October last year, I noticed that a mate of mine has been losing hair. I also noticed that in the last one year lot of his hair went gray. Despite that fact that he is just 31. I thought I will find out:
He runs a web design studio and has been trying to grow his business. He has added four sales people and three technical people to his team of four. He told me that he gets worn out managing his sales team and also managing the delivery side of his business. He works long hours.
After we had a few drinks together, he looked very relaxed. I told him that maybe we should catch up again.
Next meeting, I discussed a Brand new strategy for business growth with him. I told him to do two things :
- Stop hiring more sales people
- Track the performance of his sales team. (We found that two of his sales team got 80% of the sales and remaining got 20% of the sales) and only keep the high performers
- His Sales Team was getting all the business through cold calling. I told him to reduce cold calling and start getting quality enquiries through SEO & SEM (Search Engine Marketing)
- He told me that when people don’t perform or show lack of commitment, he finds it unnerving. I told him to identify key performers, give them equity in the company and get rid of people who don’t display commitment.
I met him yesterday evening for a drink. Guess what, he was looking refreshed. He told me that he felt a lot more in control. His high performers now get a small share of the profit. One was asked to leave and replaced by a copywriter who helps with website promotion. He has got more business in Jan than in Nov & Dec put together.
Don’t lose hair for Business Growth. Keep fewer people in your company….only those who display commitment. And let Google do the remaining job. Trust me, it will give you lesser gray hair 😉
