You made it through another week. What were your celebrations and your struggles related to your workforce? In my role as a business consultant and the interim Executive Director of a local Chamber of Commerce, every day I connect with leaders in the community. They all have very similar experiences related to their workforce and this week I heard a lot of struggles around building the team. When to hire? How to be competitive with benefits? When to let someone go? When will I get back to working on the core activities of my position? Here are a few thoughts from my experience building teams that I hope will give you hope if you also are facing workforce struggles.

EVALUATE THE JOB DESCRIPTIONS
Who do you need to do the work of your business? Start to list all the skills and experience that is needed for the various roles that will make your business operate. How do you package these skills into a job description(s) that you could use to recruit top talent? Don't forget to include a job description for yourself. I work a lot with small business owners and I encourage them to develop FAQs that could be used for a receptionist or even on a website that help customers know what to expect, what information is needed on an order and what products are sold there. I also encourage everyone to use calendar scheduling software (such as Calendly and WeSparkle) to reduce the back and forth of scheduling meetings or appointments. Lastly, voluntary health benefits are a great opportunity to support your hiring top talent with no direct cost to your business.

WHERE ARE THE EMPLOYEES?
Business leaders need to be creative. The traditional job board posting may not be how you fill roles you have. Outsourcing accounting, human resources, marketing and administration is a great opportunity to develop your back-office functions without the overhead of many employees. Part-time can be something people are interested in and could develop into full-time. Don't forget about temp agencies. There was a season where I was trying to hire a research accountant. We were realizing we were going to have hire a successful accountant and train them for a research accountant role because there weren't experienced research accountants in the applicant pools. We made an investment into an accounting recruitment agency and were successful to get four employees who brought great value to our team in a short period of time. Three of them have been promoted from where they started and are still at the institution we hired them into. This was 6 years ago. Recruitment agencies can provide value to your hiring barriers.

LETTING EMPLOYEES GO
Having to let employees go is the top reason that business leaders don't hire. So what do you do? I have experience with this both in my own retail shop and also as a manager of a large higher education department. I'm very passionate that if you have an employee who with coaching continues to bring a negative energy to the team, they must go. Be clear of expectations. Keep facts, not emotions of their behavior and the impact it has on the team. Get human resource guidance to ensure the departure is compliant to employment laws. If you don't have the work to pay for an employee and need to let them go, help your employees find another position with referrals and/or help them get to their next promotion. I do encourage you to know when you need to hire for your own mental health. You will get through whatever happens after the hire.
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Thank you for reading. Was this helpful? What ways have developed a workforce? Have a great weekend!

For the past few years we have been active in the community learning about the barriers that small business owners face in running their business.

​What we continued to see in all industries is the burden on small business owners to either do all their own back-office tasks and/or navigate multiple outsource entities in order to put together their back-office business solutions.

We are excited to launch My Back-Office Agency campaign providing four back-office functions that Faith, Owner, Goenner Consulting, LLC has over 20+ years of leading both in the public sector and her own entrepreneur journey.

We are now offering back-office business solutions of human resources, accounting, marketing and administration. ​​Outsourcing back-office functions allows business owners to streamline their operations, reduce overhead, and focus on core activities to increase revenue.

With a monthly membership, we will be providing small businesses with business solutions that are developed uniquely for each business' needs. 

Gold - Get all four back-office business solutions.
Silver - Get two (2) back-office business solutions.
​Bronze - Get one (1) back-office business solution.​

​Happy Friday! I'm writing today to the business owners and managers who are exhausted by their lack of employees; the ones they have aren't the best; their high-performers are most likely looking for a new job. The reality of having a dream team may be far from your thoughts, but today's reflections are a few encouragements that you can have a DREAM TEAM REALITY.

START WITH YOU
The leadership of your business starts with you. Your ability to find healthy ways to keep going will benefit everyone. You notice this doesn't doesn't say time for yourself, you don't have this. Look around your business right now, what makes you happy? Is there a genre of music you could play in your office? Is there a non-alcoholic beverage that you could have stocked for yourself? Can you listen to a motivating podcast during your day? Can you go for a walk at the top of the hour? Focus on yourself so that you are refreshed to lead everyday. As I write this, I am seeing a super busy business owner of a very successful coffee shop. Being busy is a good thing, right? Well, she definitely was short-staffed as she was preparing a catering order and helping the customers at the counter, but the space was so beautiful with great music and I noticed she was drinking a favorite non-alcoholic beverage that wasn't sold at her business. (Emphasis on non-alcoholic because I know most people do think about their favorite alcoholic beverage during stressful times.)

