From Growth to Stability: Proven Strategies for Start-ups

Stabilizing a growing start-up Hiring The first thing that gets out of control when your business is growing fast is Hiring. The temptation to hire ahead of a growth curve is very strong but... Take it slow. Keep an active candidate pipeline and interview as many people as possible AND keep a tight leash on offers. Identify which roles are so critical that the company would not survive if you didn’t have people performing those roles. Remember these are roles not jobs. Write all of them down. A job may combine several roles. Forget about hierarchy. If having an office baby sitter (for example) is critical to the success of your business, include it! The number of these critical roles will differ depending on many factors. Still, even for large and complex organizations, I find that the number on this list is typically between 50-100. Take the list and check them off on your orbranchesganogram. You want to make sure someone is playing each role and ideally, you would have a back-up for each person. Prioritize these roles when hiring. Everything else is arguably negotiable

Culture You have probably heard the saying “Culture eats Strategy for breakfast” When you are growing fast, acquiring customers, building systems, etc, work is very exciting Your team at this stage is a motley crew drawn from different other organizations. This is the best time to start building your company culture. If you wait, it might be too late If you look up the definition for Culture, you’ll find many definitions. I define it in simple terms as How you relate. Your culture is expressed in how you relate to each other, to your customers, your suppliers, your local community and everyone who interfaces with your organization. It is also expressed in what counts and what does not count. Culture and values are linked but are not the same. Your values are branches. The tree is your Culture. Most companies can survive bad decisions, poor strategy etc but a bad company culture is hard to outrun. Culture How do you go from defining a company culture to making it stick? Start with a list of the core values you want your business to be known for. I have seen companies list up to 10 core values. My take? 3 is the sweet spot. Any employee can remember 3 core values of your company. Among the 3, identify 1 that is absolutely non-negotiable. Why? People can remember 3 values, BUT there will be at most 1 they will never forget. I have never forgotten Respect for the Individual and You don’t Need a title to be a Leader. They are core values from two different organizations I worked for. Next describe each core value using at least 3 scenarios highlighting do's and don'ts. For example a good scenario describing “Respect for the Individual” could be “When communicating with colleagues, regardless of their level in the company, always speak in a cordial and respectful manner even when you disagree with them”

Culture Finally Train your employees on the scenarios Demonstrate the values in the organization Reward employees who consistently live your values - What gets measured and gets rewarded gets done Here is a question for you How do you deal with 1. A highly competent employee who consistently fails on values?

OR

2. An employee who is exemplary on values but is incompetent

Have questions, comments or want to suggest a topic for the series? Send Juliet Anammah a short email at info@cgandrstrategy.com

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