Brilliant Start-Up, 2nd Edition

188 brilliant start-up

hours. If you make a good sale or call – give yourself the rest of

the day off. Go and see a matinee at the cinema, go for a long

walk in the country. You’ll come back refreshed, energised and

far more effective.

‘Throw a sicky.’ You know the days when things just don’t

look so great. If you force yourself into work you’ll only pro-

long your illness. And don’t scrimp on holidays. It’s a shock,

but you’ll often find you are not as irreplaceable as you thought

you were. Which brings us nicely on to staff and delegation…

Where to find good employees

Recruitment can be an expensive process, so it’s best to start off

using your own channels first.

Free options

Ask around your own network. This can be larger than you

think. Ask friends and family, but don’t automatically employ

them. It might seem an easy answer in the short term, but

become an emotional minefield longer term.

Ask suppliers. They’ll possibly be dealing with your competi-

tors, and know a disgruntled staff member. Ask customers.

Again they might know your industry. Put an advert on your

website, or try web forums and newsgroups in your industry.

Ask the local enterprise agency and/or council.

brilliant tip

Don’t become irreplaceable. Many people console themselves that

they’re the only one who can do a job perfectly. While flattering

to the ego, that’s not a good place to be. You’ll never grow the

business and might have just bought yourself an expensive job.

Taking on staff 189

Social media is also a help here. Put a note on your LinkedIn

profile, Facebook or Twitter.

You might also want to incentivise people to find staff. Large

companies pay thousands for staff referrals, but in a small busi-

ness a nice bottle of wine can be a sufficient token of appreciation.

The government can help you. The most obvious place to look

is Job Centres, but local enterprise organisations often have pro-

grammes such as ‘women returners’

or schemes for placing enthusiastic

graduates with local companies. Also

consider local university, college and

school career offices.

Commercial options

If the above don’t work, consider advertising. Look at online

job boards. Also consider smaller line adverts in the recruit-

ment sections – these can work as well as larger display adverts

at a fraction of the cost.

For highly skilled jobs, don’t rule out recruitment agencies.

Sure, they’ll charge you a percentage of the person’s first year

salary, but you can negotiate hard on this. They’ll save you

the cost of advertising, and hopefully have a good stock of very

suitable candidates.

How to interview for staff

This is not an area on which to cut corners.

Draw up a detailed job description

A sample is shown overleaf.

Ensure that as well as the tasks they’ll do and skills they’ll need,

make sure you also include the attitudes. These can often be

more important.

the government can

help you

190 brilliant start-up

Job description Shop assistant

Person interviewed Jennifer Hopeful

Attitudes needed Friendly and likes working with people

Reliable – will turn up on time

Previous shop experience

Enthusiastic – will muck in

Skills needed Ability to work with customers

Basic maths

Notes

Score out of 10 Friendliness Enthusiasm Reliability Experience

Beware of hiring a clone of yourself. Sure, your new production

manager is a hoot. They laugh at the same jokes as you, and

love to go around chatting to clients. But what happens if they

share the same lax attitude and scant attention to detail as you?

If you’ve done a good analysis of your skills and weaknesses

(Step 1), you won’t actually have much in common with your

new employee. But the pair of you may just be the perfect fit.

Also, be wary of the softer skills staff need in a small business.

They need to be self-motivated, trustworthy and able to work

on their own. Someone coming from the relative security (ha!)

of a large company might freak out at what’s required in a

small business.

brilliant example

You are running a café. The most important skill I would imagine for a

waitress is a pleasant and outgoing personality. So what if they don’t have

experience or food handling qualifications? You can teach those. But you

can’t teach the right attitude.