To assess a VP of Sales candidate properly, look past their sales record to how they lead: how they build and coach a team, how they forecast, and how they respond when they're wrong. A good executive assessment combines several methods, such as a structured interview, realistic simulations, testing and references, scored against what your role actually needs. No single method, and certainly no résumé, does the job on its own.
Most owners hiring a VP of Sales start with the numbers. Quota attainment, deals closed, territories grown. Those numbers matter. But they describe a seller, and you're hiring someone to build and run a team of sellers. That's a different job.
Why is hiring a VP of Sales so risky?
Because senior hires fail more often than most owners expect, and they cost more when they do.
You may have heard that "40% of new executives fail within 18 months." We traced that one. The earliest version we could find is a 1998 Fortune column (Fisher, 1998) about newly hired managers, not executives, and it doesn't name a study. So we don't use it.
What the research does support is a range. A 1989 Center for Creative Leadership report (Lombardo & Eichinger, 1989) said "perhaps 30-50%" of high-potential managers and executives derail. A 2019 peer-reviewed study (Koortzen & Oosthuizen, 2019), citing earlier research, put the estimated base rate for leadership failure at roughly 30% to 50%. Consulting firms report similar ranges: McKinsey summarizes surveys showing 27% to 46% of executive transitions are judged failures or disappointments after two years (Keller, 2018), and DDI reported 35% for internal promotions and 47% for outside executive hires, based on HR leaders' views (Paese, 2021). Those are survey figures from firms that sell leadership services, so treat them as estimates. But they all point the same way.
The reasons leaders derail are telling, too. The CCL report's list (Lombardo & Eichinger, 1989) includes "difficulty in molding a staff," "lack of follow-through" and "poor treatment of others." None of those shows up in a quota report.
Why isn't a strong sales record enough?
Because selling well and leading sellers are different skills.
Economists Benson et al. (2019) studied salespeople at more than 100 firms. The best salespeople were more likely to be promoted into management, but stronger sales before promotion went with weaker sales by the new manager's team. Salespeople with more experience selling as part of a team did better once promoted.
In our view, a strong VP of Sales or other senior sales leader looks less like the best closer in the room and more like the best coach. A few things worth looking for:
They develop people. They can describe, in detail, someone they made better, and how.
They can be corrected. They ask for disagreement, invite the junior people to speak first and can say "I had that wrong" without getting defensive.
They forecast on evidence. In a pipeline review, they ask "what's your evidence?" before "when's it closing?"
They reward early bad news. The rep who flags a slipping deal early gets help, not a hard time.
They coach one thing at a time. They listen to calls and pick the one change that matters most.
The red flags run the other way: a leader who relies on charm, pushes reps to forecast on warm contacts, or treats activity counts as proof of progress.
What does an executive assessment include?
The term covers a lot of ground, from a one-hour personality test to a full day of exercises. A well-built assessment usually draws on several of these:
A structured interview. The same job-related questions for every candidate, scored against set standards. In a major 2022 re-analysis, structured interviews ranked as the top selection method, with a validity of .42 (Sackett et al., 2022).
Simulations. Realistic exercises like running a pipeline review, coaching a struggling rep or presenting a sales plan. Assessment centres combine several simulations, often with tests and interviews, scored by more than one trained assessor (Meiring & Buckett, 2016). International guidelines limit the name "assessment centre" to processes that meet their standards (Rupp et al., 2015).
Testing. Cognitive and personality measures. Across leadership studies, the Big Five personality traits together correlated .48 with leadership, with extraversion the most consistent single trait at .31 (Judge et al., 2002). That's leadership in general, not sales results.
References. Done properly, with structured questions to people who saw the candidate lead. We've covered reference checks for sales hires separately.
Do executive assessments actually predict success?
The honest answer: some methods do, and the evidence is stronger for some than others.
In 17 samples where people took both, assessment centres predicted job performance at .44, compared with .22 for cognitive ability tests (Sackett et al., 2017). Across the broader research, the revised estimate for assessment centres is lower, about .33 (Sackett et al., 2023). Either way, they're among the stronger predictors available.
