This topic really hits home with me. In case you don’t know my background, I used to run a regular brick and mortar store with office help, technical employees and the whole shebang. Managing employees takes a very specific skill set that does not come naturally. Well at least it wasn’t natural for me. I found it exceptionally challenging.
For years I struggled with finding the right people and motivating them to do their work properly as well as efficiently. Believe me it was not easy. You learn things about people that you never realized. I was quite naïve when it came to my employees. I thought that they really cared about the business and their jobs. Later on I came to realize that everyone is really pretty selfish when it comes to work. They want more money for less work and deep down they honestly don’t give a damn about you and your business. Keep that in mind.
You might think that when you hire your first employee, you will become good friends almost to the point where they are extended family. I have seen this happen, but man is it rare. It is really rare. I thought it would happen for me. I tried to make that happen with my first four employees (one at a time) and I failed every time.
My outlook about employees was that I would wait to see if they were going to be top producers before I would pay them the big bucks. The employee’s viewpoint was the exact opposite. They wanted the big bucks before they would really work hard. I grew up as a farm kid. I never knew anything but hard work. Where I grew up people always worked hard crappy hours and got paid little. Once I started running a business in the city I came to realize that most of the people were actually lazy and wanted to do as little work as humanly possible. It is funny how people who grow up in urban and suburban environments have an entitlement mentality where they think that everyone including their boss owes them something. Country folk aren’t like that. They automatically assume they are going to have to earn every penny. That is a story better left told on some political website though. I won’t bore you with that here.
The real eye opener for me came when a fellow business owner and client of mine referred me to the series of books written by Dan Kennedy. If you have never read his stuff, you should. His books opened my eyes to what is really going on in an employee’s mind. I kept reading and the light bulb kept lighting in my head. I was thinking “No wonder this happened” and “No wonder that happened.” He really opened my eyes. It was after reading his books that I decided I needed to move away from the traditional business model and move back to a home office model with zero employees if at all possible. I am done with being an employer.
Funny huh? Most people dream of growing their business to the point where they can grow out of their home. I wanted to change mine and shrink it so I could go back to working from my home. Wow has that been liberating.
Having said all that, my take on employees is that they are the key to massive leverage in a business if that is your goal. They are essential if you want to build a massive business and get uber-wealthy. But, you had better be damn good at hiring the right ones. You had better pay them exceptionally well. You had better not assume they are your friends (because deep down they are not). Even the ones you think are your best friends are probably talking about you behind your back. You will always be their “boss.” Remember that. Respect that and make them respect that.
I decided that I could not stand and did not want the headaches that come with employing people. The paperwork here in the US is ridiculous both on a state level and a federal level. God forbid you ever make a mistake on any of that paperwork. You better damn well pay a bookkeeper or accountant to do that paperwork for you. If you don’t you are extremely foolish.
The truth is though that you don’t need to have employees to reach the million dollar income mark. Plenty of people have done it. They don’t necessarily do all the work themselves though. They have found ways to get people to work for them without being employees. They outsource all the necessary job related functions that they cannot or will not perform themselves. They outsource them to companies and contractors though instead of employees. That is how they get the leverage of having employees without all the crap that comes along with them.
