By Stefania Aulicino
Does your company have a backup system for your computers?
What if one of your key executives was stricken unexpectedly?
What if you could backup your team –in just 90 seconds?
Ted’s 5 year old company was in the midst of introducing a new product in the medical endoscope field. Jerry, his VP of operations was his right hand.
As the visionary, Ted came up with the features and Jerry in operations translating production into a saleable process which was cost effective.
Parts were designed, vendors were being selected, the beta customer was ready
Then Jerry ended up in the hospital.
Jerry was a diabetic. A series of personal health issues turned into complications and his doctor finally sent Jerry to the hospital. It’s been 4 weeks so far.
Ted shared with me that he was not sleeping much. He had taken over as much of Jerry’s role as he could, in addition to his CEO responsibilities.
Ted was operating from assumption:
• he did not have the time divert his attention to address this issue because he was overwhelmed with the additional responsibilities.
• he did not have the money to pay for help.
• Delegation was not possible!
So I asked Ted, “Who is the most knowledgeable person in Jerry’s department?
“Well Micheal has been on Jerry’s operations team for just 8 months, but he has been a fast learner, but, I don’t think Micheal is VP material.”
“No problem”. I said.
“You don’t need to make any decisions about VP level solutions just now.”
“What you need is management leverage.”
“You need to avoid having your entire company hostage to the absence of a single key talent. Does Micheal know what’s going on with regard to the new product?”
Ted had to admit: “Sure, he is our best engineer and is taking the lead in discussion with several of the vendors. He knows how to be efficient in assembling the product.”
“Perfect! All you have to do is tell Micheal that he is now your BACK UP for Jerry!
If you have any questions about the Operations Department, Micheal is on alert that if you can’t get to Jerry, you will go to Micheal to get any info you might need.
This accomplishes 3 things:
1. lets Micheal know that you VALUE him- and just might unlock some very surprising talents
2. gives you automatic management BACK UP
3. lets you determine if Micheal will RAISE TO THE OCCASION and become VP material
OK, it’s nice to have a backup for emergencies, but turns out Ted was not the only one losing sleep!
When we looked at Ted’s team overall, each VP was underperforming:
The VP sales was only performing at 80%;
VP service was 50%;
VP finance was 35%;
VP IT was 25%.
Each of these critical players, while very enthusiastic, were unable to focus forward because they had no one to let go of day to day stuff- they had no back up.
Each of Ted’s critical players was suffering because of assumptions Ted had about scare time and resources.
I could tell Ted was still harboring some resistance, so I asked Ted, “how long will it take for you to identify the backup person in each department?”
“30 seconds” he responded.
“How long will it take to have a phone call with each of those individuals to let them know:
If I need any info about your department and cannot reach your boss, I will be looking to you to get the information I need.”
“1 minute” he said.
90 seconds- that’s fast….for a solution or a mistake! Even a mistake has a silver lining:
Make mistakes fast, give these BACK UP people an opportunity to prove-themselves as worthy…or move on to next person, if necessary.
So in 90 seconds, Ted resolved the management depth issue that was keeping him up at night, and his company hostage.
How about you?
Are you ready to give up assumptions about time and money to create a MANAGEMENT BACK UP for your fast growth company? Try this 90 day solution to leverage your team and let me know what you discover.
Stefania Aulicino, president of CapitalLinkUSA ensures business owns get cash to keep control of a bigger, more profitable company, faster, safer than they ever thought possible- in any economy. Become a magnet for non equity and equity sources to fuel your growth. Explore our tools, solutions and consulting options tailored for different growth stages and different budgets: www.CashAndControl.com
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