You can’t manage your business alone. Apart from the push and pull on your schedule, it’s unlikely that you have all the skillsets necessary to make your business successful. A management team exists so that you can use the combined efforts of people with different strengths to achieve your vision.
While it sounds like a simple concept, it’s not something everyone finds easy to do. Even managing leaders has challenges, after all. The good news is that when you do it right, your business will enjoy the rewards of excellent administration.
Cultivate their Skills and Knowledge
A capable management team comprises of people with separate areas of expertise. Hiring these people isn’t the totality of the solution, though. You need to commit to cultivating their knowledge and skills so that they can evolve with your company.
It’s easy to make the mistake of investing in this one time and letting them learn the rest through experience. Doing this doesn’t guarantee that they can keep up with the advancements in their field by their own efforts.
This means that you need to make marketing, sales, finance, and administrative training a regular investment to your management team.
There are also things they need to do together, like post-merger integration training. They must have the resources to handle the workload and the people after a merger or acquisition. If you envision your company to grow, then you must equip your leaders with the tools to oversee it.
Evaluate Their Performance
Training loses its purpose if you don’t take the time to evaluate their performance. It’s through a proper and thorough evaluation that you can determine improvements and further areas of growth.
It’s not something that needs to raise tension or cause offense. Coordinating with them in making objective reviews of their performance can help them develop a better sense of leadership. Through this, you’re able to train them to accept constructive criticism and prioritize the betterment of your company.
Another benefit of a proper evaluation is that it aids the rest of your management team in taking critical steps towards improvement. A shortcoming of one member can affect the performance of two other members. They must have the openness to know how to solve problems together.
Celebrate Them
Leadership is a stressful role. Now and then, your management team needs a reminder that you appreciate their hard work.
Celebrate their achievements through a group dinner in a fine restaurant. Give them an incentive or pay for their vacation on the beach. Find out what helps each member unwind and shoulder part or the whole of the cost.
These gestures of appreciation are like rest to an athlete. It helps them recover when they need it most and ensures that they can continue to perform at their best.
It’s also a means for you to express your care for the entire team. There’s no better motivator than loving to work with your boss and your colleagues. It’s when you establish a good relationship with them that you can be sure that they’ll weather all kinds of economic climates with you.
Invest in your training. Evaluate your performance. Celebrate your efforts and your success. Owning a business and raising leaders to run it is no small feat. Before you can do an excellent job of fostering their skills and talent, you first have to cultivate your own.
