Building your Team

There is only one way you cross a mine field. Find someone with bigger feet than you who has successfully crossed it in the past and carefully follow in their footsteps. In the minefield that is small business, not enough people take the time to find a mentor. Many of those who do, often pick the wrong one. Your long term odds go way up if you can find someone with the success you are seeking to take a vested interest in your business. So why should you have a mentor, and once you find the right one, what do you do?
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I was given some very precious advice from a billionaire the final time we spoke. “Building a business is incredibly simple with the right people. Building a business with the wrong people is the hardest thing in the world.” In “Good to Great: Why Some Companies Make the Leap… and Others Don’t”, Jim Collins explains that the companies he studied spent very little time motivating their people once they had the right people on the bus. So how do we determine the right people? How do you keep them once you’ve got them? Can you develop someone into the right person?

Peter & I are firmly committed to the idea that you create long term satisfaction by providing people the opportunity to win. You provide them challenge and all the support they need for a series of consistent successes. The key here is setting your team up for success.
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The stronger our ability to communicate effectively, the happier we tend to be. Understanding how people react to situations and how to respond appropriately is a key to success in business, in marriage, in friendship, and in life.
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When should we say “we” and when should I say “I”?

Shane and I have often stumbled over the we vs. I issue. Here’s what “I” think:

“We” serves the function of exchanging credibility with the others included in “we”. If I make something and say that “we” made it, I am at once sharing credit with the team (even if I’m the only one working on it) and sharing responsibility. If something goes wrong in my creation, it is our fault, not mine alone. “We” also serves the purpose of inspiring confidence by implying there are many people involved in a given commitment. For example, “we are accepting applications for the open position.”
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