When you want to remain a successful organisation, then you need crucial skills to support your growth. However, sometimes people can leave, the market can change faster than expected, an opportunity can pop up, and so you are lacking skills to keep on growing.
Fortunately there are 4 ways in which you can gain those needed skills.
A lack of skills
Let’s say you started a business offering various IT-services. You have had a decade of experience already and know all the ins and outs of the current trends. You’re highly talented and have had many happy customers. However, you have no idea how to market your business, and being a small company, you don’t have the funds to hire a social media manager, so you ask your niece to create an Instagram page for you since she is more involved with that.
Your niece may be able to post good pictures, but she does not know any IT-service you offer. Therefore, there is no substance to your online presence, and you will not attract new customers.
Situations like these and similar ones can occur in both smaller and bigger companies but can be solved easily with the right mindset.
Hiring a professional
Hiring professionals costs money, which is especially a significant expense when you’re just starting. Look at it from another perspective. If you hire a professional to market your business on social media, you are investing in something more significant. Over time, this professional will grow your audience from a meager ten followers to thousands of them, of which at least a few hundred will actually use your service. And once you have a happy customer, they are more likely to return and to tell others about you.
Training your team
To make sure you and your employees are kept up to date with the latest skills and knowledge, you could consider schooling one or multiple people with the help of a professional trainer. Skilled employees make fewer mistakes, work faster and are therefore able to take on more of the same task, increasing your revenue. Just like with the professional, this costs money. However, this money will be earned back quickly. Also, if you set-up a training day for multiple employees at the same time, it will often be cheaper than having one employee trained at a time.
A cheaper way to train you and your team is to use online courses. The downside to this is that not all courses are as reliable as others and may require more time and effort to grasp fully and the key is here to find the right supplier in your niche and with the right type of trainings.
Coaching your team
When you do have the skill set necessary for your business, you should coach your team to help them expand their skills. Think back to the example of your niece. If you explained to her what your job is and what you want to share with the world, she could incorporate that in the content she posts. As a bonus, she could also teach you to manage your own social media page.
Start by asking your staff the following questions to know where their struggle points lie. It will also help to increase morale.
- Are there any obstacles you are facing, and how can I help?
- Is there one action you can take to improve your performance? What’s needed to take that action?
- Is there anything you would like to learn to help your development in the workplace?
Photo by sydney Rae on Unsplash
These questions not only increase morale but also open up the potential to work together more closely. By working in teams, stronger links within your employees will be able to guide the lesser skilled ones and help transferring skills to them.
Other types of development
Another essential thing to consider is that there may be an underlying reason why your company isn’t growing as fast as it should. Perhaps your staff does have the skills but is facing more personal problems. These problems can be connected to the workplace or their home situation.
In either way, it’s wise to ask your employees about how they are feeling and if there is anything you can help with.
Often it is the environment that is not the right one to implement those skills, and you will need to build a culture that learns and nurtures skills. And that will be food for another post! 😉
Conclusion
So, whether you choose to increase skills by hiring a professional, hosting a class, coaching, or by trying to find underlying causes, it’s essential to understand that growth doesn’t happen within a day.
However, by continuing to improve, your business will receive a boost that will help to create a steady growth pattern in the future.
