The Fierce Business Babe Podcast Ep 210: Who to Hire Next in Your Business

Today, I am diving into everything you need to know about hiring your next team member. Whether you’re hiring your very first team member or your latest addition to the team, I am here to share all of the information you need. I’m also going to share my favorite way to determine what to delegate to your newest team member.

Who to Hire Next in Your Business

By: Melissa Lin

Welcome back to another episode of The Fierce Business Babe Podcast. Today we're going to be diving into your business and who to hire next. I’m so excited because we’re going to get into some really juicy stuff. This episode will definitely support you whether you're hiring your very first team member or if you have many team members. If you're trying to figure out who to hire next, we will be going through all of that today. I have over 12 amazing team members in my business, so I definitely have experience with hiring and making the decision of who is next and if it’s the right time. We're going to get into how to decide who to hire next to your business, where to find your next team member, my favorite exercise to determine what to delegate to your next team member that you hire, tips and tricks, and so much more!

Deciding Who to Hire

Let's start with how to decide who to hire next in your business. Typically your very first hire will be somebody who can support a few roles. If you are a one woman team, amazing, let’s get you some support. The more support you get in your business, whether it's more team members, more automation, more backend systems, the more people that you can serve. If it’s your very first team member, it’s most likely going to be someone that can fit multiple roles because you are wearing so many different hats right now. You are the coach or service provider in your business, you're the CEO, the content creator, the marketer, you are everything. There are so many different hats that you are wearing right now as a one-person show in your business, and you get to use some help and support. I typically recommend starting to make that first hire in your business when you're at the $3,000 per month mark in your business. At this point you're bringing in enough to start to reinvest back into your business. Of course this depends on what you need to live, but once you're bringing in $3,000 on top of that it’s a good time to start to reinvest into your business with some team members. I believe I have another episode talking about hiring your very first team member, so I won't get into too much detail on that.

I really want to get into how to make the decision on who to hire next after I have a few team members. If you think about it, hiring team members is going to give you time and energy back. If you're thinking about your next team member, take a look at your organizational chart that you have. You're probably at the top, maybe your OBM is right below you, and then you've got a few other team members below that. So see who you have and ask yourself, what areas do I really need support with in my business? In my business we have quite a few different areas that we have team members supporting different roles. We have a marketing area, an executive area, a sales area, a support area, and then a few other key pillar areas in our business where we bring in experts in those fields to support us.

What areas do you feel that you need more support? Who are some of those key hires? Maybe you have two or three in mind and you’re not sure which is going to be the right one to hire next in your business. I have a question or two for you to think about in order to make that decision. What role needs to be filled next? For example, maybe you are wanting to get into more paid advertisements, so you want some support with Facebook ad management. Maybe you are starting to expand and want some more customer support. Maybe you just need another VA. Maybe you need to start to hire support coaches to support inside of your core programs as well. Maybe you need a copywriter. Really ask yourself, what roles need to be filled next? You can even brainstorm the next two or three roles that you need, in no particular order. Then ask yourself, out of these roles, which of these would help my business grow faster and which of these is going to help give me more time back. I would say whichever is more important to you right now, ask that question first and say that has higher priority over the second question.

Again, would someone in this role help my business grow faster? Who would give me the most time back? The more time you get back the better. If you are burnt out and need more time back, you may want to find someone who's going to give you more time back first. You may need to slow down a little bit and make that key hire before you can speed up. If you have no time, then we definitely need to slow down and hire somebody to support you and give you a little bit more time. They can take some of those tasks from you so that you can speed up. You don’t want to hire a certain role to help your business grow faster if you have absolutely no time right now. If you hire an ads manager or a sales team to help bring in more customers and make more sales when you already have no time, you're not going to be able to support all of those clients and sales coming in. I think sometimes you do need to slow down before you can really speed up in your business. Make sure that you're filling some of those roles that you really need support with in your business. You are here to grow your business and support more people, not drown yourself in work. If this is your very first team member, it may be a virtual assistant, somebody who can support you with multiple tasks, and not necessarily an expert in one field. It’s all about who is going to support you the most.

My very first hire was in 2018, and to be honest, I should have hired much sooner. However, I was stuck in my own ways thinking I could do it faster and better, so why would I hire anybody else? Can you relate to that? I was so proud of being a one woman show until I hit one of the biggest burnout moments of my business. My very first team member was a virtual assistant, actually my first two team members were virtual assistants. Then we had a few consultants that I hired more-so project based. Then I started to expand into social media support because value is so important to me and I wanted to get more content out. Then eventually we expanded into more management roles, support coaches, my online business manager, copywriters, and so on. I started with what was going to get me the most time back because burnout is not fun. There is a lot to keep in mind, but start with that list of the next two to three members and then start to narrow it down and really prioritize.

