hr processes

The Most Effective HR Processes for Supporting Company Culture

Dec 21, 2017

Did you know that highly engaged employees are more than twice as productive, yet 70% of American workers are not engaged at work? Several polls confirm this testament to the importance of great hr processes.

You can greatly improve employee engagement by developing and maintaining the right company culture.

Company culture drives employee motivation and behavior. Maintaining the right company culture leads to higher performance and more loyal employees, bad company culture does the opposite.

Let’s take a look at how you can adapt your hr processes to create a workplace where employees thrive, care and take pride in their work.

Refine Company Culture

You can’t develop a good company culture without a well-thought-out structure and end goal.

Start with alignment. Gather management to define company culture. When you have a clear idea of your ideal company culture, assess out how it fits your business strategies, and how well employees think it matches their experience in the workplace.

Adjust and make plans to fix any misalignments. Make sure the leadership’s picture of company culture mirrors how the employees really see it. Otherwise, your management is leading in blindness and unable to make optimal decisions, and your workers feel mistreated and ignored.

Learn from your employees and adapt your hr processes, because the company will only go as far as the workers take it.

Hiring and Training

Handle prospects and new recruits as people, not just labor. Imagine them with the group, and their relation to your company culture. Are they a good fit? Make company culture part of the hiring process and bring new employees smoothly into the community.

Activity doesn’t equal results. The position you’re offering is more than an activity. Focus on results, what this person will achieve for the company. Both in their immediate tasks and as a part of your team with a mission.

Using perks for motivation is inefficient if you haven’t established perks that are tailored to your workforce’s needs and wants. Hear them out, adjust as needed, and save money by cutting out unwanted perks.

Keep employees happy to keep them motivated and efficient. Satisfied employees will spread a good reputation for your business. Fewer employees quit, more people seek employment with your business. Thus you’ve made future hr processes more efficient.

Ensure an environment of happiness and you maintain motivation, independence, trust and belief in the company.

Eliminating Clashes

Carefully assign leaders with a clear sense of direction for the team, project, and company culture. Choose ones that care and take pride in their work.

Think of what state of mind you want your workers to maintain, and pick leaders that brilliantly represent it.

Remember that high-performers easily lose motivation. Don’t keep them thinking they’re doing more work with more accountability and less help without due compensation.

Ensure that great work is recognized and rewarded to prevent animosity between workers, and inspire more workers to strive for higher performance.

More Tips on HR Processes and Much More

Rafferty Pendery is a tech entrepreneur, VC and International speaker whose companies have worked with major brands like Hilton, HP and Time Warner.

On this blog, you’ll find lots of great information for entrepreneurs and business executives.

If you have any questions about this information, send a message here.

business strategy consultant

4 Crazy Ways A Business Strategy Consultant Produces Rocking Results

Dec 14, 2017

Do you have a gnawing feeling your business should be doing better? Do you feel like you’re leaking money somewhere, but can’t find the hole? Bringing in a business strategy consultant can help you find the answers you’re looking for.

These professionals don’t earn their money by providing you with lukewarm results. They should be able to come in and give you rocking results, almost immediately.

Here are four proven ways they can help nearly any business.

1. They Provide a Fresh (and Expert) Set of Eyes

If you feel like you should be making more money, business strategy consultants can give you that valuable perspective that helps you, find the leak and plug it. Or, they can just simply help you find a better way to do things.

First of all, you know your business and you’re an expert in your given industry. Bringing in a consultant lets you focus on these things, and spend your time where it’s most valuable.

Also, you’re often too close to your business to see things objectively. Your consultant can come in and assess things objectively.

It’s easier for them to see the big picture because they haven’t been staring at the micro details as long as you have.

People in your organization may have an emotional bias because they’ve invested a certain amount of time in a given product or project.

A business strategy consultant has no emotional attachment, and they always objectively advise you on what’s best for business.

2. They Don’t Come With “Hidden Costs”

You might be weighing the cost of a business strategy consultant against bringing in a full-time employee to handle all of this.

