Business Values: Management Starts Before You Hire

It is the eternal dilemma of the manager or business owner: how to manage people with inspiration, leadership, and motivation, still maintaining a results-driven approach?

Of course you want to nurture your team, let people develop their strengths, create a job they will enjoy, and more. But not to the detriment of meeting targets.

How do you balance the two?

Start sooner

It starts before you even hire your team.

Know what your business culture and work ethic is, and then hire people who match that ethic. This is dictated by your values: who you are, where you are going, and how you will get there.

Technical skills application, product knowledge, operational steps: most of this can be taught on the job. Having a personality that matches your company’s priorities can not.

Once you have hired people who will fit with your culture, the rest becomes easier.

Communicate

Be clear form the start on how people will be assessed.

Tell your employees how they, in their roles, will bring value to the company, and be sure to give continuous feedback, especially in the first 6-12 months.

As part of this, build a strong on-boarding plan (if you have employees already but never did an official on-boarding, you can start now an call it training instead). Train your team on:
– the client base
– the problem you are solving
– solutions to the problem
– why your solution is the best
– your product
– your team
– your growth expectations.

And anything that will contribute to understanding and meeting your expectations.

Working for and working together

Develop a partner relationship with your employees. You are all working together towards a common goal.

This approach will make it easy to share both good and constructive feedback.