"Run discovery" is an incomplete assignment when the candidate does not know what they sell, why the buyer agreed to talk or where the conversation should end. An evaluator may mistake the resulting confusion for weak discovery. The hiring team created part of that confusion before the exercise began.
A useful sales role-play brief supplies the facts needed to attempt the job task, states the practical conditions and explains what the team wants to observe. It leaves buyer-held information for discovery without hiding basic instructions. Keep that distinction separate from the broader role-play interview process.
A candidate brief you can copy
Choose a relevant scenario before filling these fields. The brief describes one exercise, not the entire interview loop. Replace every bracketed field and send only the candidate-facing document.
Exercise title and reference: [name and approved reference]
Role sampled: [role and typical selling situation]
Purpose: [observable skills the hiring team will review]
Your task: [what to do, with whom, and why]
Finish when: [intended outcome or announced stopping point]
What you represent:
- Product or service: [plain-language description]
- Approved capabilities: [facts needed for this task]
- Pricing and authority: [supplied terms and limits]
- Unknowns: [facts not supplied; how to handle them]
What you know about the buyer:
[Shared business context and reason for the meeting]
Working conditions:
- Preparation: [materials and expected preparation effort]
- Interaction: [channel and planned duration]
- Follow-up: [required work, or explicitly none]
- Permitted resources: [references, notes and other aids]
- Technical requirements: [verified requirements]
For unclear instructions or access problems:
[Named recruiting contact and verified contact route]
For adjustment requests:
[Private recruiter/HR route before the exercise]
After the exercise:
[What happens next; only confirmed feedback arrangements]
Document owner: [role]
Approved on: [date]
Change note: [reference and material changes, or first issue]
The purpose field should name behavior, such as clarifying a buyer's workflow and agreeing a proportionate next step. "Demonstrate executive presence" leaves too much interpretation to the reader. The finish field should also be specific. A candidate asked to secure a signed purchase will behave differently from one asked to determine whether a technical follow-up is worthwhile.
Filled example: an unfamiliar scheduling product
The following company, product and exercise conditions are illustrative. They are not a description of a Miki customer or a tested duration recommendation.
Exercise: ShiftNest initial discovery, reference SN-A.
Role: Account executive speaking with an operations manager who requested information about scheduling software.
Purpose: We will observe how you clarify the current workflow, check assumptions and propose a next step based on what the buyer tells you.
Task: Hold an initial discovery conversation. Finish with a summary and a proposed next step, or explain why a further meeting is not yet justified. You are not expected to close a purchase.Product facts: ShiftNest is a fictional staff-scheduling product. Managers can publish schedules, review shift-change requests and view a weekly coverage summary. The supplied product sheet is the complete reference for this exercise. Pricing requires a separate scoped quote; you cannot approve discounts. Payroll integration details are not supplied. Treat them as unknown rather than inventing support.
Buyer context: The operations manager coordinates schedules across several teams. They requested this meeting after reading a description of the scheduling workflow. You do not yet know their approval process or the specific problem they want to solve.
Conditions: Read the supplied one-page sheet; allow 5 minutes for preparation. The spoken role-play is planned for 12 minutes and ends at the announced time. There is no deck, external research or written follow-up assignment. You may consult the sheet and your own notes during the conversation. Do not obtain live answers from another person or a generative tool during this exercise.
Access and help: This example uses an interviewer-led online call. The recruiter supplies the meeting link and confirms audio requirements before the session. Reply to the recruiter who sent the invitation if instructions are unclear, the connection fails or you need to discuss an adjustment privately. Do not continue through an access problem without telling the recruiter.
Afterward: The recruiter will explain the next hiring step separately. This brief does not promise access to scored assessment reports.
Owner: Recruiting operations. Approved: 29 October 2026. Change note: First issue of the illustrative SN-A brief.
This gives the candidate enough information to work without prescribing a successful sales answer. Someone can ask sensible questions in their own order. They do not need to guess whether payroll integration exists.
Keep the evaluator's information in a separate document
The companion below is for the hiring team. Do not append it to the candidate brief. Its job is to create observation opportunities, not secret requirements that depend on one preferred phrase.
| Information supplied to everyone | Evaluator-held fact | Opportunity the fact creates |
|---|---|---|
| The buyer coordinates schedules | Last-minute changes create manual follow-up with team leads | Candidate can investigate the present workflow and its consequences |
| No approval process is supplied | The buyer can recommend a review, but finance approves spending | Candidate can clarify authority without assuming the contact signs |
| Payroll integration is unknown | The buyer wants to know whether payroll data can transfer; they do not know the technical requirements | Candidate can acknowledge an unknown and propose a relevant clarification |
| A next step may be appropriate | The buyer will consider a workflow review with a team lead if its purpose is explained | Candidate can connect the next meeting to discovered needs |
When the candidate asks an equivalent meaningful question, provide the same substantive fact. "Who else needs to be comfortable with a change?" can reveal approval ownership just as a direct authority question can. An evaluator should not withhold the answer because the candidate missed a keyword.
The OPM guidance on work samples describes tasks that mirror work and cautions that work samples are intended for competencies expected on entry. That supports supplying unfamiliar company facts while observing relevant selling behavior. It does not validate this particular brief. The broader work-sample design guide helps decide which activity belongs in the exercise at all.
If a fact appears in neither document, the evaluator must not invent it later as an expectation. Record the gap and decide whether it affected the observation.
Check the instructions before sending them
Ask a recruiter and a hiring manager to read the candidate document independently and describe the assignment back. Differences in their answers are editing work for the team, not a test candidates should have to solve.
For example, replace "Impress the CFO and move the deal forward" with "Clarify which reporting problem needs attention and propose a meeting that would resolve an identified open question." The revision names a task. It does not tell the candidate which questions to ask or guarantee that a meeting is the correct outcome.
Check that the stated preparation includes all required work. A short role-play is not a short assignment if the invitation also requests a presentation. Confirm the support route works, and distinguish general technical requirements from individual adjustment discussions. CIPD's selection guidance recommends telling candidates about duration, technology and assessment conditions in advance; its testing section also calls for deliberate decisions about storage and access to results.
Keep one approved reference copy with an owner. If instructions change materially after invitations go out, record which candidates received which version and ask the recruiting or HR owner how to handle the affected sessions. This is a team document-control practice, not a software feature.
For an AI-buyer exercise, compare the finished brief with Miki's chat assessment and manager-report example. Inspect what the participant sees and what the manager can review. Miki's scores and assessment reports are manager/admin-only; the candidate brief should explain the task without promising private report access.