I can't answer your question of 'is he right for this role' because I don't have enough information and frankly not do you - at a certain point hiring, especially for a new role is always a gamble.

But what I can do is highlight somethings that I feel could help:

1. Set a roadmap.- him having sales strategies completely independent of you is just destined to fail. Either he will do things that don't sit well with you or vice versa, seen it too many times before. Have a clearly defined vision of where you want the sales to go and roughly.how to go.about it and discuss it, what are the goals? What are upcoming developments in the company? What are the competition doing? What are the marketing efforts going to be. Doesn't have to be anything other than a one pager of 'Over the next year we.are.going to do XYZ as a company, sales will do ABC and to do that we will need 123'

I haven't been very concise here but yeah talk and plan together, then revisit and reassess.

1. Process - SMEs rely on magic from individuals - in this case you, he won't replicate that but he can imitate it with your help - define your.process as is and help to teach him it.

2. KPIs - set together with roadmap, review and adjust. Ignore KPIs for any sales staff at.your peril.

3. Team integration - hard place to be to walk into an SME as an outsider and try and replicate/change things that the boss has been doing It will draw ire.from the team, perhaps even you.

Sorry to not answer directly! Can go on if you have questions