Introduction
The people function is often the most overlooked - solutions are created to drive up sales, or improve finances to
manage the cash flow, but ultimately all these tasks are dependant on the people who are tasked to perform them.
Inevitably the health and strength of a business is dependent on the health and strength of its people and how they
react with customers, suppliers and each other.
From the onset, getting the right people for the job is crucial and this requires having clear, honest job
specifications along with comprehensive job objectives. As the business environment is constantly changing, you will
need people who are able to adapt to it and this will mean regular training to ensure they are up to date with the latest
developments. In turn, this will require that you have adequate performance management systems in place and that you and your
management team have the skills to manage them, and address areas where the actual and expected results vary.
Having the right knowledge, skills, attitude, aptitude and behaviours will help your staff to perform their roles,
be it by boosting your sales, being able to deliver high quality work for a client or having improved acumen to better
handle your finances. This can be aided by having good systems and procedures in place, but its important to maintain a
healthy balance - people, by and large, like to interact with other people and automation can only go so far.
Despite all the good work that people do, the combined wage/salary bill is likely to be one of (if not the) largest
overhead, which means that when the budget is tight, staff cuts often occur. It is important to remember just how valuable
staff are, especially long term staff and the knowledge that they hold. It is for this reason that any valuation of a company
should include this knowledge, which is often referred to as intellectual capital.
In summary, good people management will help develop and motivate your staff which will lead to increased performance
levels and better profit, whilst bad practice and lead to unhappy, demotivated staff and a high employee turnover rate.
Actions
We will start with a diagnosis of your HR/people processes to establish what systems you have in place for developing
and managing your staff. This will include:
- Hiring and induction - how do you go about getting the right staff and are they given a good start?
- Job descriptions - do your staff know what is expected from them and how do the actual results vary?
- Training - how do you identify training needs and do you ensure your staff receive regular support?
- Company development - as a company, do you know how effective your training is and what areas can be improved on?
We will also look at your current business goal or challenge and establish what the root cause is. You may think you have a
marketing issue due to a lack of sales, but the underlying problem may be a lack of knowledge about who you should be targeting,
or perhaps your sales staff lack the ability to effectively close deals. Many business problems can boil down to a lack of
knowledge or skills - your own team may be preventing you from reaching your goals.
Deliverables—what you will get from this
The foundation of any programme focusing on improving your business should be your people. In order to maximise the value of
any project, you need to ensure your staff are trained in implementing it properly with the support of the management team.
Good people management can be tied into recognised standards such as the Investors in People award, which recognises developing
and supporting your staff. Typically this will involve putting processes in place which will help improve your performance
management and as a result help empower the owners/directors to increase the improvement by up to 20% (quote study source).
All our programmes start with a business goal which will determine which programmes/modules will best suit need and end with a
review to measure the success of the project.
The Big Picture
As your staff form the core of your business, its important to have a strong base to work from and any long term
development needs to factor this in.