We understand the temptation to want to bring things “in-house.” But believe us when we say it can be a lot more economical to bring in an outside consultant.

The cost of a business strategy consultant is fixed, and there are no surprises. And you don’t have to pay for expensive extras like benefits, vacation time, or Christmas bonuses.

You only pay for services that move the needle forward for your business.

3. Business Strategy Consultants are Professional Maximizers

Think of it as an investment in making sure everything you have is being used to its full potential.

Tight budget? No problem. Limited resources? They can work with that.

Impossible deadline? We will see about that. Their biggest strength is their ability to look at everything you have, and get the absolute most value out of it.

This includes everything from your time, to your staff, to your partnerships in the industry. It’s their job to maximize everything you have and find new opportunities that you would have never otherwise found.

Ready to Hire a Business Strategy Consultant?

In only 10 years, my expertise has helped startups get off the ground. In addition, I’ve also helped Fortune 500s like Time Warner, Red Bull, Hilton, and HP make the most of their corporate strategies.

How can I help you? You can click here to contact me any time. Let’s talk business!

inspirational speaking

4 Proven Ways to Level-up Your Inspirational Speaking Skills

Dec 7, 2017

According to the Harvard Business Review, the ability to inspire and motivate others is the most important skill for leaders and managers at every level.

In order to do that, you’ll need to be able to captivate your audience and inject energy into it. In this article, we’ll tell you exactly how to do that.

Read on to find out how to improve your inspirational speaking skills.

How to Improve Your Inspirational Speaking

1. Know Your Message

In order for your public speaking to have an impact, it needs to have a clear message. If you’re not sure what that is yet, it’s time to get brainstorming.

If there’s one thing that you want people to take away from your speech, what is it? Once you define what that message is, you can work on delivering it in the most effective way possible.

2. Practice Improvising

When you’re trying to give a compelling speech, reading off a script or reeling off memorized lines just won’t do.

There will inevitably be moments when your mind goes blank or a wrench is thrown into the works, sending you off your usual course. When that happens, you’ll need to come up with something on the spot.

This requires improvisational skills.

Hone your improv skills, and you won’t have to worry about being caught off-guard. One great way to do this is by trying out some stand-up comedy.

It can even make you a better leader!

If you can handle hecklers, you can handle anything. Besides, it helps to get all the extra stage practice you can, no matter what you’re doing while you’re up there.

3. Be Passionate

Your audience won’t believe your words unless you do. That’s why passion is important for public speaking.

Emotion is what will make your speech captivating, drawing people in so that they hang on your every word. It could come through in body language, tone or just quality of storytelling.

However you do it, make sure it’s authentic.

4. Adapt to Your Audience

Your inspirational speaking approach should differ depending on the type of audience receiving it. You can’t talk to every group of people in the same way.

Try your best to get to know as much as you can about your audience before an event. The more you know, the more you’ll be able to gear your speech towards their tastes, wants and needs.

That way, they’ll be able to relate to what you’re saying, and your words will have a bigger impact.

Be Better at Business

With these tips, you can become a great public speaker. As well as improving your business and making you a better leader, it could also turn into a lucrative side gig. If you’re really good, you could even become a professional inspirational speaker.

Work hard enough, and you’ll find that people will come to you, offering to pay you to speak at their events.

To find out more, read our post on 5 tips on becoming a paid international speaker.

marketing advisor

5 Reasons You Need to Hiring a Marketing Advisor Right Now

Nov 30, 2017

Most business owners understand that a comprehensive marketing strategy is a key to success.

But for small businesses, it can be difficult to dedicate resources to marketing. In fact, only just over half of all small businesses have a marketing plan.

Luckily, if you’re one of the many small businesses without a marketing plan, there are options available to you. For instance, hiring a marketing advisor can be an effective way boost your strategy without straining your capacity.

Here are five signs that it’s time for your business to hire a marketing advisor.

