Solve problems so they never come back?
How can this even be possible? Is this a pipe dream? An over-promise?
Consider: all businesses have two broad types of “problems”…problems and, well, problems. In the heat of growing it can be easy for your people to forget that most problems and frustrations are not isolated or random. They are intertwined and symptoms of deeper problems.
Which means that for those energy-draining problems there are a few root problems.
Like weeds, if you don’t kill the roots, you will just be fighting symptoms over and over. It’s no fun playing whack-a-mole every day.
Because employees are human, people are creatures of habit, and time and dollars are always limited…growth creates predictable challenges. Every business runs into a familiar set of root problems at this size, though some firms might bog down at 25 employees while others sail smoothly until hitting 50 or even 80 employees.
The cause? Complexity increases with each new employee added. In fact, due to natural laws of human performance under pressure, complexity multiplies at an exponential pace. Eventually, this complexity will kill growth…or worse.
In the meantime, the complexity that is unique to your size and stage will affect every area of your business and every day. It will slowly rob you of cash, family time, sleep…and maybe even the joy that can only come from being freed up to do what you do best.
These predictable problems do not encompass all the problems your employees face. But what would their productivity look like if big fistfuls of energy-sapping problems could be rooted out and eliminated?
© 2019 From the Top, LLC
Emerging businesses (20-100 employees) are in the exciting transition from small to mid-size. In some situations, the specific growing pains illustrated here might be similar for smaller or larger fast companies, especially if growing fast.
