Pushing Towards an A-Team
A proud moment indeed.
This month marks an important milestone in my startups journey, a lot has happened in past few months. From working out of one room in our client’s office to cafes and even chai tapris. In less than a year’s time, we have grown from 2 to 30 people without chasing a single penny of investment.
The entire growth of Headsup Corporation is dedicated to the people who have joined our journey and stuck to it (astonishingly, our attrition rate is almost zero).
The entire feeling of working with such a young crowd is exciting, yet challenging. In this article, I am sharing my experience of creating such a team and challenges which have come along the way to make it happen.
Some of the takeaways from this journey were as following:-
1. Create a learning curve for every position and keep on evolving: Every position created in the organization must come up with the necessary milestones for the employees during their course of time in the organisation. The learning curve can be clubbed in three distinct phases of career progression and growth. First, the Lower End, involving a challenging and sometimes a slower growth in competence. Second, the Middle Part, where competence is being achieved and progress is much more rapid compared to the Lower End. Thirdly, the High End of the curve, where competence has evolved into mastery and can quickly devolve into boredom and disengagement. Create a team that is a high-functioning collection of individuals within the Middle Part, with a small percentage at the Lower and High Ends of the curve and thus, majority in the sweet spot at any given time.
2. Humans as resources: In majority of the SMEs and Startups, we see that managers try to hustle and fill the gaps as and when the need arises. They choose to fill the void with the person who they perceive to be most qualified for the position and try to close it. For some time, this might work great. However, if given the option of turning back the clock by 4 months, do you think you really wanted such a qualified person for the position? Chances of someone getting bored of the job is significantly higher compared to someone who wanted to learn and grow along with the work. Soon you are back at square one: overwhelmed, on the rebound, and poised to hire in haste again. That’s no great use of resources. Utilizing resources profitably begins with recognizing potential, followed by a period of exploration, discovery, and development. Hiring for potential rather than proficiency is the foundation for building an A-team.
3. Hire people who believe in the idea and can grow with the job: This can be done by identifying the tasks which you would like the new hire to perform by involving the existing team and employees. As a manager you must become the decision enabler and let the team do the decision making by itself. This makes the decision more binding and more acceptable. Next, try to become a nonchalant shopper who is out in the market to buy the product because you are motivated to buy and not because of the psychology of the marketer has overpowered your need. While shopping for a laptop, this might not matter much. However, as a hiring manager, choosing for talent might have very large consequences. Additionally, forecast the hiring requirements so that you have enough time to get the best (most fit) candidate.
4. Create an exciting job post: Job posting is an art, which is mostly taken for granted. The goal of a job posting should be to attract talented people who are qualified to onboard at the low end of the job’s learning curve. They won’t be experts, but they will have what it takes to learn and soon magnify their current position to other roles beyond it. Catching the eye of these candidates requires a change in how job requirements are typically articulated.
5. Push to 70 Percent Rule: At any given point of time, 70% of the employees must be firing on all cylinders. This 70% covers those with the knowledge of different ways they can improve while really enjoying the challenge.
We are driven by our consciousness of limited time. It is a force more potent than the need to have a job or to earn a paycheck. People want to dream, and then they want to realize their dreams by learning new things, developing new competencies and skills, and having an opportunity to leave a lasting imprint on the world. Managers can be makers, generate opportunities for their team members to create and recreate themselves through personal disruption. And that is how I would define a wonderful day’s work as it should be.