1. You Don’t Feel Like Your Business is Growing

Many small businesses reach a frustrating point where they feel that their growth has plateaued.

While it is important to cultivate a population of loyal customers, any business will ultimately fail without gaining new clients. An advisor will help your business continue reaching new customers.

2. You’re Not Sure Who Your Target Market is

If your business has stopped growing, it may be because you are having a hard time identifying your prospective customer base. To build an effective marketing strategy, your business must understand the persona of your buyers, and how to appeal to them.

An advisor can help your business better understand the profile of customers who frequent your business. They can also help you identify new markets that you can tap into.

3. Your Website Needs an Update

Even if you aren’t an e-commerce business, your website is still important. Your business’s online presence is the first impression to the outside world.

If your website looks old and outdated, prospective customers may assume that your business is outdated too. Freshening up your website with a new look can be a great way to attract new leads.

4. You Don’t Have an SEO Strategy

Publishing great content on your website is a great way to boost traffic and attract more customers. But if your content is not search engine optimized, prospective customers will not be able to find it.

A marketing consultant will ensure that your content is optimized based on what search engine algorithms look for. This way, your page will rank higher on search engines, which will help bring in more potential customers.

5. You Aren’t Measuring Your Marketing

The only way to know whether your marketing strategies are effective is to measure your efforts. This helps you to determine whether customers are responding to particular advertisements, website designs, and content pieces.

Marketing analytics also help you to better target the money you spend on your marketing campaigns. An advisor will help you determine what your return on investment is, and which marketing strategies are not worth the cost.

Hire a Marketing Advisor Today

If you need help with your business’s marketing strategy, hiring an outside consultant can be a great option. This can give your business an objective view of where your marketing plan needs to change.

To get started with a marketing advisor, contact us. We’ll work with you to find the perfect advisor for your business.

seo specialist

3 Ways an SEO Specialist Can Improve Your Online Presence

Nov 10, 2017

A study by Search Engine Watch proves that being the top search result will lead to more clickthroughs by 53%.

SEO (search engine optimization) is your ticket to boosting traffic to your website. People often choose the first result they see, which means learning how to increase your Google ranking is imperative to creating a successful website.

There are some techniques a small business owner can do to increase traffic numbers. However, hiring an SEO specialist can eliminate the stress associated with building a ranking on your own.

Read on to learn why an SEO specialist shapes the way traffic flows to your website.

1. Hiring an SEO Specialist is Better Than Doing It on Your Own

A website is only one aspect of your much larger business structure. Why not save yourself all the time it takes to craft your SEO ranking by hiring a professional?

The intelligent SEO specialist you hire will understand SEO inside and out. He or she is an expert in the field of online SEO and will know exactly how to factor in the right keywords to make sure your website is in the top search results.

As a business owner, you can hire an expert in SEO to help you out so you can focus your attention on other important operations to keep your business running smoothly. Generating sales leads will be a no-brainer once a trained expert collaborates with your business to increase your SEO rank.

2. See Better Traffic Results with Help From a Professional

Do you think your current website is not reaching out to the right audience?

By hiring a specialist, he or she can determine who your target audience is and how to attract them to click on your website search link. If your page is now ranked on the first few pages of a Google search, an expert can make adjustments to improving the ranking.

SEO tactics, such as choosing the right keywords to implement into your content, have resulted in high success rates. Convert leads into loyal customers by learning from a well-informed SEO specialist.

3. Avoid Black Hat Methods to Cheat Your Way to the Top

One final way that hiring extra help to boost your SEO rank with a specialist is to avoid making costly mistakes.

Black hat techniques are when illegal methods are used to boost the ranking of your site. Avoiding this path is something an SEO expert can ensure happens.

Keyword stuffing and spam-commenting are two black hat techniques that will make Google quickly push your website down the list.

Talk to your SEO consultant to discuss what techniques he or she will use to promote your website so these harmful tactics are not involved.

