Tag Archives: Right People

How Do You Institutionalize Double-Digit Growth? Six Suggestions

Situation: A company is enjoying 10% organic growth per year and wants to sustain this growth rate. They enjoy a favorable position as a technology leader. Their principal strategy is to continually advance the technology. The chief obstacle to ongoing technological superiority is getting the right people to populate their brain trust. How do you institutionalize double-digit growth?

Advice from the CEOs:

  • Look for domestic office locations that have the right talent but a lower cost of living. Florida presents attractive cost of living with low employee turnover.
  • Can the company compartmentalize?
    • Set up a remote location, run by a trusted individual, and do portions of the work there.
  • Be aware that teamwork within the company becomes a challenge with remote locations.
    • A communications strategy – for example videoconferencing – can help to engender teamwork across distance.
    • The pandemic made videoconferencing a far more viable alternative than it was prior to the pandemic.
  • If the company’s infrastructure is highly bureaucratic or the cost of quality high, can adjustments be made that will relieve some of the cost pressures?
    • Creating “Hot Teams” is a method to developing new, innovative solutions.
    • Can the company’s technology be leveraged to improve productivity – for example, using modeling and simulation to reduce prototyping costs?
  • Can the company employ knowledge management?
    • Gather lessons learned from past and recently completed projects.
    • Share good or best practices.
    • Make sure that new efforts do not start from scratch.
  • Consider outsourcing to universities, with proper contracts.

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How Do You Structure Your Bookkeeping Function? Four Suggestions

Situation: A small company has a long term clerk employee. This individual is responsible for AR/AP, Payroll and also HR manuals and reports to the CEO. This individual has been a good employee, but doesn’t perform well in this role. How would you structure accounting and bookkeeping in a small company?

Advice from the CEOs:

  • This is a key role, but there are a number of options. One is for the individual to continue reporting to the CEO, but train someone else to back them up. This will enable you to either shift the individual to another, more appropriate role within the company, or to continue with minimal disruption if the individual leaves.
  • Because of history and loyalty, this is a difficult emotional issue for you as CEO. It is important to consider what you would do if you could remove your emotions from the issue. If the answer is that you would eliminate the clerk position and hire a qualified, experienced bookkeeper at the appropriate salary, then this is your answer.
  • Packard’s Law – from one of HP’s founders – is that no company can grow beyond the capabilities of their employees. Hire the right person. This individual must be process-oriented – someone who routinely checks their own work to make sure that it is right. There is an adage in accounting that good accounting is 20% knowledge and 80% double checking the work. Hire a person who loves to do this.
  • Take care of this position in the best interests of the company, and look for another, more appropriate within the company job for the clerk.

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How Do You Stay Focused While Building? Five Suggestions

Interview with G.K. Sally Solis-Cohen, President, CEO Intronet

Situation: An early stage company is simultaneously undergoing geographic expansion and broadening its network to include new audiences. This mandates finding the right people to run the new opportunities while staying focused on existing operations. How do you stay focused on core operations while building new opportunities?

Advice from Sally Solis-Cohen:

  • First and foremost, understand your own limitations. Know what you can do, what you can’t, and delegate what you can’t do. This means choosing the right people to whom you can delegate important initiatives. As a start-up you have few people to whom you can delegate. Make sure that they see the opportunity as you do and have the skill and personality sets to handle their responsibilities. The choices that you make in selecting your core team will be critical to your success.
  • Make sure that your team talks back to you – your need their perspective and feedback, especially when their perspective differs from your own. Listen openly to their ideas. At the same time listen to your customers; they will keep you focused on your business and marketing plans. Focus more on listening, thinking and doing than speaking.
  • Have a very clear set of priorities and a to-do list. Focus on your A priorities. Delegate the rest. When you’re growing it doesn’t double your work, it quadruples it with travel and extra distractions.
  • Stay focused on your core value proposition. Keep reminding yourself why you started the business. Observe the validation that you receive from your customers and users. Live your value proposition.
  • If you are talking to nay-sayers, you’re talking to the wrong people. Surround yourself with positive people who are heading in the same direction that you are and who can present alternate points of view in a positive tone.

You can contact Sally Solis-Cohen at [email protected]

Key Words: Growth, Expansion, Right People, Opportunity, Focus, Operations, Limitations, Delegate, Feedback, Listen, Priorities, Distractions, Validation, Positive

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How do you Adapt Behavior as you Shift Focus? Five Points

Interview with Adam Kleinberg, CEO, Traction

Situation: The Company is shifting focus from project-based to relationship-based client interactions –from a short to a long-term perspective. This is a challenge. How do you adapt employee behavior to a new strategic focus?

Advice:

  • Assume the best intentions.
    • Everyone wants to do a good job. The challenge is making sure everyone knows what constitutes a good job.
    • Be clear on objectives, and why they are important. Be clear on the new roles.
    • This is most difficult when the shift is counter to a well-established company culture.
  • You have to have the right people.
    • Avoid smart people with no role, or a role for which they are ill-suited.
    • The organization IS the people. There must be absolute commitment to assigning the right talent on any job, and the right people to the right team.
    • Players must fit in terms of skill set and culture. The company is who, not what!
  • Focus efforts and objectives on the long-term vs. the short-term.
    • Paint the end state – the vision. Add tangible steps to guide people to the right path.
    • Don’t micromanage. Set direction and initial moves, but let staff blaze the path.
    • Provide feedback and recognition.
    • Negative feedback is always difficult, but best when delivered directly and quickly.
    • Recognize success and contributions both 1-on-1 and in all-hands meetings.
  • We hired an experienced manager with a strong track record. Initially this created discomfort; however discomfort was quickly resolved as this person produced positive impact.
    • We cited the wins in all-hands meetings to support the shift.
  • Make people feel that their opinions are heard, and their solutions.
    • Be clear on objectives and rationale. Assure that your perspective as leader is grounded in a credible reality that you can communicate to the team.
    • Conduct workshops which focus on the practical steps that will produce the desired result.
    • Listen to feedback from team members, and include what you hear in the agenda for future discussions. Involve the team in developing the solution. Delegate and recognize!

You can contact Adam Kleinberg at [email protected] or Twitter at well@adamkleinberg

Key Words: Focus, Client Interaction, Behavior, Role, Objective, Rationale, Right People, Culture, Feedback, Recognition, Workshop, Involvement

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