As a business owner or manager, the challenges seem endless; That’s why we love it, right? Charging after the sale, hunting for new business, and delighting and impressing our customers, these activities make business fun.
The pressure we face comes with the job. Being responsible for the income of 5, 10, 30 or 500 families can be difficult. Maintaining a successful enterprise so that you can pay a salary every week is hard work. The recent crazy inflation and high cost of transportation is another major concern.
But you know what? None of these reasons make them stay up at night. These factors can be worked out, studied, modified, placed in a spreadsheet and monitored. They can be adjusted, renegotiated and finally resolved.
They are the people who support you at night. Management, and in association leadership, requires control of a group of people. Maybe control isn’t the right word. As leaders, we work to inspire, motivate, support and challenge our teams. Some days this is fun, other days it’s frustrating.
Managing people is very challenging because people are people. They have a free choice as a sheet, receipt or tulip. You make good decisions, and you make bad decisions. These decisions directly affect our business, which leads to the hardest part of business: managing people and managing their strengths and weaknesses.
To be clear, I have been blessed to work with many individuals who are complete rock stars in sales, management, production and all other positions. But to be honest, people who are heavy on your heart always seem to have amazing skills, which are often unknown.
A serious mistake could be that your star sales rep is loose and quick to live with reality. A person struggling with alcohol can affect their performance. Health issues, children issues, mental health issues… you name it. The job of signing up is to get a win-win situation where not only do these people reach their potential, but your company benefits as well.
The key to success and sleeping well is taking the time to care for your team and take their various issues, concerns, and sometimes even beatings to heart. Yes, this requires some sleep loss, but after spending the time, sleep will return.
Success isn’t defined by numbers on a chart, success is how your relationship with your team builds and improves, overcoming challenges and pushing towards shared goals. It might even be a parting with a group member, ideally, but especially respectfully.
The best part of this success is when your team member learns to thrive and overcome their problems and stay with your company and build a base of trusted people you can rely on. Many times, after you’ve been through the fire and come out on the other side, you’ll find a team member who once cost you the sleep you once had, now helps you sleep better.
Bill Prescott is the wholesale market and wholesale manager for Sun Valley Flower Farms, based in Arcata. Bill can be reached at bill@prescottdesigns.com.