I’m Rafferty Pendery, a Tech Entrepreneur who has already helped thousands of businesses flourish through successful expansion strategies and social media campaigns.

Leaving me a message is a great way to easily reach out and learn more about the services I can provide your business today.

importance of leadership

Empathy and the Importance of Leadership

Nov 3, 2017

Empathy is the ability to truly understand someone by being able to “walk a mile in their shoes,” or see situations and events from their perspective. It’s an innate human trait that has a place in every scenario. The importance of leadership and the relationship between it and empathy cannot be understated.

We frequently wish for someone to put themselves in our place so that they’ll understand us better. However, we are less likely to do the same for others, especially in a leadership position.

Great leaders form strong relationships with their team members. Empathy, especially from a leader, is a crucial aspect of any rock-solid group.

Read on to learn why this often neglected ability is one businesses absolutely need for sustained success.

Empathy Shows You Value Relationships

Employees, no matter what their position, are first and foremost individuals. They are unique people, with their own special concerns, preferences, beliefs, and struggles.

Taking the time to acknowledge an employee or team member as a whole person will help you understand

  • Workplace difficulties and how to resolve them
  • Why this person takes certain approaches to problems
  • What motivates this person to do better
  • What role is best for this individual in a team setting
  • What makes this particular person feel secure

When you value relationships with individuals, you demonstrate it by finding out who they are and what makes them tick. You show empathy for the individual.

You are not merely issuing commands. You are functioning within a relationship with a person and actively working with them to accomplish a goal.

Putting Others Before Yourself

Putting others first is critical in establishing productive work relationships. The importance of leadership that incorporates an “others first” mentality cannot be emphasized enough.

Leadership is a huge responsibility, not a display of privilege and power. Team members respond to a leader who is willing to make their individual needs and concerns a priority.

Team members will also have more respect for a leader who is aware of the types of work being performed and accompanying challenges. This gives leaders authority from credibility, not just from a title.

Empathetic leaders empower others so they can reach their full potential and succeed. They do not insist on ruling over others. The goal is to build others up so that productivity and harmony will follow.

The Importance of Leadership and Empathy in Business Success

To succeed, a business needs to have cohesiveness between leadership and team members. Close-knit relationships will lead to more trust between leaders and their team, which naturally results in better, more effective communication.

Clear communication is a positive manifestation of the established trust and loyalty that empathy encourages. Businesses make progress and maintain momentum when each tier effectually connects within the framework of a company.

The goals of a business and those of its employees align so that effort is made for the good of all, not for the power of a few.

The knowledge that leaders are there to help, not demand, motivates team members to do their best to ensure team success. They feel their role in the process is valuable.

Leadership is About Responsibility

Responsibility encompasses more than task delegation and whip-cracking. It requires a holistic approach that includes, not alienates, every contributing person. A great leader utilizes encouragement and empathy, not blame or threats.

When you can understand where someone is coming from and work with them, the business benefits as a whole.

Explore my blog for more ideas on how to become a better leader and on how to help your business grow.

Have questions about leadership, marketing, management, or other business subjects? I’ve got answers. Contact me today.

giving back to the community

How Giving Back to the Community can Grow Your Business

Oct 27, 2017

There are many ways to grow your business. Most of them involve doing what you can to sell more and earn more money in the process.

However, some business growth methods involve not gathering more, but giving things away. Things like your time, energy, and money can greatly benefit the people around you when shared.

It may seem counter-intuitive, but giving back can actually help to grow your business. There are many ways to give back to your community as a business, and not all of them involve donating money.

There is a lot you can do to get involved, and doing so will prove to be a very wise business decision for several reasons. If you’re wondering how giving back to the community can actually be fruitful for your business, read on.

Improve Your Reputation in the Community

Getting involved with the local community is one of the best things you can do for your business. When people in the area associate your company name with altruism and volunteer work, they will have positive feelings toward your brand.

When the day comes that your customer needs your services and they must decide between you and the competition, you want to make sure you’ve left a good taste in their mouth.