One-on-one executive assessment by a psychologist, which is what many "executive assessments" actually are, is widely used. But researchers writing in SIOP's journal have acknowledged that establishing its validity is difficult (Silzer & Jeanneret, 2011). That doesn't make it useless. It means you should ask any provider how their process is built, what it's scored against and how they know it works.
And no credible source we found shows that executive assessment cuts VP of Sales failure by any specific percentage. Be wary of anyone who quotes one.
What do Ontario employers need to know about executive assessment?
Three things.
Tests must fit the job. The OHRC (2008a) says any written test should be based on the job's essential duties and scored against pre-set criteria. Under the Supreme Court of Canada's Meiorin decision (British Columbia v. BCGSEU, 1999), a standard that screens out a protected group must be reasonably necessary for the job, with accommodation short of undue hardship.
Accommodation applies. The duty to accommodate covers employment testing as well as hiring (OHRC, 2009).
How do I assess a VP of Sales candidate?
Six steps.
Define the job before you meet anyone. What must this person achieve in their first year? Build a team from scratch, fix forecasting, open a new market? Professional testing standards treat this kind of job analysis as the starting evidence that an assessment is relevant (Tippins, 2023).
Look past the quota. Ask for evidence of leading, not just selling: people they developed, teams they built, a forecast they got right and one they got wrong.
Use a structured interview. Same questions, same scoring, every candidate.
Add a simulation. Give them a realistic task, such as reviewing a messy pipeline or coaching a rep through a stalled deal. Watch how they think, not just what they conclude.
Test with care. Use cognitive and personality measures as one input, tied to the job.
Check references properly. Talk to people who reported to them, not just people they reported to.
Work with us. Ashley Wesley, MA, CHRL, CIM, and our team are based in Guelph, Ontario. For a VP of Sales or sales manager hire, our Final Candidate Review brings these pieces together and compares your finalist with your own best people, so you can decide with evidence before you commit. Our handshake guarantee: if the report and process don't help, you don't pay.
In short
To assess a VP of Sales candidate, look past quota attainment to how they lead, coach and forecast. Combine a structured interview, realistic simulations, testing and references, scored against what the role needs. Assessment centres and structured interviews are among the stronger predictors of performance (Sackett et al., 2022, 2023). The popular "40% of executives fail in 18 months" figure traces to a 1998 magazine column (Fisher, 1998), but research estimates of leadership failure run roughly 30% to 50% (Koortzen & Oosthuizen, 2019; Lombardo & Eichinger, 1989).
Key takeaways
Research estimates of leadership failure run roughly 30% to 50% (Koortzen & Oosthuizen, 2019; Lombardo & Eichinger, 1989).
Strong individual sales performance predicted weaker results for the new manager's team, in a study of more than 100 firms (Benson et al., 2019).
Structured interviews ranked as the top selection method in a 2022 re-analysis, with a validity of .42 (Sackett et al., 2022).
In 17 samples, assessment centres predicted performance at .44 versus .22 for cognitive tests (Sackett et al., 2017).
Frequently asked questions
What is an executive assessment?
An executive assessment evaluates a senior candidate using several methods, typically a structured interview, job simulations, cognitive and personality testing and references. The aim is to predict how they'll lead in your role, not just confirm what's on their résumé.
How do you assess a VP of Sales?
Look beyond their sales numbers to how they lead. Use a structured interview, a realistic simulation such as a pipeline review or a coaching exercise, carefully timed testing and references from people who reported to them. Score everything against a written profile of the role.
Do 40% of new executives fail within 18 months?
That figure is widely quoted, but the earliest source we found is a 1998 magazine column (Fisher, 1998) about newly hired managers that doesn't name a study. Research estimates of leadership failure run roughly 30% to 50% (Koortzen & Oosthuizen, 2019; Lombardo & Eichinger, 1989), depending on how failure is defined.
References
Benson, A., Li, D., & Shue, K. (2019). Promotions and the Peter Principle. The Quarterly Journal of Economics, 134(4), 2085-2134. https://doi.org/10.1093/qje/qjz022
British Columbia (Public Service Employee Relations Commission) v. BCGSEU, [1999] 3 S.C.R. 3.
