Business Owners have a big and diverse job to undertake. Many come to their business with a core skill related to the business sector. But that is far from sufficient to be a successful business owner in today’s global, regulated, changing and competitive business environment.
It is unfortunate that many business owners become insular and stop exploring externally to challenge their perceptions and to seek new ideas. Maybe it is the daily grind of being a business owner that extinguishes the inquisitive flame of the owner.
We certainly believe that to thrive in today’s complex market you need to have a thirst for knowledge a wide variety of knowledge sources. You know that you need to work on your business not in it.
Here are our recommendations for business owners in the recruitment industry.
Most of the good questions and many of the answers you seek are not going to be found within your current knowledge base, within your current business, or even within your current network.
The Jim Rohn quote “You are the average of the five people you spend the most time with” applies here. We are not suggesting you drop your friends, you just need to keep adding to your peer network.
Today’s recruitment business is global, competitive, and under threat from the new and disruptive models.
Related: Learning & Development – a critical part of any M&A Strategy
As a business owner or business manager you have a lot of responsibilities that are beyond the core selling and delivering aspects of recruitment.
In Australia there are serious legal responsibilities for being a company director. Yet my straw polls show that less than 5% of recruitment industry company directors belong to the Australian Institute of Company Directors or have ever undertaken any education on the responsibilities of being a company director. You can go to jail for getting some of your responsibilities wrong!
The number (of non-accountants) who have undertaken any education on financial accounts for managers and directors is as poor.
Today we can curate a relevant, current, world class reading platform with little effort. There is no excuse to not follow a combination of global economic, business strategy and industry trends.
And we can have it delivered to our daily hand held device. Never before have business owners been able to do that. In addition to news update emails and products like LinkedIn there are tools such Flipboard that, once set up, make the sifting, sorting and expansion of our reading palate a pleasure.
Conferences have so many benefits to business owners and managers. Firstly they take you out of your office. You are forced to network with new people, listen to new ideas, and dream a little about how your business can change and evolve.
When planning your conference attendances, try to attend conferences that are not just attended by your current peers. You don’t want to be subject to group think; it takes away the benefit of the conference.
Travel is the best tonic for the development of broader business knowledge. Getting out of your comfort zone, experiencing different cultures and understanding different rules, regulations and business cultures is enormously important to your development as a business leader.
HHMC Global provides advisory services to the recruitment and staffing industry and is best known for its work on M&A transactions. HHMC is based in Australia and works with clients globally. To discuss your business future contact Rod Hore or Richard Hayward.