In addition, there may be a large demographic in your community that needs help, whether it’s the school system or animal shelters. If your company is the one that comes to the rescue, you will be highly regarded by everyone affected.

If you become known as the company that’s always there in times of trouble, you will come to earn the respect and admiration of many potential customers.

Build A Loyal Customer Base by Giving Back to the Community

There are many ways that giving back to the community is a powerful business tool, and the loyalty you’ll win in the process is no exception.

Some people may come to you — and you alone — for business after you have helped them out. For example, sponsoring a children’s baseball league may earn you the unyielding loyalty of all the parents on the team.

Other ways of giving back to the community also nurture loyalty and appreciation. Mentoring budding entrepreneurs for a few hours a week can make a big impact. Donating items to an organization in need will also inspire those who see your good deed to express their gratitude by becoming a customer.

Improve Company Culture

Having your company volunteer as a team is a great way to motivate and inspire your employees. Working together on a collaborative effort for the greater good will boost company morale overall, and that’s always good for the bottom line.

When getting a group of employees to help out, you may want to offer the opportunity to volunteer during work hours. Or, you could offer it as a more fulfilling alternative to meeting for happy hour drinks.

Either way, when your employees feel good about your vision and mission, they’ll feel good about working for you. You will receive the best work possible when you have earned the trust and respect of those you employ.

startup stages

Understanding the 5 Startup Stages

Sep 29, 2017

If you want your startup to succeed, you need to live and breathe your business.

This also means understanding the startup stages. This way, you can respond with the appropriate action to move your business forward. These stages will see you move from idea to startup to maturity. While starting and running a business will always be challenging, looking at each stage of your business will help you understand what you need to overcome.

90% of startups fail. If you’re planning to be in the 10%, here are the 5 startup stages you need to know about.

1. Idea and Development

This is when you’ve got a solid business idea, but your startup isn’t yet officially in existence. Here, you begin to assess the viability of your startup.

That means getting advice and opinions about the potential of your idea from a wide range of sources. That include colleagues, family, friends, business associates, and anyone else in your industry.

You also need to begin thinking about how you’ll finance your launch. This stage is all about considering the feasibility of your idea.

2. Startup

Once you’ve thoroughly tested your business idea and it’s ready to go, you can launch your startup.

This is often the riskiest of the startup stages. Mistakes you make during this stage can impact your business for years in the future.

This stage is all about adaptability. You can expect to spend a lot of time tweaking your services or products based on initial customer feedback.

3. Growth

By the time you get to the growth stage, your business should consistently be generating income and regularly attracting new customers. Your cash flow should improve as you get recurring revenues to cover your ongoing expenses.

You should also be expecting your profits to steadily improve.

One of your biggest challenges will be managing your time. You’ll need to learn to divide your time between many tasks requiring your attention, including:

  • Hiring new employees
  • Dealing with competitors
  • Managing customer service
  • Increasing revenue

This is when you’ll learn the importance of hiring smart people.

This will help you grow quickly and let trustworthy employees take some of the responsibility off of your plate.

4. Expansion

In this phase, running your business will start to become routine. You’ll have staff in place to handle tasks you don’t have the time (or don’t want) to manage. You’ll also have firmly established your business in your industry.

This is when you may want to begin thinking about expanding your range of products and services. Another option is to enter into a new market or geographic location.

5. Maturity

Once you’ve navigated the expansion stage, you can expect to see stable profits each year. This is when you may begin thinking about further expansion, but you’ll need to consider a few questions:

  • Is further growth sustainable for your business?
  • Is there enough opportunity to expand?
  • Are you financially stable enough if the expansion is unsuccessful?
  • Are you emotionally ready for further expansion?

Which of the Startup Stages Are You In?

Which of the above startup stages sounds like your business? Are you effectively navigating your growth, or do you feel like you’re going backward?

Leave a comment below, or check out some of our great business resources.

