Strong cold-outbound SDR. Probes before pitching, recovers fast under pressure, and ready to carry pipeline from week one.
Jordan is a strong cold-outbound SDR. They open on the buyer's problem, not the pitch, and they recover fast when a quarter goes sideways. Coaching lands in the moment. Jordan looks ready to carry a pipeline target from their first month.
Jordan starts with the buyer's world before planning a single call. They ask what the market is struggling with, then work outward to the deal. When the interviewer offered a new angle, Jordan took it and built on it. They run their numbers out loud, and they hold a steady tone whether the story is a win or a loss.
Strong mechanics for an SDR at this level. Jordan researches with intent, runs the pipeline math out loud, and handles objections with a clear method.
6 skills demonstratedPre-call research - looks for funding news and hiring signals, not just a job title.
Pipeline math - worked the quarterly target down to 45 dials a day, unprompted.
Discovery - named SPIN, then used implication questions on the price objection.
Objection handling - acknowledged, asked a question, then reframed. No script, no deflection.
Buyer empathy - described the VP of Sales' week and what makes them pick up.
Tooling - named Apollo, Clay, and a sequencer, each with a real use case.
Cold email craft - this is a voice assessment. Ask to see a real sequence.
Most SDR pipeline now starts in the inbox. Seeing a real sequence tells you whether they can earn a reply, not just make a dial.
Full multi-channel cadence - they mentioned LinkedIn, but the day-to-day rhythm was not tested.
Buyers ignore single channels. A rep who runs calls, email, and LinkedIn together books more meetings from the same list.
CRM notes and AE handoff - not surfaced here. Worth a quick check.
A clean handoff is what turns a booked meeting into a closed deal. Thin notes quietly lose deals the SDR worked hard to source.
Walk me through your last cold email sequence - the subject line, the hook, and the call to action.
Show me how you would plan a week of outbound across calls, email, and LinkedIn.
When you qualify an opportunity, what do you hand the AE in your notes?
Points outward to the buyer first. Asks before assuming.
Evidence-backedAsked what Quota.ai's buyers actually struggle with before planning any outreach.
Caught the gap in the brief and asked how the current SDRs are performing.
Named paying customers as a first learning source, ahead of the product.
Going a layer deeper on the competition would sharpen how they position.
Buyers compare before they buy. A rep who knows the alternatives can position the deal, not just describe the product.
Building a habit of writing down what they learn each week would compound it faster.
Knowledge that lives only in their head does not compound. Written notes become the playbook that ramps them, and the next hire, faster.
Pushing past the first answer - a second and third "why" would surface root pain quicker.
The first answer is rarely the real pain. The second and third 'why' is where the qualified, urgent deals are found.
Take the last buyer persona you sold to. Outside of what colleagues told you, how did you build your own picture of their week?
Tell me about a deal where one question changed the outcome. What did you ask, and why?
How do you research a competitor before a call - what are you actually looking for?
Takes a reframe and builds on it in the moment.
Evidence-backedTook the nudge about customer voice and rebuilt the answer around it.
Named a weekly call-review session with a peer, not a one-off.
Stayed open and even-toned when challenged, with no defensiveness.
Asking the coach a question back would turn good listening into a real exchange.
Coaching that sticks is a conversation, not a download. Questioning the reframe is how a rep makes it their own and uses it under pressure.
Tracking what they change after feedback would make their progress easy to see.
What gets tracked gets better. A visible change-log shows the manager the coaching is landing, and shows the rep their own progress.
Seeking feedback before it is offered would speed up how fast they improve.
Reps who wait to be coached ramp at the manager's pace. Reps who pull feedback ramp at their own, which is far quicker.
Tell me about feedback that stung. What did you change, and what did you push back on?
How do you get feedback when no one is offering it?
Describe a habit you built from a manager's coaching - how did you keep it up?
Steady under pressure. Back to basics, not to excuses.
Evidence-backedTold a specific story about a flat quarter and the reset they ran.
Went back to basics first - more dials, a tighter list - before anything clever.
Kept the same calm tone describing a loss as a win.
Naming the deeper why behind the work would lift their motivation story.
Targets motivate on the good days. A deeper reason is what gets a rep on the phone on the bad ones, when most quietly coast.
Holding the long view would steady them through the month-three dip.
Month three is where new SDRs quit in their heads. A rep who expects the dip rides through it instead of spiralling.
A daily reset ritual would protect their output on the hard days.
Output collapses when one bad call bleeds into the next ten. A reset ritual protects the rest of the day's dials.
