may seem.  If it is true a compliment such as: “There is no organization that does training like ABC Corporation”, shows your respect for the company.

.Additionally, there should be no disparaging comments about your previous manager.  You are on fair ground if you cite the fact that you did not have much support, but disparaging comments are out of bounds.

Compensate For the Weak Areas

If you have been terminated for not reaching goals, you will do well to have some support from your former co-workers.  You should get letters of recommendation citing your accomplishments.

We have covered before in Black Sales Journal, that you need to fully be prepared when you go to the interview including customer testimonials and all of your sales numbers.  Don’t share proprietary information which would jeopardize your past employer’s customers or information, but do be prepared to support your effort and accomplishments.  A customer testimonial helps to illustrate your affinity for customers and the sales process but you still may have some work to do to show that you effectively prospect.  Cover all of the bases and give yourself a chance to win.

You should provide good focus on your strong points and accomplishments as well as tout your specialties.  You need to be prepared to talk about your weak points that caused you the termination.  They may not apply to the new job, and thus lose relevance, but something like door-to-door prospecting might still be a part of the job, and you need to be prepared to show how you are going to change things.

Above all, you need to walk or run the road to continuous improvement, and be prepared to enunciate this also.  Your ability to tune-up your sales career (Black Sales Journal 8/15/2011 – Tuning Up Your Sales Career) may have some relevance to a prospective employer, but it is for you.

Thanks for reading, and your comments are always welcome

If you are a job applicant, there are things that  you need to do, and this is one of them.  Information on you in the public domain may be true, or it may be false, but it should not be a surprise to you.  Know what exist about you as you should always “be the expert on yourself”.  This post from 2011 spells it out in good detail.  Read it, and do your research!

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We took a little time to discuss the effects of social media sites (Black Sales Journal – 3/10/2011, Social Media, know the Pitfalls) and what it could do to your employment, as well as your job search.  It can be devastating if you release the wrong information at the wrong time.  Pictures are worth a thousand words, and if you are not judicious in your attempts to show your great vacation, night out with the girls, or guy’s trip to a local gentleman’s club, you could damn your next job.

These are self-inflicted wounds that you can do to yourself, and regret for the rest of your life.  They are definitely avoidable so the more private you lessen the chance of this happening.

As you will see there are other wounds, and these are not necessarily self-inflicted, yet they can have a similar, or more striking effect.

Investigate Yourself

You owe it to yourself to know everything that others can glean about you.  It is a process I call “investigating yourself.”

Here is a short list about your sources:

“Googling” is good when you need an answer to almost any question.  A very simple act now is going to the keyboard and getting hundreds of results.  Quite frankly, we do it without thinking, and usually get the information that we want.  Search engines are imperfect devices that string together the characters of the alphabet and primary numbers to peruse the lexicons of all sorts of databases in order to find like strings of information.  Prospective employers use this tool as well.  What they find can be amazing.  What they find can be menacing as well.

You can be left without any recourse other than to try to explain the product of this search as you may have major difficulty changing it.  With that in mind, it is best to know what is there in its entirety.

Suggestion:  “Google”, “Bing”, and “Yahoo” your name and all of its’ variations to determine what information a prospective employer will see when they look you up.  There may be some things you can change; yet you will be armed with a view of what they are going to see.  If you are Milton Jones, and you also see that a Milton Jones from the same city and state was convicted of embezzlement, you have an opportunity to explain that he may be a distant relative, but he is not you.

Credit reporting can be your worst enemy or your best friend.  Are you aware that it is commonplace for a prospective employer to check your credit?  It is explained for you, although in fine print on the packet of information that is completed on line, or physically, as you must give them a signature or approval, and your social security number.  Remember, a terrible credit score might not keep you from getting a job, yet it can be a potential strike against you.  If you are going to have company credit cards, a company vehicle, or need to be bonded, this may present a problem.

Suggestion:  Know your score from the three credit reporting agencies (Trans Union, Equifax, and Experian) and have your explanations ready regarding why it is impaired.  If a company is going to trust you with their assets, your story may need to be very solid.  If there are situations like identity theft, you may want to bring information to prove that there was a problem.

Public Information sources carry strong credibility.  The following records can sink you if you don’t have good explanations:

• Police and Arrest Records
• Personal Debt
• Bankruptcy
• Judgments
• Liens

There are things in the above list that comes from circumstances we could not control, and things that, as our grandmother’s used to say, came from trifling behavior.  No matter how they got there, they are potentially on your record, and they may be irremovable, unless they are a mistake.

If they come from disputes that have not been properly adjudicated, you may have some hope, yet search engines as well as public record can find this information.

Suggestion- These are your records so don’t take it lightly.  Find out why, and how these items might be removed.  Review search engines for this as well as the credit records for debt.  You should know if there are any judgments or liens in the public record.  Of course you will know if you have filed bankruptcy.  Know your story, and your circumstances.  You are the expert on you, so reduce it to writing.  I suggest you don’t fabricate some lengthy story, but be able to explain what went wrong.

A Practical Example

While I was a sales manager, I received a call from a local basketball coach who suggested that I consider a basketball star from one of the public universities in Wisconsin.  He was Black, and from the same community I was from, and was supposedly a premier student from the standpoint of grades.

We went through the interview process and I not only thought this individual gave a great interview; he also had a list of references that was exemplary.  Everyone from college professors to past employers thought he had the personality and deportment to be a great employee and to sell.

I completed checking a representative number of his references, and proceeded to gather the rest of the requisite information.  Then came a possible roadblock.  The school would not release to the transcript to me.  We were at a crucial time in the process as I had done a significant amount of work already and I could not check his grades.

I figured that he might have a “past due” that was from not having settled up, so I contacted the candidate and advised that if he wanted to have the opportunity that I presented, he needed to act fast.  It turned out a little different in the end.

The candidate “fessed” up to me under time pressure that he had some library books that were not returned, and that they were holding his transcript until he settled up.  My response was, “if you want this chance, you need to get it solved within the next two days.”  Then it got more involved, and we determined that there were parking fines…numerous parking fines.

This marked the end of this issue, as I removed the candidate from consideration.  This one, more than anything else was an example of ‘trifling’ behavior.  Not returning of a couple of reference books and not making good on some university parking tickets cost this individual a chance at a good opportunity in outside sales with a reputable company, including a car and expense reimbursement.  It was the height of irresponsibility.

Your Access Vs. The Employers Access – A New Age

There was a day that your access to information was limited, and corporate access to information was supreme and penetrating.  Now, there has been a leveling of the field.  Your access to information is penetrating as well.  Business will pay someone to do it, yet you should have enough energy to “be the expert on yourself.”

Do not think for one minute that you are not going to be checked out!

Your comments are welcome.