When you don’t focus on the goals what you see is obstacles.
That is based on something Henry Ford said, it is through something I believe to be absolutely true about starting up and running a recruitment business.
Let’s say you’re a recruitment consultant, with some experience and a solid track record when it comes to placing candidates and hitting the numbers. You’re at the stage when the idea of running your own show is somehow always there in your mind.
Let’s go further and say that you do it. You take the leap, find the funding and start up. Now stop and think what happens next. Suddenly, at precisely the moment you want to focus on building a client base and delivering that gold standard service you believe in so much you’ve got a thousand other things to do. And, (please take this constructively) some of them are things you’re quite possibly not very good at.
You’ve never had to wear as many as hats as this before. There’s the marketing and website to sort. You have to arrange the premises and leases. Suppliers want paying, staff want briefings and guidance, the bank wants to talk to you and HMRC would like you to get in touch. Now!
Suddenly it’s all down to you, and you are going to be out of your comfort zone. So, because you’re determined to be the boss and get your business running properly you direct your attention to all of those issues. And those issues become obstacles. They get in the way of what you want to be doing and, frankly, what you should be doing. Because if you’re not ‘doing’ recruitment your business will have a rather different problem than those you’re trying to solve. It will have a problem called failure.
At The Recruit Venture Group, we have now helped almost 50 recruitment businesses to start up and they are running successfully. One of the reasons for their success is that as joint venture partners they are able to focus on their goals, and therefore don’t have to stare at obstacles.
From the initial risk free funding – a massive help in itself – to the mentoring and support we provide they’ve had a package of guidance and back up that allows them the freedom to focus.
All of those distractions I mentioned, and many more besides, are things that we look after for them. The marketing, the premises, the tax issues are all covered. Crucially they have access to our back office systems meaning their administration is up to speed. Vitally we keep them informed of industry legislation and rulings.
None of this is at the cost of their autonomy. As a joint venture partner with us you run your own business. And that’s the point. You can get on with running your business, doing what you’re best at. Because you doing what you’re best at will result in your business growing. You running around trying to do things that – sorry – you’re not necessarily very good at anyway will result in your business floundering.
Avoid the obstacles. Because obstacles are things you only see when you’re not focused on the goals. And your goal is to be the best recruitment business on your patch.
You’ll only achieve that if you have the freedom to focus – on recruitment.