5.1 Make People Central To Your Success
People will drive forward your vision
Success in business only happens to entrepreneurs who spend time improving and optimising each area of their business. From the initial idea, the product and the market potential; to the plan and vision, sales and marketing, the finance and growth strategy - each factor needs attention.
But a business is nothing without its PEOPLE. It is the team who helps the entrepreneur drive the vision forward.
Success is a team effort. Your people will represent your brand and help you achieve your objectives, so this area needs particularly close attention.
Entrepreneurs who don't deal effectively with people will face an uphill struggle to achieve success. Hiring the wrong person results in more time being spent managing the individual to uncover and resolve problems. The cost of re-training and re-recruiting can also be huge.
Successful entrepreneurs know that a strong team is a critical success factor in business and realise they can save time, money and increase productivity by hiring properly. Success in business always comes back to people. Employing and retaining the right people is key. It can also be a considerable challenge for entrepreneurs - perhaps the most challenging of all the factors for success.
And it's not just about hiring the right people; it's about managing them in the right way. Creating a team who will take your vision forward with you is about guiding, managing and leading those people in the right direction with the right tools and motivation.
You want to employ people who want to work for you and stay working for you; you need staff who see the bigger picture, are passionate about the vision and know exactly what is expected of them. That way you can optimise performance, productivity and results.
5.2 Be a skilled recruiter
People will drive forward your vision
Success in business only happens to entrepreneurs who spend time improving and optimising each area of their business. From the initial idea, the product and the market potential; to the plan and vision, sales and marketing, the finance and growth strategy - each factor needs attention.
But a business is nothing without its PEOPLE. It is the team who helps the entrepreneur drive the vision forward.
Success is a team effort. Your people will represent your brand and help you achieve your objectives, so this area needs particularly close attention.
Success in business always comes back to people. Employing and retaining the right people is key
Entrepreneurs who don't deal effectively with people will face an uphill struggle to achieve success. Hiring the wrong person results in more time being spent managing the individual to uncover and resolve problems. The cost of re-training and re-recruiting can also be huge.
Successful entrepreneurs know that a strong team is a critical success factor in business and realise they can save time, money and increase productivity by hiring properly. Success in business always comes back to people. Employing and retaining the right people is key. It can also be a considerable challenge for entrepreneurs - perhaps the most challenging of all the factors for success.
And it's not just about hiring the right people; it's about managing them in the right way. Creating a team who will take your vision forward with you is about guiding, managing and leading those people in the right direction with the right tools and motivation.
You want to employ people who want to work for you and stay working for you; you need staff who see the bigger picture, are passionate about the vision and know exactly what is expected of them. That way you can optimise performance, productivity and results.
5.3 | Care for your staff
Great relationships are critical
One of My 10 Golden Rules is CARING. It's a virtue that is pivotal to running a thriving business. I've found it is absolutely essential to care about the people who work for you - your staff and your business partners - because they are your biggest asset. Successful entrepreneurs know what their staff, partners and customers need and what drives them; what makes them tick. It is that understanding of people that spearheads success.
In business, one of the best lessons I've learned is to treat others how you want to be treated yourself.
It is vital to care about the people who work with you, because they are your biggest asset.
Relationships with people are critical. Business and personal relationships should be cherished. The entrepreneur who knows and values this is the entrepreneur who retains their staff and builds a winning team. Caring begets loyalty. It really is as simple as that.
Part of caring about people is knowing exactly how to motivate and reward each individual member of a team. And this is what comes out of the analysis of individuals at interview stage. Everybody is different and people are motivated by different things.
Motivating your team
People aren't only motivated by the money that they earn. There are many different reasons why people are motivated to come to work. Your job is to uncover what motivates the people you employ from the outset.
Once an individual has been evaluated, it's vital to sit down and ask yourself (and your recruitment panel):
- What are the real hooks and drivers for this individual?
- What excites them? Rather than what you think is an exciting way to motivate them.
- What do they really enjoy doing? Focus staff on doing something they like to do and ensure it benefits the business.
Relationships with people are key. Business and personal relationships should be cherished.
Motivate through clear direction
Caring is an essential starting point when it comes to dealing with people on your team. In addition, you need to motivate them through giving clear direction
- Align what that person has been brought in to do with the motives and objectives you want them to fulfil. Clearly document and outline exactly what you want that individual to do.
