Build Your Team
If you surround yourself with the best people, they will deliver the best results, for which you ultimately will get partial credit (and cash for that matter). Your focus needs to be on how to build the best team possible. First, seek out partners and employees on your own, and then, as your company grows, hire a great Human Resources (HR) person or team to find those people for you.
Carefully think through each position. Document what you want each position to accomplish and what sort of person would best fit. Then spread a wide net with the purpose of capturing the most viable prospects. This net should include an e-mail to your personal network, ads on your web site, and listings at web sites for job seekers (use FaceBook, LinkedIn, Monster.com, WashingtonPost.com and CraigsList.org, for example). Also, consider headhunters, newspapers, and local publications. And don’t forget to promote from within because using already existing staff whenever possible will work best for everyone.
A virtual team can be effective for many types of projects, too, which could be considered “telecommuting”, although, not all projects are appropriate for telecommuting. The bigger question is whether you are willing to personally direct the day-to-day actions and manage the hours of an at-home worker or not. One big issue is that they can frequently become sidetracked on side projects and family matters when they work from home. Another is there are many times they risk looking unprofessional, or miss out on professional networking, team building, water cooler chit chat, socio-business interactions, and the like.
If you don’t want them as your employee or as a liability, consider hiring them as an independent contractor. This can possibly save you on taxes, benefits, and other expenses. Also, at-home employees may not be on the clock forty plus hours a week, so you won’t necessarily be responsible for their full-time employment expenses, like the reimbursements for excessive fuel costs or lost hours in traffic.
Hire the people you think you need, but be careful because you have to be responsible for funding all your decisions. If you want to fund something or someone at a high level, then there must be a proven or provable payout cycle for you to become cash flow positive. It could be a fatal mistake to incur too much debt or otherwise put your company at risk.
The national debt is our government representatives way of getting their cake and eating it, too. Government expense overages come from unfunded mandates, just like hiring people you can’t afford.
Hiring good people must be done, but it has to include a careful funding process and be part of a seemingly profitable business model.
