Every sales manager candidate you interview will tell you the same three things. They led a team that beat quota. They built a process. They love coaching reps.
None of it is verifiable from a conversation, and most of it is inflated. Sales managers interview well for the same reason sales reps interview well: talking persuasively is the job. So you cannot hire off the interview. You have to make them do the actual work in front of you.
The test
Before the interview, pick a real recorded sales call from your team. Choose a mediocre one, not a disaster. A call with one big structural problem and four or five smaller issues is perfect, because it tests prioritization.
In the interview, play the call. Then say this: "Coach me like I am the rep who took that call. Go."
Now watch for exactly three things.
What a great candidate does
First, they prioritize. A real coach identifies the one or two issues that actually cost the deal and leads with those. If the rep never booked a follow up meeting and also had a weak opening line, a great manager talks about the missing BAMFAM and does not even mention the opening line today. Someone who lists everything they noticed is showing off their ear, not their coaching. Reps coached that way get overwhelmed, and overwhelmed reps do not change behavior. We broke down why in the one-fix-per-call article.
Second, they get specific. Bad candidates coach in abstractions. "You need to build more urgency." "Work on your discovery." A real coach gives you exact words. "Next call, when they say they need to think about it, ask: putting the price aside for a second, does the system itself make sense to you? Then stop talking." If the candidate cannot produce actual language a rep could use tomorrow, they have never actually developed anyone. They have managed a spreadsheet.
Third, they close the loop. Unprompted, a great candidate tells you how they will verify the fix happened. "I would listen to your next two calls and check only for that one thing." Managers who coach without verification are just giving speeches.
The second test: the numbers conversation
After the roleplay, ask them to walk you through the last team they ran, with specifics. Team size, quota, attainment by rep, and what they personally changed that moved a number. Then ask the killer question: tell me about a specific rep you took from underperforming to hitting quota, and what the first fix you gave them was.
Real coaches answer instantly, with a name, a specific problem, and a specific fix, because they have lived it dozens of times. Fake coaches give you a vague story about "working closely with the rep on their fundamentals."
Red flags that should end the interview
They manage by dashboard only and cannot remember the last call they personally reviewed. They talk about motivation and culture without ever mentioning talk tracks or call structure. They describe their coaching as "leaving detailed feedback," which almost always means the fifteen-item breakdowns that ruin reps. Or they cannot roleplay at all, which means they have not been close to live selling in years.
What to pay attention to that most founders miss
The best sales managers we have placed share one trait that never shows up on a resume: they treat coaching as a daily habit, not a weekly meeting. Ask the candidate what their daily schedule looked like in their last role. If call review does not appear somewhere before noon, be skeptical. Managers who "get to coaching when there is time" never get to it.
Summary
Do not interview sales managers. Test them. Play a real call, make them coach you live, and check for prioritization, specific language, and verification. Twenty minutes of this tells you more than five reference calls.
Frequently asked questions
Should the test call come from my company or can I use a generic one? Use your own. You also learn how quickly they absorb an unfamiliar offer, which is exactly what they will have to do in the role.
What if the candidate asks clarifying questions before coaching? That is a good sign. Great coaches gather context. Just do not let them stall past a few minutes.
Does this work for hiring a director of sales too? Yes, and add a second exercise: have them design the first 30 days of KPIs and cadence for the team. The KPI article in this category shows you what a strong answer looks like.