The Calling Comfort Trait Measures Willingness to Make Business Calls Before You Hire
The calling comfort trait is one of six dimensions in the Expressive and Social quadrant of the Behavioral Assessments. It shows whether a candidate reaches for the telephone or for email when a matter needs settling. Inside sales, service and supervision all depend on that answer.
What Does the Calling Comfort Trait Measure?
The calling comfort trait measures the willingness to make outbound phone calls to people with the intention of marketing something. It also covers the willingness to make phone calls to others in the course of business.
It does not measure how well or how successfully a person makes those calls.
Why calling comfort problems are invisible in interviews
Interviews ask candidates to describe phone work rather than do it. Anyone with ability can perform a job successfully for a few months, so early results reveal very little. Behavioral assessments measure the pattern across many items, where reluctance is far harder to mask than in a single conversation.
What the Calling Comfort trait helps you evaluate before you hire
This trait does not measure willingness to make unsolicited cold calls to strangers who are likely to resist them, and Cold Calling covers that separately. A high reading here may or may not indicate any willingness to work a cold list at all.
Why the Calling Comfort Trait Matters in Hiring
This trait predicts what happens at about the three month mark, once a new hire stops pushing through work that does not come naturally — which is exactly when early results stop being a useful signal.
Comfort and Retention
Anyone with ability can do a job for a few months. When that job is not comfortable, the person quits or does less of what matters.
The Hurdle Is Willingness
The trait does not measure how well a candidate handles a call. Instead it measures willingness, which the assessment calls the major hurdle to phone marketing.
Internal Calls Count Too
The trait also covers calls made in the ordinary course of business. Where Talking reads low too, a candidate may put off even necessary internal calls.
How low Calling Comfort scores show up on the job
Low scores rarely show in the first months, because new hires push through unfamiliar tasks. The assessment places the change at around three months of employment.
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How the Calling Comfort Trait Is Scored
The calling comfort trait is scored from 0 to 100, and the three bands below summarize the picture. Because phone demands differ sharply between positions, role benchmarks are essential for interpreting results accurately.
An IC profile does not report this trait at all. It appears on the SL Behavioral Assessment and Work Styles DISCovered.
Low — 0 to 39
Reluctant to make phone calls, and below 5 that reluctance turns severe. Even a proven sales record leaves a problem in positions requiring many hours of calls each day, and the difficulty usually appears after about three months.
Medium — 40 to 60
Some reluctance remains, especially when the intended message is challenging. A proven sales record leaves little problem in most phone-heavy positions, so weigh this reading against how difficult the calls in this particular position will actually be.
High — 61 to 100
Above average willingness to make phone calls, and above 96 very comfortable with marketing calls for many hours a day. Willingness to cold call strangers stays unknown at this level, so read the Cold Calling score separately first.
Calling Comfort is one of six traits measured together in the Expressive and Social quadrant
Each trait in this quadrant shapes how candidates engage with other people, and certain combinations change what a single phone reading actually predicts. The Expressive / Social Quadrant sets the reading beside Talking, Warm and Sociable, Cold Calling and Impulsive, which together describe how a candidate engages with the people around them.
Cold Calling
Cold Calling is the narrower of the two, covering unsolicited calls to resistant strangers. A candidate can clear this reading and still avoid a cold list.
Talking
Talking covers comfort expressing yourself out loud. Where both read low, a candidate may put off even the internal calls that the job itself genuinely requires.
Warm & Sociable
Warm and Sociable covers ease with unfamiliar people. When this trait, Talking and Warm and Sociable all read low, people-facing work becomes a documented risk.
Confront People
Confront People covers facing difficult situations directly. The assessment names it closely related, which matters most when the call has to carry a genuinely challenging message.
Assertiveness
Assertiveness covers the comfort to speak up and persuade. Combined with this reading, it indicates how readily a manager will call internal people about poor performance.
Expressive / Social Quadrant
Calling Comfort is one of six readings that build the Expressive and Social quadrant, where the interest runs toward talking and telling rather than toward listening.
Best Practice: Assessment results support your hiring decisions, they do not replace them. Always read the calling comfort trait score alongside the full profile and your role benchmarks before drawing a conclusion.
How to Interpret Calling Comfort Results
The number of phone hours a position genuinely requires determines how much weight this score carries. An IC profile does not report the trait at all.
What to Do Based on Your Calling Comfort Score
Avoid positions built on phone work regardless of the resume. Review Talking as well, because a low pair suggests even internal calls will go unmade entirely.
Confirm how many phone hours the position requires each day. Where calling drives the role, expect the problem to appear after the first three months pass.
Acceptable for most phone work. Probe how the candidate handles calls carrying a difficult message, since reluctance concentrates there rather than across all of their calls.
Well suited to phone-based positions. Confirm separately whether the role also requires cold calling, because this reading alone says nothing about approaching genuinely resistant strangers.
Very comfortable with sustained phone work. Add the Telemarketing Test when the position is genuinely telemarketing, since that test surfaces contradictions that are worth investigating further.
Assessment results support decisions, they do not make them. Always interpret scores in context: the specific role, interview performance, references, and your organization's culture.
The Calling Comfort Trait Matters for Every Role You Hire
Because phone work ranges from constant to occasional across positions, benchmarks define what a strong or weak score means for each role. Review results against the job-specific benchmark.
Roles where Calling Comfort is especially critical
| Role | Why it matters |
|---|---|
| Inside Sales Representative | Phone work fills most of the day here, and the assessment ties a low reading to problems that surface after the first three months of employment. |
| Telemarketing Representative | The assessment advises adding the Telemarketing Test for these applicants, because it surfaces contradictions between a candidate's stated comfort on the phone and the underlying reading. |
| Collections or Recruiting | Both roles depend heavily on calls that carry a difficult message, and the medium range is exactly where that remaining reluctance still tends to show itself. |
| Operations Manager | One client credited a high reading for a manager who called internal people about job status, though the assessment reads that comfort from several traits together. |
Relevant for all role types
Inside Sales Representative
Customer Service Representative
Telemarketing Representative
Account Manager
Collections Specialist
Recruiter
Dispatcher
Technical Support Representative
If any of these situations sound familiar, this assessment is for you
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Frequently Asked Questions
The calling comfort trait measures the willingness to make outbound phone calls with the intention of marketing something, and the willingness to make phone calls to others in the course of business. It reflects readiness to place the call rather than skill on the call.
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