Every February looks the same. Annual planning just wrapped, SKO just ended, and sellers who've seen their new quota and comp plan are quietly deciding whether this is the year they look around.

The trap for hiring managers is that almost every seller interviews well. Thirty minutes of good conversation isn't nothing, but it's a terrible predictor of whether someone can hit a $1.2M quota by closing ten deals a year in your specific environment — with your specific level of marketing support, your specific competitive set, your specific lead flow.

Marshall Goldsmith's line applies directly here: what got you here won't get you there. A candidate who ran at 120% of quota at their last company might have done it on the back of a strong marketing engine generating 80% of their pipeline. Drop that same person into a startup with a thin install base and no SDR safety net, and the traits that made them a star may not even be traits they have.

The fix is to separate the outcome from the competencies that produced it — consultative selling, competitive drive, lead generation, communication — and interview for the second set specifically, with the same structured questions and a real scoring grid for every candidate. When someone clears the bar on every competency, make the offer immediately; every extra day of "let's see a few more people" is a day they can accept somewhere else.

I go deeper on the full process — including the interview scorecard — in my piece for Revenue Magazine, and there's a free version of the rubric if you want to start using it this cycle.