Creating Professional Development In Your Business

Are you ready to take your company’s operation systems to a completely new level? Then begin by creating more than just a job for your employees.



What most small businesses do not realize – I know I was caught off-guard by it – was when I had an employee come up to me and say, "so what are the professional development opportunities in the business?" I was speechless. I did not even know what that meant. At the time, I just thought of myself as the guy who paid the bills and was trying to grow a new business. What I came to appreciate is that every job that you hire for is an opportunity to create a career for someone within your business. You can be that important.



Here are a couple of tips that I found that are very useful for helping me direct and create wonderful people who will husband the systems that I’m creating. Systems are of very little value if the people who are involved in your operation are not worth their salt. It is no good if the people involved are not absolutely committed to your vision for the business.



First, hire for unique ability. Whether it is for a traditional employee or a contractor, they must excel and like doing what you hire them for. I recommend reading Catherine Nomura’s book, "Unique Ability" to learn about how to hire people based on their best skills and talents.



Secondly, take time to create a vision for each employee and stakeholder. Understand what is bringing them into your business and where they want to go because they are integral in being able to carry on the systems that you create.



Thirdly, identify and discover the goals and strengths of each of your employees. I recommend a series of books written by Marcus Buckingham called, "First, Break All the Rules." The book is all about managing people "unfairly." A very, very effective way of managing different people and different levels of performance, and making sure that you get the best out your best people; you get good work out of good people, and you end up getting rid of bad people.



The fourth thing that you want to do is design a path for the attainment of your employees’ goals, making sure that they know why they are there. Knowing where they are and what career path they can take in your company is a huge way to have lasting job satisfaction for a person who is going to be with you to help you achieve success.