Nurture Your People

Creating an environment where individuals feel valued, supported and empowered to grow is key to fostering a thriving, engaged workforce. When employees feel cared for and invested in, they are more likely to be motivated, productive and loyal, ultimately driving long-term success for your business.

Now that your business is off the ground, you need to focus on growing it and making it more secure. Once you start hiring people, the last thing you want to do is spend a lot of your valuable time in a continuous hiring loop, replacing employees who move on. Keep your valued employees by encouraging their ideas and welcoming their suggestions. Then reward them in meaningful ways by giving them more responsibility and making them feel valued and trusted.

If you’ve been following the steps we have laid out here, your business should be up and running, or very close to it. You’ve secured financing, planned for contingencies and you may have even hired an employee (or more).

Starting a new business is no easy task. But you are well on your way on this journey to entrepreneurship. The heavy lifting is behind you. Now it’s time to focus on your employees and the stability of your fledgling operation. Finding and keeping good employees will go a long way toward securing the future of your business.

This is a good time to assess your progress, tweak your day-to-day operations and plan your next moves. Here are some suggestions to get you started:

• Hiring the right people is no easy job, so when you find them, hang onto them.
• Establish clear goals for employees and be available to answer questions and offer guidance as needed.
• Respect your employees’ abilities, rely on their instincts and give them room to flourish.
• Reward them — not just with money but in novel ways such as a gift card, a spa day or a dinner for two.
• Conversely, if you see an employee do something you don’t approve of, say so — but never in front of customers or other staff members. A good rule of thumb is to praise in public, while making critical comments in private.
• Change the dynamics of your hiring altogether. Remember, prospective employees are less interested in money than in feeling valued and supported. There are more jobs available these days than applicants to fill them. Keep that in mind when you build relationships with prospective employees.
• Delegate responsibility and trust your employees to do their jobs. Don’t hover or micromanage. Instead, encourage their ideas and, whenever possible, provide opportunities for them to build confidence by taking on new and challenging tasks.