Sales Interview Take-Home Exercise Pack
Three graded take-home exercises: a mock discovery call, a cold email, and a deal review: each with a scoring rubric, so every candidate is evaluated against the same bar.
How to use it
Match the exercise combination to the role level using the administration guide, send the relevant written exercises as take-homes with the exact briefs provided, and score every exercise against its rubric with two independent graders before the debrief.
What's inside
- Exercise 1: live mock discovery call brief + buyer persona script + 100-point rubric
- Exercise 2: cold email exercise brief + 100-point rubric
- Exercise 3: deal-review case study with sample pipeline data, 4 questions, and 100-point rubric
- Combined weighted scoring sheet by role level
- Administration guide (which exercises for SDR vs. AE vs. senior/manager)
- Grader reconciliation rule for score disagreements
Three exercises, three different skills. Use all three for a final-round AE hire; use just Exercise 2 for SDR roles; use Exercise 1 + 3 for experienced/senior AE or sales-manager candidates who don't need to prove cold-outreach skill.
Exercise 1: Mock Discovery Call
Format: 20-minute live call, candidate leads, interviewer role-plays the buyer persona below. When to use: final-round AE/closing-role candidates.
Send to candidate 24 hours ahead:
You'll be running a 20-minute discovery call with our VP of Operations, "Morgan," who is evaluating [Company]'s product for the first time. Come with a discovery plan: we're not looking for a scripted pitch, we're looking for how you think through uncovering the real problem.
Interviewer persona brief (Morgan, VP of Operations):
- Company: 200-employee logistics company
- Real pain (reveal only if asked good questions): losing ~6 hours/week per site manager to manual scheduling conflicts; has tried a competitor tool that failed on adoption because it wasn't mobile-friendly
- Personality: mildly guarded, gives short answers unless the candidate asks a real follow-up; will not volunteer the mobile-adoption failure unless asked "what have you tried before, and what happened?"
- Budget authority: real but not final: reports to a COO
Rubric (100 points)
| Element | Points | What to look for |
|---|---|---|
| Opens with agenda/permission, not straight into questions | 10 | Sets expectations for the call before diving in |
| Asks open questions before pitching | 20 | Doesn't pitch in the first 5 minutes |
| Follows the thread (asks about the failed prior tool without being prompted) | 25 | Single highest-signal item: surfaces whether they actually listen |
| Quantifies the pain (gets to the "6 hours/week" or equivalent) | 15 | Doesn't accept a vague pain statement at face value |
| Identifies buying process/other stakeholders | 15 | Asks who else is involved, and about the COO |
| Confirms next step before ending call | 15 | Doesn't end on "I'll follow up": proposes something concrete |
Exercise 2: Cold Email Exercise
Format: written, 30–45 minutes, take-home. When to use: SDR/BDR roles and AE roles where outbound is part of the job.
Brief: Write a cold outbound email to Jamie Reyes, VP of Operations at a 40-location regional restaurant group who has never heard of [Company], which sells shift-scheduling software for multi-location retail/restaurant operators.
Scoring: Subject line (5) / Relevance & personalization (10) / Value prop clarity (10) / Call to action (5) / Structure & brevity (10) = 40 points. (Pair with 3 written objection responses, 20 points each = 60 points, for a combined 100, see the full brief and rubric in the companion "Sales Aptitude & Skills Test (Pre-Hire)" resource.)
Exercise 3: Deal Review / Pipeline Judgment Case Study
Format: written, 45 minutes, take-home. When to use: senior AE and sales-manager candidates: tests judgment, not just execution.
Brief given to candidate:
Below is a simplified pipeline snapshot for one rep's book of business. You have 45 minutes. Answer the four questions that follow.
Sample pipeline data (adapt names/numbers to your business):
| Deal | Stage | Value | Days in stage | Last activity | Close date | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Acme Foods | Proposal | $85,000 | 41 | Emailed proposal, no reply, 12 days ago | This month | Champion went quiet after proposal sent |
| Bolt Logistics | Negotiation | $120,000 | 9 | Call 2 days ago, discussing terms | Next month | Legal review in progress |
| Crestline Retail | Discovery | $40,000 | 5 | Discovery call yesterday | This month (rep-set) | Single call so far, no economic buyer identified |
| Delta Manufacturing | Verbal Commit | $200,000 | 60 | No activity logged in 22 days | This month | "Verbal yes" logged 60 days ago, nothing since |
Questions:
- Which deals do you trust in this month's forecast, and which do you not? Why, specifically?
- What's the single most important next action on each deal?
- If you were this rep's manager, what's the one coaching conversation you'd have with them this week based on this data alone?
- What does this pipeline snapshot tell you about this rep's habits, independent of any one deal?
Rubric (100 points)
| Element | Points | What "great" looks like |
|---|---|---|
| Correctly flags Delta as forecast risk | 20 | Recognizes stale "verbal commit" + no activity as the highest-risk deal, not the biggest opportunity |
| Correctly flags Acme's stalled proposal | 20 | Identifies champion going quiet as a real risk signal, not just "waiting to hear back" |
| Realistic, specific next actions (not generic "follow up") | 20 | E.g., "re-engage Acme's champion with a specific new angle, not a check-in email" |
| Identifies the coaching conversation (CRM hygiene / stale deal follow-up habit) | 25 | Names the pattern (lets deals go stale without escalating) rather than one deal in isolation |
| Synthesizes a pattern across the whole book, not deal-by-deal only | 15 | Answer to Q4 shows systems-level thinking, e.g., "this rep needs a forced re-qualification trigger at 30 days no-activity" |
Combined Scoring Sheet
| Exercise | Weight (AE/senior role) | Weight (SDR role) | Score | Weighted |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1: Discovery Call | 40% | : | /100 | |
| 2: Cold Email | 30% | 100% | /100 | |
| 3: Deal Review | 30% | : | /100 | |
| Total | 100% | 100% | /100 |
How to administer
- SDR/BDR: Exercise 2 only, take-home, before first interview.
- AE (mid-level): Exercise 1 (live, final round) + Exercise 2 (take-home, early round).
- AE (senior) / Sales Manager: Exercise 1 (live) + Exercise 3 (take-home), skip Exercise 2 unless outbound is core to the role.
- Grade all written exercises with two independent graders per the rubrics; reconcile any >15-point gap by discussing the specific line items before finalizing a score.