When I was five years old my mother gave birth to twins — my brother, Bob, and my sister, Sue. They caused quite a flurry of activity in our immediate family, the neighborhood, and even my hometown when their picture made the front page of the local newspaper.

My reaction to all of this was not the happy scenario my parents had anticipated. I did not greet these little bundles of joy with open arms. In fact, it was just the opposite. I was unhappy and jealous of all the attention they were getting, and began to pinch Bobby's plump, pink arm when my mother wasn't looking (in my juvenile wisdom, I decided that if he cried often enough, my parents would want to get rid of him)!

Unfortunately, my ploy was quickly discovered, and I was sent to stay at my grandmothers house more often than I would have liked during those first few weeks. Things eventually did calm down and I actually came to like these new little critters (in time).

Recently my mother and I were reminiscing and laughing about my behavior and my frequent trips to my grandmother's house when my mother said, "Well, you know, that probably wouldn't happen today but those were the days before self-esteem." I knew exactly what she meant.

I admit my behavior was pretty bad towards my new siblings and probably could have been avoided altogether with a minimum of "child psychology." But in my parents' generation, the psychological preparation for a new baby (or in this case, babies!) wasn't "front and center" the way it is now. I'm not saying that was right. But I am saying that it probably wasn't as extreme as what I see happening now.

From No Self- Esteem to Too Much Self-Esteem

What's happening now? What I have noticed in the past twelve years of interviewing hundreds, if not thousands, of candidates is that, quite frankly, some have more self-esteem than they warrant!

What I see are candidates who have had mediocre performance in a company but who are overly proud of their contribution. What I see are companies that have become like educational institutions (don't get me started on grade inflation!), passing out "Presidents Club" awards en masse.

So, how can you know when you are hiring if you have a real performer in front of you or someone who has unjustifiably been told over and over and over that they're a performer?

Drill Down on the Numbers

One important way for you to find out if that potential employee you're talking to is the "real deal" is to get lots of factual information — in other words, get the stats. Just like in baseball (Go Sox!), there's no hiding the numbers.

Here's the information you should get for the past five sales years:

• What was their actual dollar annual quota?
• What actual dollars were sold before the end of the sales year? (Important: if candidate starts talking about "run rate" and pipeline activities, it could be diversionary. Be careful not to be sidelined.)
• What was the average size deal they sold and how many deals did they do to reach goal?
• If there are any awards listed, at what point in quota performance did award status kick in? (I interviewed one candidate who came from a company where Presidents Club status was awarded when you reached 80% of your sales quota!)
• Find out what percentage of the sales force made it to the awards level. In other words, how "exclusionary" was the awards program. (You could be hiring a superstar or someone from a company with low barriers to entry on the awards programs.)
• Beware of the "Rising Tide Syndrome." If the candidate sold in an industry that had a dramatic upturn, and where every salesperson was selling up a storm (think internet connectivity in the 90s), you need to determine how much of his success was attribute to actions, as opposed to just order taking.

In the end, you need to be like Joe Friday and "get the facts," in order to hire the salesperson who is the real deal. Someone with a healthy ego and healthy (not inflated or deflated) sense of self-esteem will be fun to work with and able to get you the real results you're looking for.

I found out I couldn't make my little brother Bobby go away by pinching him. Unfortunately, you won't be able to make the wrong sales guy go away by pinching him either — so get all the stats you can before you make the offer!

Tell me what you think — is too much self-esteem a problem in your organization?