How to Start a Business

Were you born to manage?

Running your own business can be dermined by one-key element: your ability to manage. Having the product, resource and cash to start a business is but a side-show compared to your ability to get the best from those around you, and of course yourself. If you are a business owner and you acknowledge your lack of conventional managerial skills: you could be losing any of the following, and possibly all:

- Tangible losses: - productivity, sales, revenue, and profitability

- Intangible losses: - honesty, respect, hope, effort,

- Being accepted as a manager by your colleagues is one of the most notable pinnacles in anyone’s career. Rising within a company is a goal most of us share: whether or not in private we believe that we may never achieve such heights. The question has always been ‘born to lead’ with natural ability – or ‘brought through’ by a mentor or by company indoctrination. Whatever you believe – I think a bit of both is generally the case but that one or the other will also succeed – a potential manager must want to be a manager.

- The small business owner does not usually want to be a manager, but a successful businessperson. We all know of the business owner who is a “diamond to work for”, and “a real nice chap” – well! I know of very few successful businesspeople that fit any of these descriptions. I do know many successful business owners that could be described as “she’s ok, a bit pushy, but only expects a fair days work from you”.

The No.1 reason given by staff as the quality they most look for in a manager is ‘leadership’, not how nice they are to their fellow workers. The manager, to be thought of as a leader, needs two main qualities:

Competence

- A sound knowledge of all areas of responsibility: be that helping staff to understand the practical workings of a machine, or the theory of completing a share purchase at a stock exchange. If you as a manager do not know when things are not working as they should, or how to improve systems, or spot opportunities, staff will suffer from a lack of confidence in your ability, and ultimately a lack of respect

Achievement

- By definition ‘achievement’ suggests something over and above the normal. It is human nature to ‘do your job’, and not to seek extra loading in your daily routine. It is therefore a great quality in a manager to be able to achieve difficult targets where this means gaining the full co-operation and commitment of subordinate staff.

- Look at people you know in managerial positions: do they ‘lead’ their staff, individually and as a team, to greater achievements or ‘manage’ their staff’s daily routine.

- Small business owners have to be very much aware of their impact on staff. On the one hand you try to encourage individuals to ‘treat the business as your own’ and on the other hand, you can be so close to the action that you see every mistake, waste of material/time, or inefficient or ineffective situation which can, and often does, lead to extreme criticism of the staff member.

- Letting some of your staff ‘treat the business as your own’ can result in them coming in half an hour later than everyone else in the morning, a two hour lunch break, chatting to a suppliers secretary all afternoon and golfing every Wednesday afternoon. Expecting staff to truly feel and exhibit the same response to pressure that you feel as the owner is unrealistic in almost every case. Now! If you decided to offer equity in your business

- With the issue of working close to the staff and feeling frustrated at inefficiencies, you need to adopt a damage limitation policy. This means not shouting at young Tom every time he does something wrong – not even in jest. If you were being shouted at every day you would be unlikely to care about your job, see any future or get any better at what you do. If your business only consists of you and young Tom, you need to adopt a mentoring style – talk, teach and watch (believe in the end product, being that Tom will be equal, if not in advance, to your own capabilities). If you have a number of staff, you can use part mentoring (by yourself), part delegation (to Tom’s immediate boss) and the fostering of a positive spirit in the workplace.

- The subject of people management is as complex as people are themselves. Time and experience will improve an individuals ability to manage staff and gain results, however, is that ability built on dogmatic management attitudes or on all the benefits of good leadership?

- Many books, videos and courses exist on this vast subject with many aimed at the small business/owner. It is virtually impossible to become an expert manager without some form of instruction. The time/resource/cost taken to understand this subject can be minuscule compared to the improvement in profitability that stems from good management and leadership.