How a Little Structure Helped our Small Business BOOM!
Owning a small business is sometimes described as ‘The American Dream.’ But what people often times overlook is that along with the dream comes a fair share of nightmares!
The Beginning – Chaos
In the beginning stages of our business, like any startup, we lacked structure but were fortunate to have owners possessing key traits like: passion, energy and a very strong drive to succeed. Each owner wore multiple hats, interchangeably. One moment you’re trying to land your first client and the next you’re changing light bulbs while the other owner is going from designing a new logo to figuring out how to satisfy the needs of your first client. Owners had to juggle everything, all day, every day and often times all night.
The Employees ≠ Less Chaos
Once we finally brought in some business, the ‘quick fix’ to the chaos was believed to be simple: hire employees! This proved to be easier said than done… Taking your hard-earned money, that cost you blood, sweat, tears and sleepless nights to generate, then hesitantly give a portion of it to someone else in hopes they can ease your burden.
What is sometimes overlooked is; people bring a whole new set of baggage to your party! Yes, it’s nice to have someone help you with the phone calls, the e-mails, the customer service, the sales, etc., but they also come with the challenges of; wages, taxes, benefits, different work ethic, different personalities, etc. So, hiring new employees did allow us to shift some responsibility but in the same breath added more, different, responsibilities to our plate.
Mini-Me’s = More Chaos
When you run a business for several years and you experience the pains of a start-up, then the growing pains of becoming a legitimate business, you finally realize: we’ve created mini-me’s who, like the owners in the beginning, wear multiple hats and interchange them throughout the day.
The new employees were trained to do nearly everything the owners were doing (because that’s the way the owners did it and that’s how they wanted it to be done). New employees we taught a piece of marketing, were encouraged to help sell, were taught customer service and expected to satisfy all the client’s needs, while also helping in some of the HR and finance roles, because again, that was once the owners job which was partially passed down to the new employees.
The Consultants = Structure
Finally, after experiencing so many growing pains, a lightbulb went on when we were introduced to the concept of business consultants. We began meeting and interviewing expert consultants from different firms looking for The One who would help us find a better structure in order for us to establish a foundation for future growth. Growth had come over the years but it came with many growing pains. We believed our new strategy for a better business structure would be the key to quicker, more substantial, growth.
And, as it turns out, we were right!
Structure = Greater Success
In 2012, nearly 17 years since our business began, we partnered with the consulting firm, Petrous Leadership. The result, in a nut-shell: we doubled in size! Through many months of coaching, brainstorming, consulting and white-boarding, we found a structure that was custom-designed for our unique business.
With solid structure finally in our company tree came structure within each of our processes. We designed custom processes to streamline job duties, improved processes and operations, built new interview and screening techniques, all of which helped us find, hire, train and retain top talent who all fit into their structured roles within our newly structured organization.
Having the ‘right people’ in the ‘right roles’ is what it finally took for YES to experience growth on a greater scale, even after many years of business behind us.
End Result = Staffing Perfected
Staffing Perfected is our goal, it’s also our end-result when our structure fires on all cylinders and our team is ‘on fire.’ We’ve reached the goal of becoming more structured and having a clear plan in place for all our staff members and a road map for future growth. What the future hold is still yet to be seen, but come what may, we are ready and structured for success.
Jarum Stone
Operations & Safety Manager
Your Employment Solutions
