How to Move the ‘Mother Hen’ Out of Your Organisation
Don’t get me wrong here. ‘Mother hen’ is a reference used for any incumbent worker, both male and female, who have played a variety of roles within a business without a targeted skill set. Though they have been valuable in the initial stages of establishing the business through the entrepreneurial journey, the established business that is looking to grow and scale will no longer find this type of staff member effective or profitable.
Think about that person who has been in the business for quite a long time, managing payroll, doing some of the book keeping, answering phones, filing, doing the odd social media post and maybe even arranging staff lunches. This is the person who will fuss around the place thinking they need to hold it all together and, in some part, they possibly have until now.
This person is often critical in a fledgling business but for a business trying to scale, this can be the thorn in your side. I see it time and time again - it’s a silent killer to growth.
Whilst it is critical to do so (and deep down you really know this), it can be very difficult to move this person on. They have been stitched into the overall fabric of the business until now, and removing them can be like pulling teeth… a painful and lengthy process. Not only will you need to hire for the various roles being covered by this one individual, but you will also need to deal with the potential emotional fallout from the worker who perhaps feels like they have sewn their entire life into helping you grow thus far. They usually have a false perception of their value to your organisation. They are very set in their ways and believe the company will collapse without them, and that you will never replace them.
You need to take action! Additionally, you can relieve yourself of the burden of knowing that you need to do it but not knowing how.
Here are 4 ways to solve your problem:
Map out your organisational chart - in the same way we do for our strategic planning process, imagine your business 2 years from now. On a blank page you need to map out all required roles in your organisation to facilitate the desired level of growth. Don’t use names of people in your organisation, define roles. This will eliminate your bias to ‘shoehorn’ people into roles.
Assign existing staff to roles - mostly this will be fairly straightforward, but there will be the odd chess piece that, deep down, you know does not fit on the board. Leave them to the side for now.
Identify the roles that are not ‘filled’ - rethink these roles in the context of your business goals and growth plans. As a small business, you often see a person filling more than 1 role in a business because the business doesn’t have the resources or the need to hire a person for each role. When you are making the conscious decision to scale out your business, this approach simply won’t cut it.
Prioritise today’s unfilled roles - of course, scaling does not simply mean hiring for every potential role you have imagined on your board. However, it does mean hiring purposefully for the important roles you will need next. Prioritise either marketing or product development, a BDM or a COO or optimising your finance function versus the filing function.
In order to alleviate the ‘multiple hats’ from key team members, an effective approach is to simply start by outsourcing some of the work. This is not high level strategic work that really needs to be done by key people in the organisation, but more process driven production style work that can be more or less automated.
For example, outsourcing your bookkeeping to a professional organisation who knows the ins and outs of accounting will not only save you time, but will more than likely save you money. Professional bookkeepers who have a basic accounting background will be able to recognise incongruences quickly as well as advise on monthly progress. Talk to us today if this is something you would like to consider.
Keeping a staff member onboard just because they have been there so long and you are too chicken to have ‘the chat’ with them is not a valid nor wise decision for a growth-focused business. This will become more like a bottleneck for growth and will affect the culture of the company significantly. Your company is only as good as your people so be sure that the people you have on your team are moving in the same direction as you are.
Want Proactive Advice To Keep You On Track Each Month And Guaranteed Execution?
Work with us for 90 days and if your business is not transformed, we'll give you your money back.