YOU AREN'T ALONE
As I went full-time consulting a few months ago, I had no idea the stories I would hear from small business and nonprofit leaders and be able to emphasize for how hard it is to lead your own business. Many employees and customers don't realize the pressure when the weight of the business is on you. You may feel alone in your organization, but you aren't alone. I know there is a community of other business leaders in your area. I hope there is a supportive Chamber of Commerce and opportunities to take a break with other business leaders. Take time each week to find a group of business leaders that you can connect with or better yet, start your own. It takes a village, even for your business.

Please call 988 if you or someone you know is in crisis or suicidal.

EMPLOYEE ENGAGEMENT
This week I went to a education event around fraud in businesses and it was so disheartening to hear about how much is stolen from employees. Recently I heard a story of having to fire a very good employee because they were caught on camera stealing. Stealing something that had they asked they needed it, the employer would have most likely given it to them. So what does this have to do with employee engagement? If you don't know what your employees may be going through in their personal lives, you might want to find out. I don't mean going on the shop floor and asking them "Is everything ok at home?", but taking time to meet them and learn more about them on a consistent basis. Is your business to big for you to do this? I recently heard about Marketplace Chaplains and they have care partners to support your employees in their personal lives so they can keep being successful at work.

What did I miss in helping business owners and leaders keep going amidst the labor shortage, higher material costs and burn-out?

I'd love to hear your story, send me a LinkedIn message or email [email protected].
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Have a restful weekend and I appreciate you!

I can't believe how much information is thrown at small businesses. All the information is intended to be helpful but it becomes too much and difficult for anyone to make decisions. From social media strategies, financial resources, investor pitch competitions and government programs it all becomes a huge opportunity that requires analysis to determine what is right for your business. In the end, how to do you know what to do?

I am a small business owner and as a small business consultant I have been following relevant entities that support small businesses. My Facebook feed is full of trainings, software and other items that claim to drive customers and crack-the-code of limitations. What good is this if you don't have a solid business launched yet? So how does someone get their a solid business launched? One step-at-a-time.

I recently joined a Facebook group of women small business owners. It was a fantastic group, but a bit too large for my comfort. What I loved about the group is women were showing their websites and/or sharing their business vision and were getting feedback. Not just "looks good" or "needs improvement", but tangible feedback with changes to make it better. I also saw many other small businesses offering to help them. This is the type of small business community that will help entrepreneurs be successful.

This may be a bit off our topic for today's topic, but I have to challenge small businesses to shop at small businesses. I recently heard a small business ordering printing from an online company instead of ordering from their local print shop. Lets shop local even when we see we can save a few bucks online.

​Back to the topic, here are the three must-have's every small business owner needs. The rest will organically fall into place as you build your business with your expertise and vision.

PROFESSIONAL EXPERTISE
You will not operate your business successfully without an accountant, an attorney and insurance companies. The landscape is changing and you must make sure that you have the professional expertise to navigate your finances, legal matters and insurance. The accountant will help you with payroll, taxes, budget, accounts payable, accounts receivable and other financial matters. Your attorney will help you with establishing your business, contracts and/or other legal matters your business encounters. You may need one or more insurance companies that will handle your business liability insurance, cyber insurance, medical insurance and other voluntary benefit insurances. Make sure you shop around and are comfortable with the professionals and/companies you will be working with. When you encounter a situation you will want someone that makes you feel safe, heard and supported.

MARKETING EXPERTISE
It is hard for me, even as a small business owner with marketing expertise, to see how much time we spend in marketing when we could be working on our business. I understand starting out the budget is limited but as you obtain traction invest in marketing expertise. Another way to talk about marketing is your brand. Being able to have a cohesive online and print messaging will build loyalty to your products and/or services. What do I do? I am still doing my own online marketing, but I use my locally owned Minuteman Press for all promo and print materials (double-sided business cards, pens, notebooks, clothing and more).

