Thinking Entrepreneur

An owner’s dispatches from the front lines.

The beginning of the year is a great time for reflection, revelation, resolution and even a little celebration. We did do some things right last year, and the results are starting to show. I also did some things wrong, which I intend to rectify in the near future. Move out of the way, 2011.

We hired about 10 new people last year. Nine have worked out extremely well. One quit for “a better opportunity.” Nobody crashed and burned. These are very good results, especially compared with the old days. What changed? I am no longer leading the hiring process. I have a human resources professional who has been with me for several years.

She has come to fully understand the nuances of my different companies, and she continues to fine tune the process. Many small businesses are not big enough to warrant a full time H.R. person — mine wasn’t until I had about 100 employees — but there are a couple of things that anyone can do and that I believe can be game changers.

There is a huge difference between hiring from the best candidates who show up at your door and hiring from the best candidates in the market. Increasing the pool may require placing more ads, placing better written ads and being patient enough to wait for the right candidates. It may also require more creative recruiting strategies, like finding candidates who aren’t actively looking for a job through social media sites like LinkedIn. That’s the first step.

The second step is reflecting on who is doing the hiring. Is it you, the owner? From my experience and observation, the characteristics that make one a successful entrepreneur frequently make one a lousy hirer. Entrepreneurs love their companies and their missions. They talk about them too much, and they don’t listen enough; the candidate should be doing most of the talking. Owners also tend to be in a hurry. They have 10 other things they need to do, and it is very easy to rush through the process and rationalize choosing a less-than-stellar candidate.

If you believe that hiring is not your strong suit, have someone else do it. There are companies like A Hire Authority that offer contract recruiting services for large and small companies. They write and place the ads, do the interviewing and check the references. Miriam Berger, president, told me that she was seeing an increase in the hiring activity of large and small companies. Improving your hiring protocol will not only make your company better for your customers and other employees, it will make your life easier.

So what do I need to fix this year? This was another revelation. While I have five outside salespeople and five inside support people selling art and framing to businesses, I have been a retailer all of my life. I have learned that running and growing a successful outside sales staff requires a very different mentality and skill set.

Retailing is more of a “pull” business. You put everything together and customers come in and keep coming back. Outside sales requires managing the whole process, from prospecting to follow up. We have been using software to keep track of leads for more than 15 years. Our system was pretty progressive — when I bought it 15 years ago. Today, it is outdated and only does a small fraction of what new technology offers.

I have come to recognize (years late) that we need to get one of the new C.R.M. — customer-relation management — systems. We have been looking into salesforce.com. It operates in the cloud and has the ability to track business and customer work flow and to give real-time reports. It also helps build social interaction and community with a feature that looks and feels like Facebook. This will give us better communication among staff members, better ways to interact with customers and better controls to help our sales manager track what is going on. (All advice on choosing and implementing a C.R.M. system is welcome!)

This year, I have decided I’m not setting goals. Goals come and go. Instead, I want a plan. There were numerous things that I wanted to do over the last few years that I put off because of the soft market. It is time to play catch up. I know there are many companies in a similar position. It is this pent-up demand that is slowly increasing business for many of us. Welcome, 2012. Out with the old, in with the bold.

Jay Goltz owns five small businesses in Chicago.

Article source: http://feeds.nytimes.com/click.phdo?i=b52e278149d1949af760adb0c3fe6d81