Commercial Performance Prediction Test

After extensive bibliographic research, various factors associated with successful commercial performance were identified. Which was systematized and validated through various studies and factor analysis, finally allowing the identification of seven factors associated with sales success, a model that has subsequently been validated in multiple investigations.

The seven fundamental factors associated with successful business performance are:

• Establishing positive relationships

Since the 90s, the concept of emotional intelligence has received great attention from researchers, understood as the ability to monitor one's own and others' emotions, identify them, and use that information to guide thought and action. Some authors conceptualized it in four dimensions: 

• Assessment of personal emotions. It involves knowing and expressing emotions naturally.
• Assessment of other people's emotions. It is perceiving and reading the emotions of other individuals.
• Self-control and emotion regulation. Adjustment and control of one's emotions.
• Positive use of emotions. Use your own emotions, directing them towards constructive activities and personal performance.

When developing the Establishment of Positive Relationships factor, we consider two central aspects of the emotional intelligence model described above, particularly that related to self-control, together with the positive use of emotions, through behaviors such as assertiveness, flexibility, and empathy. 

The Establishing positive relationships measures socially positive performance in business functions in terms of interaction with customers, aiming at the achievement of the business objective, including an adequate level of assertiveness, self-control, flexibility, and empathy. It involves trying to understand others, possessing the ability to listen attentively, and understanding thoughts, feelings, implicit or not fully expressed issues.

Assertiveness is understood as the ability to express one's own point of view while respecting that of others; Self-control not only as the action of dominating and controlling our emotions, but fundamentally of manifesting or inhibiting them in a correct way; Flexibility implies having a certain ease to change criteria and orientation; and Empathy, considered as a set of capabilities that begins with oneself and that allows us to recognize and understand the emotions of others.

• Identification with the Sales Role

Various authors suggest that commercial performance is influenced by factors such as the perception of their role and the activities they must fulfill to achieve the desired performance.

It is important to consider that the sales role does not always have a high social status, being considered a secondary job option, triggered by truncated careers or limitations in the labor spectrum. And identification with the sales function and the self-motivation associated with its performance is essential for successful performance.

Due to the above, according to the evidence, belief in one's own commercial capabilities and satisfaction with the commercial role are key axes for excellent performance.

Self-efficacy is understood as the salesperson's belief that they can successfully manage their business activities. In other words, it is the trust of an individual in his ability to perform excellently in commercial tasks.

Identification with the sales role is implicitly associated with confidence in achieving excellent performance in commercial tasks.

The Identification with the Sales Role measures the degree of identification with the sales role and the projected level of security regarding commercial functions. It is related to knowledge of specific techniques and understanding of the essential dynamics associated with the sales process. In this sense, highly self-effective salespeople perceive greater freedom to adjust their behavior to the demands of the sales interaction and have a greater appreciation for specifically commercial tasks.

• Ability to take risks

The vast majority of sales functions consist of variable income associated with the results achieved, expressed in commissions or bonuses, so each salesperson would not know with certainty what the amount of their monthly salary would be at the beginning of each month. This characteristic of the commercial function means implicit uncertainty and risks, which the collaborator in commercial functions must bear.

Being an intrinsic characteristic of the sales work, every collaborator who performs commercial functions must have the ability to manage risk and uncertainty appropriately.

There are certain commercial functions, mainly in the financial area, that involve a higher level of risk and uncertainty as they are determined by external factors, for example, unlike sales in the retail sector.

Salespeople, when carrying out promotional actions, would tend to engage in riskier behaviors than more cautious people. In this way, salespeople with a strong focus on promotion would be inherently more motivated to implement risky strategies to achieve objectives such as prospecting new customers.

The Ability to Take Risks factor measures the probability of handling risk and uncertainty situations adequately and the predisposition to face them positively, assuming controlled risks associated with commercial functions.

Good management of risk and uncertainty is an essential capacity for commercial functions, allowing better performance, since risk (uncertainty) is understood as an inevitable part of any sales process, and associated with regular income, which in the Most of the time they have a strong variable component.

• Achievement

Competitiveness, directly associated with the construct of Achievement, is one of the main aspects associated with business performance, defined as the desire to be better than others or the need for interpersonal competition. 

The Achievement factor measures Achievement Orientation, the tendency to seek new challenges, and the competitiveness trait. Achievement is understood in terms of economic and personal satisfaction, it implies the concern for seeking excellence, exceeding standards and directing actions towards achieving the objectives and the defined strategy. Competitiveness is an essential part of this factor, and is understood as a person's enjoyment of interpersonal competition and the desire to win and be better than others.

For commercial functions, this factor is relevant to the extent that it combines competition to seek higher levels of results and excellence in an essentially competitive commercial environment.

• Extroversion

The characteristics of an extroverted person are theoretically related to critical behaviors associated with effective selling, suggesting that extraversion should be the personality trait most closely related to commercial performance. In fact, some authors suggest that the salesperson represents the prototype of extraversion in our culture.

It is worth mentioning that this factor is linked to certain types of sales, since, in more technical or consultative sales, being extroverted could be counterproductive.

The Extroversion factor measures the tendency to enjoy interacting with other people, given that the internal energy of extroverted people increases when they interact with more people, this implies having a way with words and the ability to develop the necessary behaviors for interacting with others in a way satisfactory. Extroversion involves a dynamic and active approach to the social world and includes traits such as sociability, activity, and positive emotions.

For commercial tasks, it is very important to have ease of communication, especially considering that a large part of their functions are related to regular interaction with clients.

• Influence

The ability to persuade and influence others to make purchasing decisions is considered a key axis of the commercial process, which has been documented through various studies.

The Influence factor measures the intention and ability to persuade, convince, influence, or impress others with the purpose of indirectly guiding purchase decisions. It implies having the ability to persuade others with relevant arguments based on a positive style, through joint reasoning, and using strategies that allow building satisfactory agreements for everyone (where everyone wins).

This factor is relevant, for example, when presenting key concepts about a product or service in a sales process.

• emotion recognition

Derived from the emotional intelligence model defined by four key elements:

• Assessment of personal emotions. It involves knowing and expressing emotions naturally.
• Assessment of other people's emotions. It is perceiving and reading the emotions of other individuals.
• Self-control and emotion regulation. Adjustment and control of one's emotions.
• Positive use of emotions. Use your own emotions, directing them towards constructive activities and personal performance.

The recognition of the emotions of others, and in this case of the client, stands out.

This capacity is a key support to adapt the progress of the negotiation, in addition to the position of the commercial executive. Being able to identify the client's emotional state is essential in order to generate empathy and act appropriately, always in the context of a commercial advance.

The emotion recognition measures the ability to adequately perceive and identify the emotions clients experience through verbal and non-verbal communication.

The ability to identify the mood and emotional state of a client is key to the commercial result, allowing them to subsequently adapt their behavior in accordance with the diagnosis made, also monitoring the client's reactions in order to be able to adapt their own behavior, favoring a better relationship with the client.

In this way, the commercial profile test, the Sales Performance Predictor® or SPP sales test, is based on these seven factors and measures them in order to provide a global indicator called SPP Index that measures the probability of success in commercial functions, calibrated for various commercial positions.