International Speaker

5 Tips on Becoming a Paid International Speaker

Aug 31, 2017

What happens when you talk?

Are you able to captivate your audience no matter who is listening?

Are you the type of person who has an incredible story to share and you enjoy helping people?

If you have interesting and inspiring stories along with the “gift of gab”, becoming an international speaker might be the right move for you.

Keep reading to find out how to get it done.

The Route to Becoming an International Speaker

1. Solve Their Problem

This is where the whole process starts. Look at people like Tony Robbins and Dave Ramsey. They had a problem. They fixed it. Now they’re both helping other people with their problems and making a fortune while doing so.

Ask yourself, “What problem do entrepreneurs and business owners have that I can help them fix?”

An even better question: “What problem will they pay to have fixed?”

People who own their own businesses are go-getters. If they can solve their own problems, they want to. Sometimes, there just isn’t any information out there.

You need to have that information.

2. Learn the Language

If you would like to become an international speaker, you need to accept the fact that not everyone speaks your native tongue. English is used as a second language twice as often as it’s used as a native one.

For maximum success as a public speaker, focus on becoming fluent in Arabic, Mandarin, and/or Hindi. These three languages combine to increase your potential reach by nearly two billion people.

3. Tech Up

Once you’ve started, you’re going to likely stay on the go. You’ll probably have a small team constantly needing to exchange information with you.

Immerse yourself in the tech world. It will make your life easier.

This includes everything from leveraging social media to utilizing the newest types of communication software. Having a Gmail account is probably not going to be enough.

4. Make Them Laugh

Entrepreneurs and small business owners are stressed out. They have come to you with a severe problem and are paying a lot of money to have it sorted out via your speech.

With all of that tension in the room, you can use humor to cut through it. This will help you connect with your audience, grab their attention, and help them relax.

Use a funny personal story that relates to your speech to maximize the efficiency of the joke. It could be something that affects business owners all over the world. Or it could be about your first experience in their country.

Just make sure it isn’t offensive and keep it relevant.

5. Establish a Brand

In many ways, business is its own form of communication. Don’t underestimate the value of creating your brand.

When you become an international speaker, you should learn to rely on your brand. No two languages are quite the same and often things get lost in translation.

Your brand can say everything that it needs to about what you have to offer without a word. It can also help create a level of emotional trust and authority that cannot be misconstrued in translation.

Wrapping It Up

While these are five awesome tips that can help get you started and you should be thinking about them, there is no way that we can squeeze every piece of need to know information into one blog post.

I’m Rafferty Pendery, I’m an international speaker who has helped thousands of businesses over the years. I can help you, too. Contact me today.

 

brand yourself

Why It’s Important To Brand Yourself

Jun 30, 2017

Successful entrepreneurs and business owners know the effect that good branding has on their sales.

Developing a strong, well-established brand is one of the most important things you can do for your business. So you create a logo, a catchy business name and headline, have your packaging sorted out and publish content on a daily basis.

But many entrepreneurs don’t realize that they can grow their business even more through effective personal branding.

So how can you develop a personal brand along with your business brand? How can you do it and still stay focused on your big goals?

Keep reading to find out why it’s crucial to brand yourself and how to do that successfully.

Why It’s Important to Brand Yourself

Whether you’re an entrepreneur, a solopreneur or a business owner, you have to work very hard to position your product or service on the market.

One part of your business success is related to the quality of what you’re offering and the other parts are the branding and the relationship you build with your potential customers.

This is where personal branding comes into play. It’s basically your chance to tell people your story and connect with them on an emotional level. This will establish trust and credibility.

Another reason to brand yourself is to stand out from the crowd. This is important in an overly saturated market.

One of the best ways to do so is through social media. If you use these platforms the right way, you can connect with other like-minded business owners. You can meet people who may have business opportunities for you.

How to Brand Yourself for Success

Creating a personal brand alongside your business brand is easy if you know where to begin.

