Adapted from a real OPS Staffing article originally posted by Mitchell Riley (Sep 2026).
A great restoration salesperson is not a generic closer you drop into a shop. They already understand mitigation and reconstruction language, can sit with an adjuster without embarrassing you, and will still make the next call after a no. Character still matters. Industry fit is what keeps them past month three.
Screen three layers in this order: have they sold in restoration or a nearby insurance-adjacent book; do they have the character traits you cannot train; and will someone in the market confirm they actually did the work. Gut instinct without those three is how you hire someone who looks sharp in the interview and is gone after the first slow month.
OPS Staffing runs restoration sales searches nationwide. Contingency is one path. Shops that want a flat-fee / structured sales search should read the Floodlight Sales Program. Retention context: winning the retention battle.
| Trait | How it shows in this industry | Ask or check |
|---|---|---|
| Character | They do not oversell dry time or hide a miss from production | A time they walked away from a job or told a client no |
| Customer empathy | They can sit with a homeowner after a fire without making it about quota | How they handled a claim that went sideways |
| Self-discipline | Adjuster touches and follow-up happen when the shop is slammed | How they tracked activity last quarter, in their words |
| Goal track, not goal talk | They can name a number they hit and the activity that produced it | Personal goals they set and what they actually did |
| Rejection without collapse | Insurance and property managers say no often | What they did the morning after a lost account |
| Ambition that will stay | They want a book they can keep, not a logo they can flip | Job-hop pattern and whether contacts are tired of the pitch |
A plug-and-play rep who already knows Xactimate language is tempting. Still run the character screen. Look at how often they have changed shops and how many competitors they have already sold. A grass-is-greener resume can arrive with a book that is already weary of hearing this company is the best.
You can teach a disciplined seller how your mitigation and reconstruction process works. You cannot teach integrity on a live loss. You also cannot teach someone to care about the file after the commission check.
That sequence beats hiring from the shallow end because someone interviewed well. Pair it with a written guarantee. OPS placements carry 60-120 days. Process: recruiting process.
Sometimes, if they will sit with your PMs and learn how a file gets paid. Budget ramp time. For a seat that has to produce now, hire restoration-experienced BD.
Most seats can be contingency. If you want a dedicated sales search with a different fee shape, that is what Floodlight is for. Do not buy temp labor and expect a hunter.
Talk to a recruiter or call (888) 482-6019.
Updated September 2026 by the OPS Staffing recruiting team. Employee-owned. Based in Pasadena, TX. Placing restoration and construction talent nationwide since December 2015.