Building The Plane In The Air - The Long Game - Ep. #88

A month in, with two new hires thriving. The only regret: not doing it a year ago.

In this episode of The Long Game Podcast, Ryan shares what he learned in the 30 days since bringing on two new hires, an operations coordinator and a marketing manager, and why the only regret he has is not doing it sooner.

Ryan walks through the 40 to 50 hours of preparation work he put in before his new team members ever showed up: mapping his existing systems, building a central operating manual, and documenting how he makes decisions so that two people could walk in and hit the ground running. He's transparent about what worked, what didn't, and why most of the systems he built were meant to be reshaped on the fly. The real value wasn't in getting it perfect. It was in having a foundation.

What You'll Learn:

• Why most entrepreneurs' hiring problem is actually a systems problem in disguise
• How to document your own processes before you can effectively hand them off to someone else
• Why imperfect action still requires a baseline level of organization to succeed
• What "intangibles" actually look like when you're hiring for a small, growing team
• Why technical skill and cultural fit are not the same thing, and which one matters more
• How to create enough autonomy that a new hire can contribute from day one without constant hand-holding
• Why Ryan went from a team of three to a team of five in two weeks, and what that decision taught him

If you're running your own business and feeling the pull to hire but keep stalling, this episode gives you a practical, honest look at what it actually takes to bring someone on and make it work.

Interested in connecting?

HOST
Ryan Richards | Branch Manager, Northpoint Mortgage | NMLS 1987735
rrichards@trynorthpoint.com | www.financewithteamrichards.com 
204 Turnpike Rd, Westborough, MA 01581
Licensed in MA, CT, FL, NC, NH, PA, RI, ME, TN

Follow us on Instagram @financewithteamrichards @the.longgamepodcast

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Chapters:
00:00 Hiring Hesitation
00:21 Two New Hires Update
00:55 Regret And Readiness
01:37 Scaling Fast To Five
02:01 Documenting Your Work
03:08 Build A Company OS
03:55 Plans Will Change
04:23 Hire For Intangibles
05:56 Know Your Strengths
06:22 Blueprint For Autonomy
06:53 One Month In Results
07:04 What's Next Growth Plan