For example, attending as many networking events as you can is essential for spreading the word about your business. It’s also important for meeting other entrepreneurs with innovative ideas.

Networking is a great way to expand your connections and meet people who can help you grow your brand.

Another way to brand yourself is to connect with your customers on a personal basis. Tell them the story of your brand and how you started it. Listen to what your audience says, the feedback they give you, and what they’d like to see next.

Paying attention to your customers’ needs and implementing them in the future will help them trust you.

One of the best parts of developing a personal brand is the opportunity to show your personality. You can do this through creating online content and videos. Show people that behind your successful brand stands an equally successful person.

Bottom Line

Creating a personal brand for yourself and your business at the same time may seem daunting, especially if you’ve never done it before.

But if you learn how to approach and execute it, you’ll find it incredibly rewarding both personally and professionally.

More and more entrepreneurs and business owners invest their time and work into personal branding and it’s what takes them to new heights.

hiring independent contractors

The Benefits of Hiring Independent Contractors

Jun 26, 2017

“Should I hire independent contractors?”

It’s a hand-wringer for many business managers. It might come up as your business experiences a sudden surge, or when the chance to bid on a huge contract presents itself.

The independent workforce now makes up over 40% of US workers, so there may be no better time to tap into that resource. But is it right for you?

While we can’t answer that question outright, we can give you the tools to understand why hiring independent contractors could be a real benefit to your company.

Give yourself flexibility

Everybody wants to be able to do everything in today’s commercial marketplace.

Partly that’s because we all want to be ready to respond to the latest changes in our industry. That could be anything from developing technology to a social media trend.

Hiring independent contractors is a great way to add that flexibility to your organization. With traditional employees, your ability to capitalize on situations is limited by the skill set of your employees and the long lead-times involved in the hiring process.

You could hire new employees, sure, but then who’s to say their skills will remain relevant to you over time?

Independent contractors are also great for managing changing business needs. You can bring on a retinue of contractors to cope with high volumes of work or a particular project without needing to find a niche for them when the work reduces back to normal levels or the project comes to an end.

Save on expenses

It’s no secret that regular employees come with a lot of requirements and expenses employers must meet or incur.

Among the considerations for a company hiring employees are:

  • Providing space for employees to work. This will include health & safety considerations as well as comfort.
  • HR support to deal with parental needs, ambitious or underperforming employees, requirements to show continued professional development, and other personal and interpersonal issues such as stress and disputes.
  • Benefits such as health insurance, pension etc.
  • Continued payment for employees outside of a usual working pattern, such as long-term sickness and parental needs.
  • Compensation in the event of accident or injury
  • Meeting travel and training expenses

All of these add up to a lot of expense for an employer. And that’s fine if you’re investing in your company’s future and trying to build a skilled in-house team.

But you don’t always need that. By hiring independent contractors, you can bypass a lot of these expenses while still completing work.

Independent contractors may have a higher payment per hour, but when you factor in the extra investment of time and money into regular employees, the savings soon become obvious.

You can hire independent contractors fully-trained without any of the other financial obligations to your company except their salary.

Protect your company

As we’ve covered, regular employees can need a lot of maintenance to keep them happy. What happens when the employer/employee relationship breaks down?

Lawsuits can be devastating for a company. By hiring independent contractors, you can insulate yourself from this risk.

Contractors aren’t your direct employees, so you don’t have the same legal responsibilities for them as you would a regular employee.

Here’s a selection of rights held by regular employees that you won’t have to worry about when hiring independent contractors:

  • Right to form a union
  • Right to sick or parental leave
  • Protection from employment discrimination (except racial discrimination)
  • Right to minimum wage and increased overtime payment

So hiring independent contractors can ensure your core business doesn’t become eclipsed by legal issues and expensive payouts in the event of a dispute.

Anything that allows you to focus on what you do well gives you an advantage over competitors distracted by other issues.

There are some legalities you’ll need to keep in mind. Your written contract will need to be smart to set the terms of employment. You’ll also need to consider things like the question of what happens to intellectual property created by independent contractors.

