As you are waiting to be interviewed, in the HR lobby, they have a copies of their benefit package on the HR counter for you to read. Nothing in the benefit package really jumps out and grabs you.
Before I start, there is one distinction I feel I need to make. I feel that many of the candidates do not really realize the gravity of the potential of this particular inside sales position. If you could put your time in, and stick it out, this job has life-changing implications. When they first tell you what their top producers are making, your first impression is to say to yourself yea-yea, sure-sure. But, after it's all over, and you are on your way back home, that's when it all hits you - you should have put a lot more into it than you did.
The first interviewer, who was the HR manager, explained the pay structure. He said that the first 3 weeks of training you will only bring home the base pay rate of 400 gross, which is about 260 take-home, depending on your deductions. He wanted to know how many hours I would be willing to work, so I thought I would blow him out of the water, and said 80. To that, he implied that 60 would be sufficient. He seemed to be real concerned about whether or not I could make the 400 gross for three weeks work, or not. I believe that would be salary, not hourly, so at 400 a week, at 60 hours a week, you would be working for $6.66 an hour, which is below minimum wage. That's probably why he seemed to be real concerned about whether or not I could make that 400 gross for three weeks work or not.
Another subject we covered was the training and how it broke down. Two days of this, three days of that, and three days of live call taking, while you are being monitored.
We went through my resume, but only lightly. I told him that other telemarketing companies played games with the call flow, and he came back with the fact that they are a fortune 500 company, and that they grossed some crazy number in the millions or billions, and that they "don’t do that there". At the end of the interview, after he was done filling in pretty much all the information he wanted on his paperwork, we then began a role-playing session. He acted as a customer, and I had to come back with the proper responses. This went on for about 15 to 20 minutes. He wanted to see what my responses would be to a bunch of canned customer objections. And basically, I had to close the deals right in front of him. It was " What do you say when the customer says this" for about 20 minutes. He was also concerned with how long it took me to get to the interview, and I said 20 minutes, but that it didn’t matter because as soon as i got the job, i was going to move closer.
He asked when I could start, and I said "yesterday". Then we then took a long walk through customer service, then tech support, and then sales; all the way to the other end of the building, where he brought me to a big partitioned off, glass area, and asked me to have a seat, and wait to talk to the sales-floor-lead.
This guy was going to be my direct supervisor. He too was concerned with how long it took me to get there. Now we went through the resume with a fine-tooth-comb. Again I brought up the subject of call flow, and he admitted that they do, in fact, send the calls to their best people first. The second guy asked "Why do you want to do sales?; Why do you want to work at Dish?"; and "What are your salary expectations?" We hit a rough spot on the salary expectations. When I told him 35K, he looked like he was going to spit-up. So I had to quickly recant, and jack up the salary expectations to 1500 a week. With that, I could see his blood pressure return to normal, as much as could be expected,anyway.
We then got into the nitty-gritty, as to why I wasn’t at any of my previous employer's anymore, he got defensive, and asked if I was going to do any of that stuff with him, and then again, I had to back-peddle, go into damage control, and explain how I would never do any of that stuff with him.
I then attempted to close the deal, and asked when I could start. He said they still had to do a background check, drug test, and everyone concerned had to discuss the matter before I would be allowed to attend the training class.
When the interview was over, he escorted me back to the HR Lobby, where we shook hands, I thanked him for his time, and I again grabbed a seat. I was under the impression that I was still going to talk to people, but I was told no, we were done for the day, and that they would be in touch.
Dish pays bi-weekly.