- Continually review ways to use their character traits and drive them to fulfil expectations and achieve results.
- Motivate by giving clearly focused objectives. People get de-motivated when they don't have a firm understanding of what's expected of them. Match your expectation and their expectation. Be clear. This way, when an individual completes a task they feel happy they've met a challenge and achieved a goal.
- Be personable and approachable. Chat informally to all employees, no matter how big your company grows. I genuinely believe a good CEO will talk and listen to everyone who has a stake in the business or the business's future, including all staff and business partners. Relationships are important to me and other successful entrepreneurs. Make sure they are to you.
5.4 | Develop a culture of change
Managing Change
The world around us is constantly changing and so are the forces affecting any business. Configuring a business to deal with change is a big challenge but it can be resolved with the right attitude and culture.
People fear change, because it takes them outside of their comfort zone. To worry about change is saying you worry about your own ability to do something slightly different. And when people get into a comfort zone, that's when they don't perform. They just do what's required. They don't go the extra mile.
There is a right way and a wrong way to manage change within the workplace. The right way results in guiding people outside of their comfort zone; to educate and empower a team of individuals to embrace change and see the benefit and longevity of change. The wrong way results in confused, defensive and demoralized staff.
The wrong way to embrace change
Often, organisations making changes will say, ''things aren't going right and this is what we're going to do''.
To say ''this is what you will do'', means people's roles change, jobs change. That is just poor management because it completely destabilizes the work force, resulting in people now doing different roles that they weren't employed to do. They won't embrace change and why should they? They want to protect their own position and job.
The right way to embrace change
Explain why you need to change, communicate the change and bring a team in.
For me, change is about brainstorming, about think tanks. Successful entrepreneurs embrace change by utilising their senior management team (or business advisors), by considering all of the things that aren't being done, how to make things better, how to do things differently. Evaluate why changes need to occur, whether there is a crisis to manage. Brainstorm and pinpoint areas that need to change in the business to avoid similar problems going forward.
Implement change as a collective. Rather than one person saying, ''this is how we're doing things, this is why we're changing'', it's actually saying, ''you've made the change, you've enhanced the business.'' This gets buy-in from those involved and becomes a lot easier to live with as a result.
Successful entrepreneurs create a culture within their company in which innovation and change can be welcomed. These companies have strong leaders, passionate teams and, together, they make decisions. They measure the effects their decisions will have. Find out what they don't know and why, resolve the issue, make the decision - team work.
New ideas are a vital part of being an entrepreneur, and these involve change. By leading from the front within a culture that welcomes and brainstorms new ideas, entrepreneurs are far more likely to succeed.
Implement change as a collective. Brainstorm with your team.
5.5 | Reality check: recruit effectively
Reality check: recruit effectively
- Know what you want. Analyse exactly what you want and match the role and responsibility to the individual.
- What do you want to see in the individual?
- What is the role and what are the responsibilities?
- How does the interviewee match the enterprise?
- Be analytical. Use psychometrics. Remember, some people expand the truth and say what you want to hear at interview stage. In practice they may be less skilled.
- Make joint decisions. Involve existing staff - a panel of more than one person to interview and make the decision to hire. Make sure people who will be managing or working with this person are involved in the decision making process. A panel of objective views works far better than making the decision as an individual.
- Go into detail. Ask for specifics. What experience have they had? Can they give examples? Drill down to individual successes, motivations and results.
- Get a mix of people across the company. Don't match their persona to yours. Ensure the talents and personalities of each individual you take on complements what's missing in others, including yourself. The strongest enterprises house innovators, entrepreneurs, sales and finance specialists, grafters, creatives; technical experts, it's about the right mix of strengths to reduce any weaknesses.
- Use your intuition. This is a gut feeling whether you can work with a person; whether what they're saying stacks up and whether they have the skills, energy, drive and enthusiasm to perform well. First impressions do count. However, don't always rely just on instinct. Trust it; listen to it, but use it alongside analysis.
- Steer people in the right direction. Detail and define the roles, responsibilities and objectives clearly to the people you employ from the outset. Make sure people know what is expected of them, what the role entails and why.
- Get to know people as individuals first. Find out what motivates them and what makes them tick at the analytical interview stage. This will help further down the line once they are employed to motivate and reward staff effectively to get results and loyalty. You reap what you sow with business relationships. Provide opportunities and something to believe in.