You spend 24/7 making sure your business is running. Your family and friends sure do miss you. They keep asking, “When are you going to do yourself a favor and get some help?”
You want help, but you don’t have an exact game plan for what you would delegate. Maybe if you advertise for a candidate that considers themselves “entrepreneurial” and who “has the confidence to work with little direction,” then you can make up the rest as you go. Two heads – and two pair of hands – are better than one. Right?
Here’s where I want you to reconsider. Believe me, I’ve been there. I understand the stress, loneliness and confidence crashing feelings working alone can create. But there is a wrong and right time to hire your number two.
The right time involves answering yes to several questions, and they all boil down to one important point: Will hiring this person generate more profit for the company?
Don’t Hire Without a Plan
Don’t allow being stressed and being unsure about the new person’s role guide the hiring process. Keep in mind:
- A new hire is an investment: Paying a salary will take a big chunk out of your earnings.
- The cost of a new hire should be offset by how he or she generates revenue.
- The new hire needs a job description tailored to revenue-generation: To accomplish this, you need to look for someone with a very specific skill set. It could very well be a set of skills you don’t have or don’t do well.
- Can the new hire be salaried or on contract?: Even for specialized skills, it may be possible to start with a person on an as-needed basis.
You know it’s time to scale up when you’re confident that the hire is going to make the company more profitable. Write a tailored job description focused on just that.
If it’s a Profitable Decision it’s the Right Decision
Here are issues that impact profit, and can help guide your decision to hire:
- You’re turning down work.
- Your customers are unhappy. When customer service suffers it’s the surest path to losing clients. The only thing worse than one client that leaves is the one that leaves and lets their network know how unhappy they are with you.
- The quality of your products/services is suffering. Either you know it is, or it’s possible that when working alone, you’ve become blind to certain issues.
- You’ve found a new revenue stream. You want to tap into this new market, but you can’t do it without help.
If you would like to take a closer look at your financial picture before you start a search, we’d be happy to help. We are also connected to large networks of professionals from many different fields, thanks to our involvement with local business and professional associations. If you need a lead on a new hire, let us know!
Source:
5 Signs It’s Time to Hire Your First Employee by John Boitnott, Inc.com, 4/24/19