Transcript

0:00

If you're running your own business, then you've definitely come to the point at which you need to hire someone. But a lot of times people get stuck in that phase of, "I need to hire someone," but they don't know what to do about it. And most people actually just let that continue on forever. They never actually end up getting that extra person. They never take the step or the initiative to make a change. Well, I'm here to share my story as to why you absolutely need to do that. A few episodes ago, I talked about my evolution with my two new hires. I was looking to hire an operations coordinator and someone to take over my marketing. Since then, I've hired them both on the job for about a month, and I wanna share some of the stories and insights that I've learned throughout the process, so stay tuned. So we're about 30 days into hiring my two new employees, and I can tell you the only regret I have is that I didn't do it sooner. It was a long process for me to get to this point. For those of you who've been listening to the podcast, you know I'm definitely someone who's proactive. I like to plan. So it took me about six to 12 months to get to this point where I feel like I had the baseline system in place to be able to implement them effectively. Now, as much as I'm about to talk about how important it is to just take action, imperfect action beats perfection every time. But the… I do believe that there is a baseline level of organization and systems you have to preemptively get in place before you take this step. Certainly don't have to, but I, I found that I was so grateful for the work that I did put in ahead of these hires, which I'm about to share all about. I actually ended up going from a team of three to a team of five in two weeks. So I had two people starting within a week of each other, which some of you might be like, "That's crazy." And ultimately it was, but I felt like maybe my logic's off, but I felt like if I was going to do one, what's the difference between doing two? I've always had that belief, right? Like if you're gonna run a mile, what's two miles? Like you already did one. So I was f- I felt like that for me was going to be something that was really beneficial. And leading up to this point, here's some of the work that I put in place to make sure that this went successful So I probably spent about 40 or 50 hours of work going through, one, what do I have now? So I found in hindsight, in order to bring someone on effectively, you have to understand, like deeply what it is you do every day. And like, not just what you want them to do, like that's easy, right? Anyone can be like, "Oh, I need someone to like do these tasks." Like, that's an easy thing to do. What's a hard thing to do is help them understand how you operate. Like, what are you doing now? What systems do you have? And if you're a solopreneur, I kind of was, right? It's all in your head. So you have to tell them how your brain operates. Like, what are you thinking about? How do you make decisions? What is your goal? What tasks would you like them to do, but how do you want them to do them that's in line with your vision? So it took me, like I said, probably 40 or 50 hours, if not more, to go through all of my systems for everything that I was going to ask them to take over. One, for me to understand how to relay this to them, so they came in with a set expectation and a foundation to actually hit the ground running. And then the other part is if you're someone who doesn't have a central operating system, which I wasn't, where is everything gonna be stored? Like, if you just give them a computer and say, "All right. Let's start doing things," th- there's no way that they're actually going to be able to be effective. So creating that central operating system and creating that rubric, like, "Here's our operating manual as a company." Like, you have to start thinking in that direction because it gives, one, you more clarity, but the person that's coming in, they know the vision. Like, "Here's what we're trying to accomplish on a macro level. Here's what we're trying to accomplish next year, in the next six months, 90 days, 30 days, next week, and even the first day." So I built out all of those systems and all of those documents over the fir- probably a course of like three to six months so that when they came in, they had this rubric to hit the ground running. And it was a lot of work, but I can tell you it paid off 100%. What I will say, though, and I don't wanna… I say this in the best possible way. It wasn't exactly how I thought, which is that most of the things I planned weren't the best answers or the best direction, but I knew that going in. Like, I knew all of this work that I did was probably going to be molded, shaped, half of it thrown out, but that's exactly what I wanted to happen. I needed a foundation to be able to set the direction But then we start making adjustments and modifications as we go. And what I can definitely say is making sure you're finding the right people for that mold. I'm very grateful that I did this early on, but even in the hiring, the interview process, making sure that the person that you're hiring fits the mold of your company. And you have to be accepting of that, that you're not an established corporation. Like, you're not Apple. I haven't worked for Apple, but I can imagine if you do, you go into Apple, like, they tell you how to do everything. I don't know how to turn my computer on. I don't know how to use this document. There's probably an SOP in a folder in a library that shows you how to do that. I don't have that. So the person you're bringing on needs to understand, like, we're building this thing together. I have an idea. I have a vision. I'll give you direction. But are you up for the task of building the plane in the air? And some people might be very technically skilled, like they might have all the skills on paper, the resume, the GPA, the proficiencies and softwares that you need. But if you… they don't have that intangible, I don't think it'll work. I had this hire early on I talked about before. It was actually two hires that didn't work out, but I tried to hire too much on technicality. They could navigate the system well. They knew the guidelines. They knew the job. They knew their role. They were skilled, but they didn't have the intangibles of, like, fitting in the team culture, being a part of what we're building. Like, they weren't really motivated in that way. And I'm lucky that the people I just brought on are, and we've aligned really well on that, and I think it's empowered me to allow them to take more, not off of my plate, I don't love that analogy, but help them thrive at what they're good at, and me accept that I'm not the best at some of the things that they do. And that's a hard thing to realize. The last podcaster, depending on timing, a podcast with Jamie Sanborn I just did, she was talking about that. Like, as an entrepreneur, you have to look in the mirror and be like, "What am I really good at, and what am I not good at?" And then accepting that someone else is going to be better than you at that. I'm actually… for me, it really wasn't incredibly difficult, to be honest, because I'm totally cool with accepting that I'm not good at certain things, and I just need to find someone who is and have them help me with the task. So if I can give any piece of advice on that, it's definitely take the time to learn yourself and learn your systems and lay out a blueprint before you jump into a hire like this, especially if you're super busy. If you're at a point where, like, you have some capacity, sure, you might be able to sit with them and train them for four hours a day for a week. But I knew going into this I wasn't going to have that amount of time. I would love to. Would love to have a four-hour training every day, but I just don't have the time right now. So I needed to create some semblance of autonomy that they'd be able to come in and start doing work on their own. And since then, we're a month in, it's been great. I can't imagine not having them. I wish I did it 12 months sooner. But although I'm paid, guess I wouldn't have met these two people, so I guess it works out for the right reasons. So hopefully this advice helps you. As always, I'll be talking about more topics like this in the future, and stay tuned. This is going to be an evolution. I've … My goal this year was to hire two people in the first quarter, and I do wanna hire at least two more by the end of the year. So stay tuned as we learn, evolve, and grow, and hopefully you take something from the show.