BUSINESS PEER COMMUNITY
In a previous article I talked about the importance of community. This community can be a chamber, a mastermind group, a local entrepreneur group or one that you put together for your own needs. What this community will do is allow you to talk and have others understand what you are saying. Most people who are employees don't ever understand what the decisions and/or challenges their employer faces. You will also bring your expertise to be able to support other small businesses. You are not lonely at the top.
Thanks for reading, I hope you got something out of this and I would love to hear your thoughts. Have a great weekend.

 Have you ever had a job where there wasn't any training? I have. Once I had a job and didn't get told where the bathroom was. It felt weird to ask, "Where is the restroom?". It was at that time that I told myself I would NEVER have anyone on-board without some basics for them to have the best first day ever. Here are three reasons why training matters in your small business or nonprofit.

ON-BOARDING CONSISTENCY
On-boarding should be a formal process to convey the values and culture of the organization. Each employee should be provided the same information so that they all have the same grounding as they enter the organization. Employees are deciding if this will be a good fit from the beginning. Many employees may have left a organization and/or job they loved, but you offered them a promotion or opportunity they were seeking. Make sure you are able to meet them where they are at and start to build community so they want to stay. Through the consistent on-boarding practice employees will have a sense of stability and safety to learn their own role in the organization.

COMPLIANCE IS IMPORTANT
Yep, employees can bad talk all the orientation required to start a new position, but your organization is on the line that your employees know what is expected and are compliant. Compliance is HIPAA, OSHA and many more government mandated compliance. The new compliance that your employees need to know about cybersecurity and their role in reducing it at your organization. Make sure your have annual training that refreshes your employees of all expectations you have around sexual harassment, discrimination and other items that may be grounds for termination if found the employees aren't compliant.

EMPLOYEES CAN DO THEIR BEST 
Individuals learn differently, written, hands-on or oral. Make sure your training offers different modalities so that your employees will have an opportunity to use their learning strengths. In the tight workforce right now, I know the burden that training can put on managers. Managers should think through how to scale up the training to get employees going but also have balance with their responsibilities and getting the new employee up and going. If your processes aren't written down, this is your first step. Have employees write what they do so you will always have a position "handbook". Make sure you know where this is saved and/or periodically get a copy of it. Back to my on-boarding where there was no training, I survived and I learned to do my job networking with resources and making mistakes. I know that this wasn't efficient and I also know that not everyone would have worked through it. Commit to train your employees with the basics and then support them to success.

The question "What projects are at the bottom of my TO DO list?" is a question that I asked myself many times both leading a growing department in a research (R1) higher education institution and also as a small business owner and they remained the same month after month. What were the reasons these projects couldn't get completed? 

We want to ask you the same question "What projects are at the bottom of your TO DO list?".

If you are like most people who we have asked this question to, they pause (they know what the projects are but they are shy to say them) and so we probe them with the following three questions and then the flood gates open of projects.

1. What project(s) do you know you need to do but don't have the capacity to do them and also keep the day-to-day business going?
2. What project(s) requires expertise you don't have and either you don't have time and/or an interest to learn?
3. What project(s) requires research that you don't have staff and/or the capacity yourself to gather so you can analyze and make decisions?

We have discovered the secret sauce to get the bottom-of-the-list projects completed is to have someone focus 100% on the project and move it to completion. Remember some of the bottom of the TO DO list projects are catalysts for customer growth and/or being able to scale the business. Can you afford not to work on them?

We have the skills and expertise* to evaluate your project and prepare a work scope and tasks to have your project "get legs" and move off your TO DO list. We look forward to learning about your organization and how we can help you.

We have put together three monthly project scope levels to help us scope out your needs and help you get your projects completed within your budget.

1. Virtual Monthly Business Support - Small Project Scope = $300 1 hour 1:1 consultant time + up to 5 hours of project work.
2. Virtual Monthly Business Support - Medium Project Scope = $600 2 hours 1:1 consultant time + up to 10 hours of project work.
3. Virtual Monthly Business Support - Large Project Scope = $900 3 hours 1:1 consultant time + up to 15 hours of project work.

Contact us today to let us know how we can help you at [email protected] or 612-819-7441.

*We have skills and expertise in project management, human resources, financial operations, grants management, strategic planning, developing training materials, change management, technology implementations, communications, marketing and content development. Resume and references available upon request.