Describe your hardest month in sales. What did your day-to-day look like while you climbed out?
What is your reset after three bad days in a row?
What keeps you going when the numbers are not landing?
Clear and structured. Listens, then answers with shape.
Evidence-backedBuilt longer answers with a clear shape - setup, tension, resolution.
Paraphrased the price objection back before answering it.
Used sales language well - pipeline, ICP, discovery - with no padding.
A little more warmth in the first ten seconds would lift the cold open.
Cold calls are won or lost in the opener. A warmer first line buys the rep the next thirty seconds to make their case.
A half-beat pause before answering would give each point more room to land.
Rushing to answer signals nerves and talks over the buyer. A short pause reads as composure and lets the point land.
Tightening longer stories to two sentences would keep a busy buyer with them.
Busy buyers tune out long answers. A two-sentence version keeps a senior decision-maker listening to the end.
Give me your cold-call opener, word for word.
Tell me about a time you lost someone's attention on a call. What did you change?
How do you adjust your message for a CFO versus a front-line manager?
Hand these to your interviewer. Each tests a signal the assessment could not fully surface.
5 questionsThe full voice-interview transcript. Lines marked cited are referenced across the report. C is the candidate, I is the meritt interviewer.
Okay, you've just joined Quota.ai. It's your first week. Tell me what you understand about the role, and what you'd want to do first.
First week, honestly, I'm not picking up the phone yet. I want to know what our buyers are actually struggling with. What's the pain that makes Quota.ai a must-have, not a nice-to-have?
And I'd want a tight ICP before I touch the phones. Spray-and-pray wrecks your pipeline, and your discovery calls go nowhere.
One thing I noticed you didn't mention - how are the three SDRs already here doing? What's working for them, what isn't? I'd copy what works before I reinvent anything.
Before I dial anyone, I want to know what's changed for them recently. New funding, a new VP of Sales, a hiring spree for reps - those are the signals that tell me why now.
The VP of Sales I'm calling is staring at a number every Monday. Their week is forecast calls, pipeline reviews, chasing reps. I get picked up when I lead with their number, not my product.
One thing strong SDRs often add here is spending real time with existing customers, the ones already paying. How would you factor that in?
Yeah, that's a better starting point than what I said. I'd flip it - customers first, then leadership. The customers give me the words that actually land.
So I'd sit in on a couple of customer calls in week one. The people already paying tell you more than any deck.
For tooling, I'd build the list in Apollo, enrich it in Clay so I'm not sending everyone the same email, and run the cadence through a sequencer so nothing slips.
So, three things. First, understand the buyer. Second, learn from the team that's already winning. Third, get my tools set up. In that order.
Good. Let's move on.
Your job is to hit a quarterly sourced pipeline target of two hundred and fifty thousand pounds, with deals around twenty-five thousand. Walk me through how you'd hit that.
So 250k in sourced pipeline, deals around 25k, that's ten solid opportunities a quarter. If I book one meeting for every fifteen good conversations, and a chunk of those become opportunities, I'm looking at roughly 45 dials a day to keep that engine full.
But dials are a lagging worry. I'd watch connect rate and conversation rate first. If those dip, the pipeline problem is already two weeks away.
Every Friday I sit with another rep and we listen back to two calls each. You catch things in someone else's call you're blind to in your own.
Activity without quality can feel productive but isn't. How do you balance the two?
You're right to push on that. Volume without listening is just noise. I'd rather make 30 dials I learn from than 60 on autopilot.
Good. Last section.
It's the last week of the quarter. Everyone hit their target except you. You've got a real gap and it hasn't been your month. What do you do?
Last year my Q2 was flat. I'd lost my rhythm. So I stripped it back - I stopped tweaking my pitch and went back to more conversations, a tighter list, the same opener every time.
Basics first, always. More dials, a tighter list, before anything clever. The clever stuff is usually how I lost the rhythm in the first place.
I lost a deal I was sure of in March. I was gutted for a day. Then I asked the prospect what I missed, wrote it down, and moved on.
Different call. A Sales Director cuts you off: "I'm really busy, just send me an email." What do you say?
Totally fair, you're busy. Can I ask one question before I go? If it's not relevant I'll never call again. If it is, I'll save you an hour next week.
So what I'm hearing is, the value's clear, it's the budget timing that's the problem. Is that right?
I'd use a bit of SPIN here. Before I defend the price, I want the implication - what does it cost them to stay where they are for another two quarters?
Thanks for going through that. That's the end of the assessment.