Did you work harder after you hired more people? The reason to hire more staff is because there is too much work. How can more people create more work instead of less work?
Companies go through ‘valleys of death.’ This is commonly described as any nonprofit between $1-6 million in revenue. This is the growth period where the need for more office support (administrative, legal, hr, accounting, etc) is high but the cash is really not there to pay everyone.
Valleys of Death – Employees
Another Valley of Death happens when the staff team grows and changes.
1-10 Employees
Companies usually start with the vision of one person. How many times have you seen a great visionary start a small homeless program? The new company is built around the passion and skill of the founder. Of course, the owner cannot prepare food, clean and recruit clients so helper people are hired, 2 social workers, a kitchen assistant, and a custodian. This model climbs to 10 employees. The new staff are owner-helpers. They don’t have much authority. The director/owner sets the rules for the shelter, orders the supplies and keeps the books. The helpers clean and help. It is critical that the director/owner trusts the helpers.
10-25 Employees
Over 10 staff and more is needed than loyalty to the director/owner. Good food and safe housing created a flood of applicants for the housing program. The director/owner helpers are replaced by staff who have the ability to make good decisions when the director/owner is not there.
26-100 Employees
The staff team over 25 people is the highest level of director/owner failure. It is possible for the owner to work too hard in the 10-20 staff member range and not hire capable people to exercise independent judgment. If the director/owner continues to add 30 helpers without independent good judgment
- The director/owner will collapse from overwork OR
- The agency will lose newer staff and cycle between shrinkage and growth with 25 staff
The director/owner must prepare for a constant change in role during growth. There is a steady shift from
- Leader doing all of the work with help
- Skillful staff taking over marketing, accounting, client engagement
- Leader becoming a visionary and values thought leader with managers
- Leader setting 3 year highly achievable goals with management team
There is a saying that at 10 staff the owner needs to hire someone identical to herself. At 100 staff, she needs to hire someone much different from her style to fill in missing skills.
Any problems?
- The director feels too badly to transition staff who helped to start the company but don’t have a place on a larger team. One for-profit owner had two CEOs who could not grow as the company expanded to 5 sites around the world. He simply added them to his research staff at their same rate of pay – until he was no longer breaking even.
- A nonprofit director lost many younger staff when three ‘original’ staff were mean and dismissive and no longer playing valuable roles. She couldn’t face the stress of honesty and transition.
- A director liked to hire managers who were not threatening. They had less ability than the director. The agency could never break growth barriers because the team lacked skills and experience to take it to the next level.
There are personnel companies who can be hired to review job descriptions and actually transition unproductive managers when the owner/director or board does not feel capable of the task.
Conclusion
Leading a growing company is a difficult and constantly changing job. Your role requirements will not stay the same for 12 months. While sufficient cash is a challenge, the balance of effective people on the team at different stages is critical. The CEO job is challenging. A business coach can help and contact me if your team needs support to go through this process.