Recruitment Agencies: Why Most of Them Are Terrible at Hiring Salespeople

I’m going to say something that might sound a bit brutal, but if you’ve worked with a few agencies before, you’ll probably nod along.

Most recruitment agencies are not very good at hiring salespeople.

Not because they’re lazy. Not because they don’t care. But because they don’t actually understand what makes someone good at sales.

They treat it like a matching exercise. Job spec on one side, CV on the other, line up a few keywords and off it goes. Bit like online shopping. “This looks about right, let’s give it a go.”

And then everyone acts surprised when it doesn’t work out.

Sales isn’t a keyword game. It’s behaviour.

You can have someone with five years in a role who’s never really performed, and someone with two years who’s consistently smashed targets. On paper, the first one often looks “safer”.

They’re usually not.

What I see all the time is agencies sending over candidates who sound great. Strong CV, confident in conversation, ticks all the obvious boxes.

But no one’s really tested anything.

No one’s dug into how they actually sold.
No one’s challenged their numbers.
No one’s looked for patterns in performance.

So what you end up with is a shortlist of people who interview well… not necessarily people who perform well.

There’s a big difference.

And to be fair, part of the problem sits with businesses as well. If you brief an agency with something vague like “we want a strong salesperson with a good attitude”, you’re basically asking them to guess.

You’ll get guesswork back.

The agencies that do this properly are a different breed. They don’t just pass CVs around. They challenge candidates, they look for consistency, they actually understand the environments they’re hiring into.

They’ll push back on you as well, which some clients don’t love at first. But it’s usually a sign they know what they’re doing.

Because good recruitment isn’t about filling a role quickly. It’s about getting it right so you’re not back in the same position three months later.

If you’ve ever said “we’ve tried agencies and they don’t work”, it’s worth asking… did they actually recruit, or did they just forward you CVs a bit faster than you could do it yourself?

There’s a difference. And it’s an expensive one.