Just as with the entrepreneur’s knowledge and skills, the teams’ knowledge and skills will affect their ability to build on a business opportunity and leverage each other’s skills to create an awesome business, product, or service. The team creates its own culture as they are led by the entrepreneur. How they relate to others and the organization will determine their creativity and productivity. A weak team with limited skills, knowledge, and poor relations will adversely affect the feasibility of a business idea as there are limits on what they can give to the project. A team member who does not fit in the team can disrupt the organization’s performance especially if they are in a leadership position.
The start-up entrepreneur has less baggage to deal with when it comes to building their team as there is no culture established yet. The key shortcoming is that since the team has most likely not worked together, they have not built trust and cohesion.
The first tip is that you need to give time for team members to harmonize and understand each other’s strengths and weaknesses. With this mind, the following are great ways to get your team started right:
i) Set the standards you want to adhere to right from the beginning. This enables you to establish the culture and values you want from the onset.
ii) Communicate. Make things clear for everyone right from the beginning. Use a range of communication methods for the same message. Each team member should understand what the vision is and how they contribute to it. let them know how what they do relates to others, as well as how their performance is measured. They too should learn to use a range of communication methods and tools. Having standard communication methods used throughout, alongside coaching on how to use the tools, results in good team cohesion.
iii) Encourage creativity and innovation. A work environment that encourages creativity, innovation and that is safe for the team to air their opinions is great for the team and business.
iv) Get the right people on board and the wrong people out as fast as possible. The wrong person however qualified will mess up the team. Get the right people and put them in the jobs especially if they are in a leadership position. Having the right person means they will work well with others in the team. This quickly builds team cohesiveness and, as a result, its productivity. Where there is a poor fit get rid of them a fast as possible as the cost of keeping them both financially and within the team can be huge.
v) Spend time with the team learning and understanding them. This means you will be listening more and setting direction as opposed to telling. This builds the confidence necessary for team members to bring their best to the table. The time spent working with staff should be around 60 percent in the beginning, however, this reduces over time. When having discussions ensure the focus is on what is going well and why it is before getting to what is not and what should be done about it.
vi) Coach. Helping team members quickly learn what they need to become better and coaching them to coach others builds harmony and sustained growth of the team members and the organization. When one coaches another they tend to build trust and understanding of each other’s strengths and weaknesses in a respectful manner. It also reduces team turnover as individuals establish work relations that are homogeneous. If you find that you have a high staff turnover right from the onset it is important to take time to evaluate your leadership skills.
If you find that you have a high staff turnover right from the onset it is important to take the time to evaluate your leadership skills. Often your leadership skills may be more pronounced when you are running your own business than when you were employed. And managers in a small organization wield more clout than in a bigger organization so may also be more aggressive as final decision-makers. Carefully evaluate how you and your management team are relating to your employees and if possible have an anonymous feedback box so the employees can give their feedback on what needs to be improved in the organization as a whole. Ensure you add an option for them to evaluate the management without them feeling intimidated.
This is really important as you will get first-hand information on how you and your managers are doing as business leaders. Do not assume that feedback given during the exit interview is the truth. Always remember people do not leave jobs but bad bosses. The sooner you are able to objectively address any issues you and your leadership team may have, the faster you are able to get your business to profitability. Do use the form right to contact us or comment below.
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