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Hiring for marketing and sales positions in biotech creates unique challenges. The right candidate will have a strong scientific background or ability, excellent communication skills and outstanding sales skills. The more technical your product, the narrower your field may be, but you need enough people in your interview funnel to ensure you select the best candidate.

How many is too many?

Some employers will say as many as it takes to get the right match. But interviewing excessively can make it tougher to remember each candidate individually. Depending on the quality of the applicant pool, many businesses will interview eight to ten candidates in the first round and narrow the second round to two or three. In biotech, the numbers may be smaller because your qualifiers are more stringent.

How can you ensure you interview just the right number of qualified candidates to make an educated decision?

Attract the right people

Write your job posting to detail the essential skills, experience and education you expect from candidates. The tone and style should reflect your corporate culture to bring in people who will fit into your organization. And be honest about what it’s like to work there. If your team typically puts in a lot of extra hours, don’t shy away from saying so. Those who are unable or unwilling to go beyond 9-5 will opt out of applying.

Pretest

You know that you’re looking for certain skills and personality traits in a sales and marketing biotech professional. Why not test for both before taking the time to interview candidates? Each unqualified candidate you interview can cost you two hours of productivity. Why not winnow out the underqualified up front?

Phone screen

Starting with a phone screen is a win-win for you and the candidate. Typically, phone interviews run about 30 minutes or less – a small time investment for you both. It’s considerate of currently employed candidates as well, because they can schedule the time on their break.

Screen for hard skills, interview for soft skills

It’s often said that the best employees possess both hard and soft skills. What’s the best way to quickly screen and interview for these abilities? Focus on hard skills in the screening process. The ideal candidate will be smart, easy to work with and fit well into your organization, but the ability to do the job must come first.

Rely on a specialized recruiter

When you partner with a firm that really understands the biotech industry and what makes a marketing or sales professional successful, you can trust them to narrow the field for you so you only interview the best people.

At SMR Group Ltd, our experienced recruiters can help you recruit and screen sales and marketing candidates more effectively to quickly identify the talent you need in the pharmaceutical, biotech, and medical device industries. Contact us today to learn more.


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