- Create org chart detailing all positions necessary to operate your business (even if you are going to handle multiple positions)
- Write informal job descriptions for each position
Create a Company Organization Chart
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I remember once seeing a company organization chart where the same person (the only employee) was pictured in every slot. He was the CEO, COO, CFO, and on and on. While his org chart was designed to be humorous, there is something helpful about identifying the many positions that will be needed to run your company.
By having this org chart, you can easily see where you need to spend time and on what activities. As you grow, your early hires will likely fill more than one position. For example, you might hire a person to manage the daily operations and they may also take care of the finances.
Having an org chart helps remind you to focus on all the many important aspects of your business. A manager of Quality Assurance (QA) is an easy position to overlook when you are more worried about getting new sales and making sure you deliver in a timely basis. However, if you fail to delivery high quality consistently, you will loose customers.
Once you have your org chart, you can start the process of writing informal job descriptions for each role. This will also help you think about the work that needs to get done as well as the type of individual who might be fill the role down the road. As you hire people to fill roles, you will need to write more formal job descriptions so that people will know what is expected and how they will be measured.
To get an idea of all the roles you will need, you can picture a typical order coming into your business and think about all of the people who will need to handle it and the work they will do. Then think about all of the sales and marketing functions as well as the other back-end functions that will support these front line people. Include technology roles (up keep of computer systems), finance and accounting, quality assurance, customer service, production, and delivery related roles.
Initially you may fulfill many (if not all) of these roles. As time goes on, you may outsource on an as-needed basis for certain work. You could hire a temp for a project, work with a sub-contractor who is an independent contractor or another business. Using these as-needed resources allows you to keep your fixed costs low and quickly scale your operation as you grow. You will also learn a lot about working with different types of people and what works well for you. Over time you may even hire one of these resources to work full time for you.
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