Recruit quickly

Recruitment can be a hellish process for all involved.

Timescales are long. Even after posting a job ad, you’ll often have set a closing deadline and be unable to advance before then. Following which you need to go through the lengthy and time-consuming process of interviewing candidates.

It can often take a least a month before the candidate is able to come and work for you.

And this all supposes you’ve found the right candidate and that the hiring won’t turn out to be a mistake. It’s also pretty common for new employees to change their minds and jump ship within weeks.

In some cases, you can go through all this for just a single employee.

By contrast, hiring independent contractors lets you get boots on the ground quickly. You can mass-hire, skip interviews (even if you conduct a less intensive skills check), and deploy within weeks rather than months.

Being able to deploy workers so quickly could be the difference between winning or losing a contract, or delivering a project to budget.

It can also allow you to manage harmful backlogs.

Expand your scope by hiring independent contractors

Depending on the nature of your industry, you may find that hiring more employees isn’t the best way to scale up your business. The extra overheads of regular employees may keep your company at a certain size.

Hiring independent contractors can be an effective way to break through that ceiling. You can effectively inflate the size of your workforce and the size of your company.

Knowing you can bring in independent contractors to cover more ambitious work gives you a realistic way to beat your competitors without taking dangerous risks.

Independent contractors may help you punch above your weight in your chosen industry. You may even find they help you snowball to the point where you can afford to invest in more regular employees.

So next time you see an uptick in your work or need to meet the requirements of a project, consider hiring independent contractors and feel the benefits.

For more business tips, follow my blog or head on over to my Contact Page if you need to get in touch!

 

 

small scale business ideas

How To Turn Your Small Scale Business Ideas To Reality

Jun 16, 2017

small scale business ideas

Are you are an entrepreneur with a small scale business idea?

If so, you shouldn’t stop there!

With the right mindset and dedication, you can help turn your small scale business ideas into a reality.

As of September 2015, there were 27 million working-age Americans who started or were running a new business.

That makes up nearly 14% of all working-age Americans!

Part of being a successful entrepreneur is creating a good idea and having the passion, intelligence and work ethic to develop.

Read on to learn how to turn your small scale business ideas to reality.

Identify Your Goals

To bring your small scale business ideas to life, you need to have clearly identified goals.

What product or service are you offering your customers that they cannot get anywhere else?

If your product or service is not the first of its kind, how are you doing this better than the competition?

Once you answer questions like this, you should identify how your product or service will help to solve a problem your customers are facing.

Your goals should be narrowly tailored so that you can measure your progress towards each of them. You should also be careful to ensure that you are setting both short-term and long-term goals.

By doing this, you have a measuring stick for your small business as your idea becomes a reality.

Understand Your Market

Even the best idea can fall flat if you don’t understand your target market.

What are the demographics of the market you are targeting with your product or service?

By identifying this market, you can determine the ways that you can connect with them the best.

This might be through presentations, emails, your website or a combination of different ways.

Understanding your market will also help you to competitively price your product or service. If you are too high or too low, you risk missing out on valuable business opportunities.

Find Funding

You should also be prepared for where to find funding for your small scale business ideas.

Depending on your idea, you may able to fund the initial start-up costs yourself.

But if your small scale idea is bigger or more costly than you think, you may need to seek funding from a bank or investors who may want a stake of ownership in your business.

Make Small Scale Business Ideas a Reality

Bringing your ideas to life in the form of a business can be challenging but rewarding.

You need to ensure you spend time brainstorming your idea and how it fits into the current and future of your industry. But making your idea a reality also requires understanding your target market and identifying your goals.

If you need more funding than what you have on your own, you will need to find it from other sources, which will require you selling someone else on the idea of your product or service.

Rafferty Pendery is an entrepreneur and a venture capitalist who is here to help others who share a passion for business.

Contact him today to learn more about how he can make your business dreams become a reality!