To be a truly great leader in your small business, you must know how to recruit and retain top talent for better company culture and create profitability in your organization. 

While it sounds obvious, there are small business owners and entrepreneurs who miss the mark in their hiring process, creating less efficiency and more disruption in their businesses, negatively impacting revenue.

Great leaders build unstoppable teams.

Small businesses don’t offer employees huge ladders to climb. We are underfunded and under-resourced, and yet many entrepreneurs pull it off. Some small companies are stacked with A-players, yet the reason why is not obvious. 

I thought about my colleagues and other small business owners who have remarkable, loyal, and motivated teams. They don’t have employees who kill time until they can clock out or do the bare minimum until they can find a “better” job. They have rock-star employees who can do the job they were hired to do, who love their work, and who seek ways to contribute and solve problems. These employees are extremely dedicated and care as much about the companies they work for as the owner.

A quick start – The first steps. What does top talent look like to you? Make sure that view is serving the big picture. Is the best candidate only someone with experience that fits the text in the job description, or are you open to considering candidates who have the best attitude and potential?

1. Review your recruiting process. After you’ve assessed your needs, created a job description and reviewed your recruiting plan, it’s time to connect with top talent for the position.
2. Don’t recruit solely on resume bullet points, but on candidate potential. Great leaders know people are far more than their resume. Hiring based on experience and education is limiting—for your team, and for your company’s growth. Rather than match a person’s qualifications to a role, consider a person’s innate, experiential, and potential abilities. People who want to do a job always outperform people who need to do a job. Those are the ones who care about your business. 
3. Match employees with the work they do best to improve efficiency. I’m speaking from experience here. Kelsey Ayres started with me years ago to help run my office and as my personal assistant. She quickly helped me build out systems and today is our company president. Since then Kelsey has hired a team of ten people. Each employee was recruited for a specific position, and each one of them has a role that has evolved over time. They have additional responsibilities and tasks. By aligning roles, you’ll scale faster.
4. Lead by example with your communication. I know this may go without saying. It’s easy to get swept away in our daily responsibilities. You may intend to reach out to someone and that interaction inadvertently gets put on the back burner.  Set the standard for your expectations of future employees starting with your first communication in the recruiting process. Be responsive, available, and maintain communication about your processes and timeline, even if there is a stall in the process. You want to hire employees who are engaged, are active listeners, ask questions, give and receive feedback and want to grow with your company. When candidates reciprocated (or not) those qualities, the best ones will rise to the top and make your hiring decisions easier.

What could you achieve if you had a team that cared as much about your company—its mission, customers, growth, future—as you do? The truth is, it’s not a pipe dream. It’s a necessity. So while you’re sorting through resumes on ZipRecruiter, keep these simple tips in mind. You’ll drive profitability, manage disruption, and scale your company because your team cares about your business. 

Wishing you good health and wealth always.

-Mike