What does your team look like?

This piece was originally published in August of 2010.

I will stay with my point this month that a recovery is coming. I don’t know when but one is coming and you, as a leader and small business owner, need to be ready. And the success of any entity begins and ends with people. So, as you look forward with a positive belief that things can and will get better, you need to look at who is on your team. And you need to look closely at what you need to succeed.

Years ago I was struggling with my company. We were doing “okay” but we were not performing nearly as well as we could; there were small problems everywhere. I had a bunch of nice people who did great work. A bunch of nice people who did okay work. And, truthfully, a bunch of nice people who didn’t do very good work and needed to go. But as many leaders do, I kept poor performers around way too long. Why? Because they were nice. Because I liked them as people. Because they had been here a long time.

In business a lot of companies operate like this. They promote people because of their length of service rather than their performance. Long time salespeople are made sales managers and we are surprised when they don’t do well. Long time team leaders are made into department managers and they don’t do well. Family members are promoted due to their last name and not their performance. I’ve seen it, I’ve done it, and you have too! It wasn’t until my board of advisors, that I meet with quarterly for advice and counsel, pointed out to me the problems I had in my company were due to my inability to see the big picture. And my inability to make some tough decisions and get the poor performers out the door, regardless of how nice they were. In one instance, my board members made me realize how much one manager was an impediment to my success. I didn’t see it at first; I thought I was a great leader and motivator and I would be able to fix them. It wasn’t until I heard my friend Pete Luongo, who is an author and speaker and former CEO of a Fortune 500 Company, say two things that I became armed with the confidence to do what I needed to do. The first thing was, “I can make you more than you are, but I can’t make you something you aren’t.” And my personal favorite, “I love you, but you just can’t work here anymore.”

My quest to improve then started when a board member advised me to write out my organizational chart the way I wanted, not the way it was then. He told me to “focus on the position, not the person” and write out what I wanted the shape of the organization to be. He helped me write up the types of people I needed in each position. Ten years later that organizational chart has hardly changed and I have an excellent team of people who are in their positions because they perform, not because they are nice or are family. It was amazing the change that took place with my company in terms of culture, accountability, and the overall support of the company mission by removing poor performers. I hope you are seeing my point and maybe I am even making you a little uncomfortable. This month take some time and look at your organization and make sure you’ve got the right people in the right positions.

Here’s an exercise to help you. Get out your organizational chart. If you don’t have one, put it down on paper as best you can. Go to my website to view mine; I have posted it on the home page so you can see it to help you with this. (www.martygrunder.com/org-chart). After you have your organizational chart, get out three magic markers: one red, one yellow and one green. Go to each person on your team and if they are someone who you know needs to go work someplace else and can’t be trained to improve, or moved to another position, circle them in red. If they are someone who you think might be able to be trained to improve or do something else in your company effectively, circle them in yellow. And if they are someone you are certain you want included in your future and you want to invest in to improve and they are a leader, circle them in green. Your job as an owner or leader is to continually be looking for opportunities to improve and develop your team. You need to see on this piece of paper how good or bad you’ve got it. If there is more red than any other color, don’t feel bad; at least you know what you need to do. The outcome of the exercise should be to show you what you need to improve upon in the coming year so that your company can succeed.

Nobody ever said running a business is easy. But I can promise you, if you get the right people in the right positions focused on the vision and mission of the endeavor, you will have a very good chance to take advantage of the opportunities that are coming our way. People often ask me how I can speak, consult, spend time with family and still run a landscaping company. Well, I can tell you, the only way I can do all this is by having an outstanding team of professionals who understand what we are trying to do. We are not perfect and make mistakes all the time but we do a lot right; I am very excited about our future and there’s a whole lot more green on my organizational chart than there was 5-10 years ago.