Realising your business is at the stage of needing an employee is exciting, as it suggests growth and success. But, for a lot of business owners, it’s also daunting. If you started your business from scratch, you probably know how to do everything yourself. You know every step of every business process, you’re familiar with every client and you understand how every little thing works. It can feel risky to let someone else take charge. Unfortunately, you can’t do everything yourself, not if you want your business to grow in a way that lasts. Hiring your first employee is a big deal but, if you plan ahead, it can be one of the best business decisions you make.
It’s Normal to Find Hiring Your First Employee Difficult
If you feel stressed or hesitant about hiring your first employee, you’re not alone. A lot of business owners find themselves worried about not being able to control quality, having to teach someone from the ground up and the financial burden of paying someone’s wage. You might be worried about picking the right person for the job, and letting go of something you’ve put so much time and energy into isn’t easy.
Hiring someone is a big deal, both financially and emotionally, but it’s also risky to continue doing everything yourself. Being the only one working for your business can slow down growth, make you more likely to burn out and monopolise your time, keeping you from thinking about strategy, sales and new ideas.
Step-by-Step Guide to Hiring Your First Employee
Make Sure You’re Ready to Hire
Hiring should fix a clear problem, not just make things less stressful in the short-term. If you’re saying no to things because you don’t have enough time, you might be ready to hire. If your workload is increasing and you’re struggling to keep up, you might be ready to hire. You might find that more and more of your days are full of administrative or operational work, or you’re always working too many hours. Perhaps tasks that help the business to grow – like sales, partnerships and strategy – keep getting put off. These are all signs that you might need help.
Find the Role That Will Have the Most Impact
Your first hire should make the biggest positive difference possible. This might mean hiring someone to help with admin or someone to take care of customer service, or you might need an expert to focus on sales or marketing. Think about which jobs take up the most time, what tasks need to be done on a regular basis but don’t require your skills, and what help would make things more efficient or bring in more money. A lot of business owners find it helpful to hire someone to do routine, repeatable tasks so they can focus on growth.
Make the Role You’re Hiring Clear
Unclear roles lead to confusion, poor performance and frustration. You need to make the role clear in your job description, and this means including main duties, what the day-to-day of the role looks like, the results you’re expecting, knowledge required and preferred skills. It’s also a good idea to include working hours, location – is the role based at an office, or are you open to hybrid working? – and tools used. This will help to attract the right candidates.
Find Out How Much It Really Costs to Hire Someone
Paying someone’s salary is only one part of what it costs to hire your first employee. You also need to think about setting up payroll, any software and equipment they’ll need, time for training, insurance and possible employee benefits. There’s also a chance you’ll have less time to work during onboarding, which can impact revenue. Before you commit to hiring someone, make sure you can comfortably afford to keep them for at least six months.
Focus On Candidate Quality, Not Quantity
You don’t need a lot of applicants, you just need the right ones. There are various ways to find talented candidates including taking recommendations from people you trust, networking, reaching out to your own customers, posting on job boards, referrals and utilising the services of professional recruiters. It’s better to have a handful of strong candidates, than to have dozens of applicants who don’t fit the bill.
Look at Personality and Attitude in Interviews
In a small business, personality and attitude are important, so don’t focus solely on a candidate’s industry experience and skills when you’re interviewing them. Your first employee will most likely work closely with you, take care of more than one thing at once, have to evolve with the business and represent your brand to the outside world. This means you need to look for someone who’s proactive, wanting to learn, solution-focused and keen to get stuck into a growing business.
Onboard with Purpose
Once you’ve interviewed candidates and you’ve found your first employee, it’s time to focus on onboarding. A lot of small businesses make the mistake of hiring someone, giving them quick instructions and then expecting them to figure it out. This rarely works. A good onboarding process sets out the business’ goals, includes how to use tools and follow processes, and provides written workflows. It’s a good idea to set goals for the first month and provide regular feedback throughout the onboarding process. The more organised your onboarding is, the faster they’ll be able to make a difference.
Learn How to Delegate Tasks
Delegation doesn’t mean giving someone a job without explaining it, always checking every little thing and expecting them to take the exact same approach as you. It means explaining what you want to happen, providing resources, offering help if asked and giving someone the freedom to work freely, before you check in with the results. There’s a chance your first employee will work in a different way to you, and that’s good. As long as they’re achieving the results you need, you can focus on being a leader.
Keep an Eye on Performance
Don’t wait months to fix problems or give feedback, as you risk leaving it too late. Instead, check in with your new employee each week, set goals, communicate and acknowledge their work. If you need to give criticism, ensure it’s constructive. Being clear early on stops problems from getting worse.
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Realising your business is at the stage of needing an employee is exciting, as it suggests growth and success. But, for a lot of business owners, it’s also daunting. If you started your business from scratch, you probably know how to do everything yourself. You know every step of every business process, you’re familiar with every client and you understand how every little thing works. It can feel risky to let someone else take charge. Unfortunately, you can’t do everything yourself, not if you want your business to grow in a way that lasts. Hiring your first employee is a big deal but, if you plan ahead, it can be one of the best business decisions you make.
