Sales Development Representative Interview Questions: What to Ask and What a Good Answer Contains
Most SDR interviews are a personality read. That is a mistake in both directions: outgoing people wash out and quiet ones hit quota. These questions test the behaviours that actually predict outbound success, which are research, persistence with a method, and coachability.
- Ask about work the candidate owned, not opinions: every question below asks for a system, a deal, a campaign or a decision that actually happened, with what they did and what came of it.
- Score each answer against the note beside it. The notes describe observable things a strong sales development representative answer contains, so two interviewers write down the same evidence and reach the same score.
- Use the scorecard: research; method; live handling, and two more. Five criteria, scored 1 to 4, with a sentence of evidence each.
- Ask five questions well rather than eight in a rush. The first one, about something the candidate owned end to end, sets the tone: specifics, not generalities.
- Watch for the red flags listed below, which are patterns rather than single answers: the role-play opens with a pitch and cannot recover from "not interested", for one.
The questions
1. Pick a company you would prospect for us. What would you find out about them before the first message, and where?
What a strong answer contains: Names specific sources (their site, hiring pages, news, the person's own posts), a hypothesis about why they might buy, and a first line that references it. Generic "I would research them" scores zero.
2. Tell me about the hardest account you ever broke into. How many touches, over how long, and what finally worked?
What a strong answer contains: A number of touches and a timeline, a sequence with variety, and a specific thing that worked. Persistence without a method is just volume; look for the adjustment.
3. Role-play: I am a busy VP and you have caught me on the phone. Go.
What a strong answer contains: Gets to the reason for the call in one sentence, asks a question that shows research, and handles the first brush-off without arguing. Score recovery from the brush-off above the opener.
4. What did your manager coach you on most, and what did you change?
What a strong answer contains: A specific weakness, a specific change, and a result. Coachability is the best predictor for this role; a candidate who cannot name a coaching point has not been coached or did not listen.
5. How do you decide a lead is not worth more time?
What a strong answer contains: Explicit criteria (fit, engagement, timing), a number of touches, and a way to hand it back to marketing or a nurture sequence rather than deleting it. Someone who never gives up is wasting half their week.
6. Walk me through your week. Where does the time go?
What a strong answer contains: Blocks for prospecting, calling and follow-up, a sense of their own numbers (calls to conversations to meetings), and what they do when a day goes badly. Structure predicts quota.
7. Tell me about a meeting you booked that the account executive said was bad. What happened?
What a strong answer contains: Owns it, knows what qualification was missing, and changed the questions they ask. Handoff quality is the SDR's real product.
8. What do you want to be doing in three years, and how does this role get you there?
What a strong answer contains: A plausible path (AE, marketing, customer success), and an understanding of what this role teaches. An honest "I am not sure yet" beats a rehearsed answer.
Scorecard
Score each 1 to 4 with one line of evidence. A total is less useful than a pattern.
- Research: specific sources, a buying hypothesis, a personalised first line
- Method: persistence with variety and adjustment, not volume
- Live handling: gets to the point and recovers from a brush-off
- Coachability: names a coaching point and a change made
- Qualification: knows when to stop and what a good handoff needs
Red flags
- The role-play opens with a pitch and cannot recover from "not interested"
- No numbers: cannot say how many calls it takes them to book a meeting
- Every bad meeting was the account executive's fault
- Research means "look at their LinkedIn"
How to run the interview
Do the prospecting question before the role-play. It shows you whether the candidate prepares, and a candidate who prepares will do a better role-play, which is the point: you are hiring for the prepared version of them.
Keep the role-play short and score the recovery. Anyone can memorise an opener. What predicts success is what happens after the prospect says no for the first time: whether they ask a question, whether they argue, whether they thank the person and leave the door open.
Ask the coaching question of every candidate and weight it heavily. SDR teams are training programmes as much as sales teams, and the person who improved fastest under coaching last time will improve fastest under yours.
Frequently asked questions
Should we hire for personality?
Hire for method and coachability. Extroversion is the weakest predictor of outbound success of any trait commonly used, and it is the one most interviews measure.
Is a take-home prospecting exercise fair?
Yes, if it is short: three accounts, one message each, an hour's work. Tell them what you will score. It is the most predictive thing you can ask for.
How do we assess someone with no sales experience?
The same questions, with examples from anywhere they had to persuade strangers: fundraising, retail, campaigning, recruiting for a society. The behaviours transfer.
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