Coachability is the most quietly predictive thing in sales hiring and the least reliably tested. A coachable seller with a slightly imperfect background will usually outperform a stronger CV who cannot take input, because the first one gets better every quarter and the second one does not.
The problem is that everybody claims to be coachable. It is a free thing to say.
Stop asking the question directly
"Are you open to feedback?" produces a yes from everyone, including people who have never changed anything. The useful questions are specific and historical.
- Tell me about a piece of feedback you received in the last year that you did not agree with. What did you do?
- What is the last thing you changed about how you sell, and what prompted it?
- Who was the best manager you have had, and what did they make you stop doing?
- What would your current manager say you need to work on? What have you done about it?
What a good answer sounds like
Coachable people answer these immediately, in detail, and usually with something slightly unflattering about themselves. They can name the behaviour, the trigger, the change and roughly how long it took. They often disagreed with the feedback at first and say so, then explain what changed their mind.
They also describe coaching as a normal part of their working week rather than an event. People who record their own calls, review them, and can tell you what they heard are showing you the answer rather than describing it.
What a poor answer sounds like
- A long pause, then a generic virtue: "I always take feedback on board."
- Feedback framed as something that happened to them, not something they used.
- An example that is really a complaint about a previous manager.
- A change they made that involves no discomfort at all.
- Nothing they need to work on.
That last one is the strongest signal in the set. A seller with no development area is either very early in their career or not paying attention.
Test it live
The most reliable method is to coach them during the process. Run a discovery exercise, give one piece of specific, actionable feedback at the end, and then run a short second exercise a few days later. You are watching for whether the behaviour changed at all, and whether they mention having thought about it.
This takes about twenty extra minutes and tells you more than a reference ever will.
Reference it properly
Ask a previous manager three questions, in this order: what did this person need the most coaching on, how did they respond to it, and how long did the change take. The middle answer is the one you called for. Managers are far more candid about the response than about the person.
Why it is worth the effort
Ramp time is the hidden cost in every sales hire. A coachable seller compresses it, because they take onboarding as instruction rather than as background noise. In a business where the motion is still being figured out, that is often more valuable than a bigger number on a previous CV.