“Hunters require confi dence, resilience, social courage, and the ability to initiate relationships in a world that’s becoming increasingly impersonal.”
— Eric Schmitt President Rapids & Affi liates
“Are the people in these roles bringing in or executing the business needed to pay for themselves?” Stafford-Smith recently formalized its measurement approach by implementing a customer relationship management (CRM) system — a shift Stafford said has delivered more insight than he expected. “It gives us better insight into our sales performance, and our leadership team can follow up with individuals and coach them, if necessary,” Stafford explained. “When people start utilizing the CRM and they see what comes out of it, they’re like ‘This is pretty cool. This actually helps me schedule and organize.’”
Moving Between Roles One of the more nuanced questions
facing any sales leader is whether hunters and farmers can cross over. Even for those who can learn the other role’s skills, managers must still weigh whether the results are worth trying to develop their salespeople in new directions.
Bennett is candid about the limits of
role fl exibility. After years of testing, he has concluded that the hunter-farmer divide is about more than job roles. It refl ects fundamental differences in how individuals are predisposed to initiate and respond. “This thought process is a conative behavior that is ingrained in individuals and cannot be taught,” he said. “It is key to have salespeople in the correct seat, understanding their strengths and weaknesses.” Schmitt agrees that personality is the deciding factor. Hunters must
42 FEDA News & Views
be comfortable with rejection and thrive in uncertainty. Farmers excel in trust-based environments where the relationship is already established. When a farmer is forced into heavy prospecting, they may hesitate around rejection. Conversely, when a hunter shifts exclusively to maintaining relationships, they may become ineffective. Forcing either type into the other’s role tends to produce disengagement, not development, Schmitt warns.
“Leaders can support transitions
through coaching and clear expectations, but long-term success often comes from aligning natural wiring with role responsibility,” Schmitt said. “Both roles are essential and celebrating those differences strengthens the team.” At Stafford-Smith, that strength
comes from cross-training. But Stafford still acknowledges that it takes the right person to handle both the hunter and farmer mindsets. It’s for this reason the hiring phase is so important for the company. Candidates go through a structured profi ling process that gauges how well their instincts align with the distributor’s womb-to-tomb ownership model. There’s still room for a new hire to receive coaching and skills development, but Stafford said it’s essential that they be open to learning new strategies.
“If a person comes to us and thinks all they have to do is sell and someone else will handle all the other customer pieces for them, they’re probably not going to fi t our mold,” Stafford said.
What Else to Consider For executives evaluating whether
to adopt or refi ne a hunter-farmer structure, all three leaders point to the same starting place: Understand your people before you restructure your team.
Schmitt believes analytics and data
are an important piece of the answer. He recommends using behavioral assessment tools — such as Culture Index or StrengthsFinder — to identify who is naturally wired for each role, then building expectations and metrics around those strengths rather than hoping a salesperson will adapt. “In our experience, it’s far easier to fi nd strong farmers than true hunters,” he said. “Hunters require confi dence, resilience, social courage, and the ability to initiate relationships in a world that’s becoming increasingly impersonal.” Bennett’s advice is to review the business itself: Evaluate the existing book of business, defi ne the target market, and let the organizational structure follow from those realities. For Stafford, a successful sales team values culture and leadership by example. No model works, he said, if the people at the top are not willing to do what they are asking of their teams. “As a business owner or manager, you can’t ask somebody to do something you wouldn’t do yourself,” Stafford said. “You’re not going to win every customer, but you can win your fair share just through hard work.” The hunter-farmer model is not
a rigid prescription. As these three executives demonstrate, it can look like a clean organizational split, a fl exible hybrid, or a deeply embedded cultural expectation. What unites each version is the recognition that properly aligning talent with those skills is one of the most signifi cant impacts a sales leader can make for their organization. Noel Liston is the managing broker at Core Industrial Realty, a FEDA business services member that provides industrial real estate brokerage
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