Scaling Your Business: Building Your Team and Creating Your Culture

Scale your business with a rockstar team and strong culture for sustainable growth. Here's how to make sure you can do both.

This week in our Goldman Sachs National Business Growth Program, we focused on critical aspects of building and strengthening our team, central to fostering a robust organizational culture and enhancing our hiring practices.

Scaling your business successfully hinges on two critical components: assembling the right team and cultivating the right culture. This week we explored effective strategies for both, ensuring that as our business grows, it remains strong and resilient and continues to represent us and our mission.

Building the Right Team
Creating a team that can grow with your company starts with strategic hiring practices. Focus on aligning skills and experiences with the company’s long-term goals. Implement programs and SOPs to streamline onboarding, develop potential, and promote from within, ensuring that your team not only understands the vision but is also equipped to drive it forward. Emphasize flexibility and adaptability in your team members, qualities that are essential as roles and responsibilities evolve in a scaling business.

Hiring Process & Practices

We delved into efficient hiring processes and practices, essential for attracting the right talent. A key component of our discussions involved behavioral interview techniques, where participants shared various questions that help in identifying candidates who not only have the right skills but also fit our cultural ethos.

Cultural Development

The heartbeat of any organization is the culture. This was at the core of the conversation. We discussed how cultural symbols and shared values help in creating a cohesive work environment. Each participant was encouraged to identify and share a symbol that represents our collective values and mission. Mine is in the graphic for this week's article, a compass that guides organizations in compliance and nurses to find their self-employment calling.

Cultivating the Right Culture
Culture is the foundation of any organization. As your business scales, maintaining and nurturing a positive and inclusive company culture becomes paramount. This culture should reinforce your core values and serve as the guiding principle for decision-making. Encourage open communication, recognize and reward contributions, and foster a sense of community. Your culture should empower your team, supporting innovative thinking and resilience in the face of challenges.

Performance Management

Another significant area we explored was performance management. Performance management often doesn't get the attention it needs in any team setting because it's uncomfortable all the way around. It is focused on aligning employee activities with organizational goals. It starts with setting specific, measurable, and achievable goals. As a small business owner who is used to flying solo, we don't always have these anywhere except in our brains...

Throughout the year, performance should be continuously monitored, and feedback should be provided regularly to guide behaviors and work. Reviews should be conducted regularly to discuss accomplishments and areas for improvement in detail. Effective performance management emphasizes recognizing and rewarding employees for their contributions. The goal of performance management is motivating and retaining top talent while fostering a high-performance culture.

The Interplay Between Team and Culture
The synergy between your team and your culture is what propels business growth. A well-aligned team amplifies a positive culture, while a strong culture helps attract and retain the right talent. Together, they create the hub of the wheel that drives sustainable scaling for our businesses.

The takeaway for me is that I already knew all this - the new information I learned was almost zero BUT when I look at my own business, I don't have all of these components that are CRITICAL for growing as tight as I would like to. If I was onboarding more frequently, it would be messy and I would lose high-performing people.

So if you're like me and this is all just a review, look at the following areas and do a self-assessment to see if they are supporting the culture and growth you want to see from your business:

Hiring & Interviewing
Onboarding & Orientation
Performance Management
Offboarding and Exit
Promotion & Retention Efforts

Taking this proactive approach, you can ensure that each component of your team management strategy truly aligns with your vision for a thriving, dynamic business.

Categories: : Nurse Business, Nurse Consulting, Nurse Entrepreneur