Evan Carmichael shares three rules for managing rapid growth: hire one person at a time for cultural fit, like Jeff Bezos did at Amazon; train them thoroughly using Ray Kroc's McDonald's method; and turn away work rather than compromise quality, as Debbie Fields did with her cookies.
Hi, I'm Evan Carmichael. Welcome to another edition of Ask Evan. Today I'm going to answer a question from one of our readers, Max, who runs a company called Orange Digital Marketing, and he wrote in with a question about his company, and he wanted to know, how do I manage a fast-growing company that is taking on a lot of new employees? So thanks for the question, Max. I'm going to give you 3 3 suggestions that I hope will help.
Hire the right person one at a time. The number one mistake that most high-growth companies will make is hiring the wrong people too quickly. It makes sense, you're busting at the seams and need to bring people on board to get all the work done. Especially in businesses with under 10 employees, every new hire is critical. Your hire should have both the skills you want and the cultural and values fit that that will let them thrive in your company. If they don't meet your requirements, keep searching until you get the right candidate. It's far better to hire right and have someone thrive in their position than to be constantly replacing the position because you didn't hire properly at the beginning. It's less headache, will save you time and money in the long run, and will provide you with a much better working culture if you take your time and do it properly. Here's an example from Jeff Bezos from Amazon.com. One of the biggest factors behind the amazing success of Amazon is the people the company has behind it. From day one, Jeff Bezos has made it his priority to hire very carefully. It might not have been the company's best use of resources, but Bezos was taking a long-term perspective. He wanted his company to have a long shelf life and knew that with his staff, he would be creating an enduring culture. According to Bezos, "I'd rather interview 50 people and not hire anyone than than hire the wrong person. Ensure new hires get proper training. Another big problem with rapidly growing companies is that they don't train new employees enough. Even if you take your time in hiring the right person, you have to make sure you set them up for success once they come on board. You want to have high expectations, but not impossible ones. Make sure you set in your schedule time to work with them to explain how you do things and always be available for questions if they have them. No matter how busy you are. The last thing you want is for your team to be afraid to approach you with questions and ideas. Inadequate training leads to bad morale, a loss in productivity, and ultimately an inferior product or service being produced. If hiring and training both fall on your shoulders, then you might have to hold off on hiring someone new until the first person you hired is fully trained and ready to go. Here's an example from Ray Kroc from McDonald's. A strong proponent of teamwork, Kroc understood that his growing company could only continue its meteoric rise up if it had the support and the dedication of its workers behind it. In the early stages of the business, Kroc personally took charge of the entire hiring process. Once he'd made the decision to bring someone on board the McDonald's team, Kroc would give each and every one of them a badge with the title of "Management Trainee." It didn't matter what their actual job was, Kroc wanted every employee to feel valuable and like an important part of the team. According to Kroc, "None of us is as good as all of us. McDonald's is a people business, and that smile on that counter girl's face when she takes your order is a vital part of our image." Turn away customers. I hate turning away business, but I can't accept taking on customers and then not delivering an outstanding result for them. If you're growing beyond what your team can produce, and you're taking the right approach to hire and train properly, It may mean you can't take on every new client that comes to you, and that's okay. There are two positives here. First, you'll be able to pick your clients and only work with the ones that are more of an ideal fit for your business. Second, if you position it properly with your potential client, it will just make them want to work with you even more. We all want what we can't have, and they'll be impressed with your dedication to quality and customer service. Chances are, when you are ready for their business, they'll still be ready for you. Another option here could be to subcontract to another company until you're able to ramp up enough internally to handle the business. If you go this route, make sure that your subcontractors have the same dedication to outstanding service and quality that you do. The last thing you want to do is deliver a substandard experience to your client. Here's an example from Debbie Fields from Mrs. Fields Cookies. Fields once walked into one of her stores to see a long line of customers waiting to purchase a huge batch of cookies that she immediately knew had been overbaked. Fields was upset. She didn't want those cookies to be sold or for those customers to associate her name with overbaked cookies. Fields approached the manager to figure out what was going on. "What do you think of these cookies?" Fields asked him. He responded by saying, "Oh Debbie, they're good enough." Fields was upset and immediately threw out all the cookies. "Good enough?" she said. "Good enough never is." Fields now had a long line of hungry customers waiting to buy cookies that had just been tossed into the garbage. She went over to them and explained one by one what had happened. "We've overbaked these cookies," she said, "and I want them to be perfect, and whatever you're standing in line for, I will absolutely give them to you free, plus I'll match for free if you will come back." Thank you for watching another edition of Ask Evan.
If you liked the video, you want to see more, please give it a thumbs up below. It makes me want to do more of these videos for you guys. I'd also love to hear what you have to think. If you want to leave a comment under the video, I always read those and I really appreciate them when they come in. And if you have a question about your own business and you want me to do a video answer, you can also leave it in the comments below and I will consider you for the next video. So thank you and we'll see you on the next episode.