Fisher, A. (1998, September-October). Keeping that great new job [Reprinted from "Don't blow your new job," Fortune, June 22, 1998, pp. 159-162]. Health Progress. Catholic Health Association of the United States.
Judge, T. A., Bono, J. E., Ilies, R., & Gerhardt, M. W. (2002). Personality and leadership: A qualitative and quantitative review. Journal of Applied Psychology, 87(4), 765-780. https://doi.org/10.1037/0021-9010.87.4.765
Keller, S. (2018, May 23). Successfully transitioning to new leadership roles. McKinsey & Company. https://www.mckinsey.com/capabilities/people-and-organizational-performance/our-insights/successfully-transitioning-to-new-leadership-roles
Koortzen, P., & Oosthuizen, R. M. (2019). Integrity and derailment of senior leaders in the Southern African context. SA Journal of Industrial Psychology, 45, Article a1677. https://doi.org/10.4102/sajip.v45i0.1677
Lombardo, M. M., & Eichinger, R. W. (1989). Preventing derailment: What to do before it's too late (Report No. 138). Center for Creative Leadership. https://www.ccl.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/05/preventing-derailment-research-paper-center-for-creative-leadership.pdf
Meiring, D., & Buckett, A. (2016). Best practice guidelines for the use of the assessment centre method in South Africa (5th edition). SA Journal of Industrial Psychology, 42(1), Article 1298. https://doi.org/10.4102/sajip.v42i1.1298
Ontario Human Rights Commission. (2008a). Interviewing and making hiring decisions. In Human rights at work 2008 (3rd ed.). https://www.ohrc.on.ca/en/iv-human-rights-issues-all-stages-employment/5-interviewing-and-making-hiring-decisions
Ontario Human Rights Commission. (2009). Policy on employment-related medical information (Original work published 1996). https://www.ohrc.on.ca/en/book/export/html/2450
Paese, M. (2021, May 19). Private struggle: Why executive transitions continue to fail. DDI. https://www.ddi.com/blog/executive-transitions
Rupp, D. E., Hoffman, B. J., Bischof, D., Byham, W., Collins, L., Gibbons, A., Hirose, S., Kleinmann, M., Kudisch, J. D., Lanik, M., Jackson, D. J. R., Kim, M., Lievens, F., Meiring, D., Melchers, K. G., Pendit, V. G., Putka, D. J., Povah, N., Reynolds, D., & Schlebusch, S. (2015). Guidelines and ethical considerations for assessment center operations. Journal of Management, 41(4), 1244-1273. https://doi.org/10.1177/0149206314567780
Sackett, P. R., Shewach, O. R., & Keiser, H. N. (2017). Assessment centers versus cognitive ability tests: Challenging the conventional wisdom on criterion-related validity. Journal of Applied Psychology, 102(10), 1435-1447. https://doi.org/10.1037/apl0000236
Sackett, P. R., Zhang, C., Berry, C. M., & Lievens, F. (2022). Revisiting meta-analytic estimates of validity in personnel selection: Addressing systematic overcorrection for restriction of range. Journal of Applied Psychology, 107(11), 2040-2068. https://doi.org/10.1037/apl0000994
Sackett, P. R., Zhang, C., Berry, C. M., & Lievens, F. (2023). Revisiting the design of selection systems in light of new findings regarding the validity of widely used predictors. Industrial and Organizational Psychology, 16(3), 283-300. https://doi.org/10.1017/iop.2023.24
Silzer, R., & Jeanneret, R. (2011). Individual psychological assessment: A practice and science in search of common ground. Industrial and Organizational Psychology, 4(3), 270-296. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1754-9434.2011.01341.x
Tippins, N. T. (2023, January 31). Testimony of Nancy T. Tippins, Ph.D. [Testimony on behalf of the Society for Industrial and Organizational Psychology]. U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. https://www.eeoc.gov/meetings/meeting-january-31-2023-navigating-employment-discrimination-ai-and-automated-systems-new/tippins,%20ph.d.
Disclaimer: This article provides general HR and business information, not legal advice. Employment law turns on the specific facts and changes over time. Before acting on anything here, confirm it with an Ontario employment lawyer.
