Creating a team of keepers: managing your business

The workforce makes the business. A fantastic market potential doesn’t matter if your team can’t close a lead properly. The best project management strategy still needs competent team members to pull it off. Work on the team and you have a business that can handle every challenge and opportunity better.

An understanding of needs and roles

There’s nothing that sabotages an environment of cohesion and productivity than a lack of understanding the needs and positions of different roles in the business. Make sure you have a proper employee structure lined out, from a process map and figuring out which roles are involved in every process to creating an effective hierarchy so management is made a lot clearer. Start with the needs of the business and sculpt roles around them. Don’t create roles and then try to pigeonhole them into duties after the fact. It creates employee positions that are unfocused regarding priorities and position within the team.

A detailed hiring process

Spend more time cultivating the process of hiring every individual. This doesn’t necessarily mean spending more time organizing truckloads of applications. Rather, with tools like the best applicant tracking system, you can work smarter and not harder. You can make sure you don’t lose track of the most promising applicants amongst the horde while finding the inefficiencies that slow the hiring process down. A hiring process should involve more communication within the team as well if it doesn’t already. Make sure you’re talking to the people who are going to be working with those who might be taking a role alongside them. Get them involved in interviews and ensure your choices are informed by those who might better understand the needs of the position.

A culture of excellence

Building a great team doesn’t end with choosing the right candidates, either. It’s a constant work-in-progress and one of the keys to ensuring that work is moving in the right direction is through the company culture. Those working on the business, not in it, can do a lot to promote a better culture. Finding the importance of certain values in the business, leading by example and ensuring that the management team does the same is one method. For instance, if you want a culture of respect and responsibility, it’s up to you to ensure it’s demonstrated from the top-down.

A little investment

You want people engaged and motivated. You also want them a lot more competent as time goes on. Growing a loyal team of more skilled employees has obvious benefits. But you can’t just expect it. You have to work at it. You need to provide training, find opportunities for them to gain new experience, and you need to ensure the work environment is one they want to keep working in. Employee turnover has to be taken seriously if you want a positive company culture of any kind.

A better understanding of what the business needs, finding the right people consistently, and creating a work environment that makes the best use of them is how you build a team worthy of keeping around. Don’t be like the thousands of businesses suffering failures on every level because they fail to ensure team members in all positions are treated as they should be.

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