5 Team Management Secrets From a Serial Entrepreneur Effective team management is the secret to scaling your business.
By Vladimir Gorbunov Edited by Micah Zimmerman
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I have built several businesses in my life, and my foremost task has always been to assemble a primary team to set the foundation for the main business processes. Skilled professionals that care about what they are doing and are dedicated to ensuring the success of whatever venture you're undertaking. After all, 80-90% of your business success depends on having the right people with you.
Related: 10 Time-Tested Secrets of Serial Entrepreneurs
Role delegation
My first task when launching a new business is finding the "right" people so the team can scale in size and skill. My second order of business is to find someone who can handle the bulk of management for me. After that is taken care of, I can step aside and only get involved in strategic development as a founder. I went through this model several times in my life, and it has proved itself invaluable.
Scaling a business from 20-30 employees to 50-100 is a massive milestone in the career of all entrepreneurs. For big and medium-sized businesses, management delegation is essential. Instead of trying to control everything to the last detail, better results can be obtained by finding a team of competent professionals that can provide in-depth focus on specific tasks and branches of the company.
Related: 7 Rules for Entrepreneurs to Delegate Effectively
More brain power
In any organization, there will always be contrasting views and opinions, and the task of a wise CEO is to put together a creative team that can generate the best ideas. Business models shouldn't be set in stone but should shift and change based on the circumstances in which a company operates. The world is constantly evolving, so blindly following a rigid business model risks leading a company to bankruptcy.
Paying attention to the team's ideas is needed to maintain a creative spirit and dynamic business model. When a rational, well-reasoned idea is proposed that does not radically contradict the company values, a good founder has no reason to oppose its implementation.
Effective crisis management
When the business is running stable, and profits are going up, founders can take a step back and provide general guidance for the company in its growth while leaving the management details to subordinates. However, during a crisis, founders should return their focus to overseeing company operations directly and dedicating themselves to solving the situation.
I experienced this firsthand: before I started Crypterium, which is now Choise.com, I was CEO of a company engaged in the processing business. At one point, it became apparent that this market did not have excellent prospects, so we needed to reorganize and find a new direction to develop in. My idea was to build a business in the crypto space.
Together with the team, we applied our expertise and evolved into a crypto bank. A lot of effort went in, and the process was not easy, but thanks to the combined effort, we were successful and have significantly developed.
Related: 7 Outdated Habits That Will Paralyze Your Business
Diversity is a virtue
Diversity is a virtue in business. Regardless of what type of business we're talking about, there should always be a mix of different competencies. This is especially true for startups in emerging spaces such as fintech. This market often moves so fast and unpredictably that a diverse team is needed to always stay on top of the newest changes.
Successful teams combine different competencies and skills to develop the company's potential most efficiently. It is essential that each position suits the team members' characters, for example, reliable and responsible lawyers, honest financiers, daring marketers, creative designers, proactive sales managers, and so on.
Related: Be Intentional About Diversity
An inclusive workspace
Our team has always been open to people with different backgrounds and views. It is essential that team members feel comfortable at work to avoid a toxic environment that is detrimental to the company's goals.
However, a set of shared values is needed to unite a diverse team of different characters, nationalities, and viewpoints. That's where corporate culture steps in, combining very different mentalities with values common to the whole company
To summarize
Some founders often make the error of being too much of a perfectionist and always wanting to have everything under direct control, no matter how unsustainable the workload is. However, effective team management is a must-have for any entrepreneur on a quest to scale his business. Building a team of target-focus professionals is essential for any entrepreneur with a substantially big company. Remember, no one can do it alone.