Where to Find Team Members

Now that you have an idea of what role you want to fill, you've got to go find this team member. Where do you find them? I get this question from a lot of my clients when they first start hiring, and we support our clients through hiring their first few team members. There are tons of resources out there for hiring, and I want to share a few of those with you today. I know how overwhelming and scary it can be, which is why I love supporting my clients through it. I know for me it was very difficult to let go of some of that control and let somebody else do things in my business. My business is my baby. I'm sure you can relate. You put so much energy into your business. I know how scary it can be to let some of the reins go and let somebody else come in and support. I promise you that it's all going to work out so well for you. You have got to trust yourself in the decisions that you're making and those that you're hiring. Lean into anybody that you have in your circle. If you have a mentor that you're working with or you're in a group coaching program, definitely utilize that.

That's one of the first places I recommend looking for your next team member. If you already know what role you want to fill, check your network. Any programs you’re in, your current mentor, any business besties; check your network because I guarantee they're going to know someone who has worked with somebody that they really recommend or that somebody else recommends. You can at least go and check them out. Just because somebody recommends somebody doesn't mean it's always going to be a great fit or that you need to go and hire them, it’s just giving you some options. Go take a look, start to reach out to folks. We have an entire application process that we go through whenever we hire. Make sure it's definitely someone that you align with because there is the right team member out there for you.

There's also a lot of sites that will support you with more project-based things. There is Upwork, Fiverr, if you're looking for any kind of design support 99designs is super helpful, those are all great resources to get started if you're wanting to hire somebody for a project. I would also say that Facebook groups are a great place to look for new team members. Whether it's a big entrepreneurship or women's entrepreneur business group, there are so many people in there that will have someone they recommend for you. Check to see if there are any Facebook groups for that particular role you’re looking to hire. For example, if you're looking to hire a virtual assistant, there are so many virtual assistant Facebook groups. You can go in and post a job posting for the support that you're looking for in your business, the tasks that you're looking for, that sort of thing. You can put together your job description and some type of application form so people can apply for the role that you are looking at to fill.

You can also search on Instagram. I have actually filled a few spots by lurking around Instagram. Let’s say you're looking to hire a Facebook ads manager or a copywriter. You can go search on Instagram. If they have the word copywriter inside of their bio or their headline, that's going to pop up so you'll be able to find them. Then you can start to poke around and see if you like their vibe. If you feel they could be a good fit for your team, reach out to them. See what their application process looks like, if they have any availability, that sort of thing. So utilize Instagram, social media is so great. It’s the same with LinkedIn. It’s a great place to look for folks for that next team member in your business.

There are so many agencies out there and matchmaking services with certain team members that you're looking for. Definitely do some Googling, find some. Again, reach out to your network. They may know some agencies. I have a few that I recommend to my clients. Have fun with it. I’m excited for you to start to look for your next team member if you’re planning to hire soon. It's going to give you so much space in your business to be able to do more of the things that you love doing in your business.

Delegating to Team Members

Let's get into my favorite exercise to determine what to delegate to the next team member. Let's say that you decide you need a copywriter next and you find that copywriter. What do you delegate to them? I want to share an exercise that I share with my clients to determine what tasks to start to delegate. Grab a piece of paper, something to take notes on, and write down the tasks you do for your business that pertain to the role you are wanting to fill. For example, if you are hiring a copywriter the tasks may include writing email copy for your weekly newsletter. Maybe you also have a podcast email that goes out, any captions that you create, maybe you create things for your blog. What type of copy tasks do you have? You can do the very same thing with any other role that you're wanting to fill in your business. What are some of those tasks and what would that key team member do in your business? What would their role be?

Take a few minutes to list out all of the tasks that you do right now. Let's say that you are looking to hire a virtual assistant next. Again, list out all of the business tasks that you do. Whether it's writing and sending emails, DMing potential clients, tracking your leads, website troubleshooting, write it all down. Once you've done that, I want you to create quadrants on your paper. In the top left corner I want you to label it number one. These are going to be all the tasks that you love and you're great at, and again it's for that specific role that you're wanting to fill. In the right top box, label it number two and write down all of the tasks that you like and are good at. In the bottom left corner, label it number three and write all of the tasks that you dislike and you’re good at. Then the last quadrant is going to be tasks that you dislike and are not good at.

If you are filling a specific role, again we’re using copywriter as an example, there may be something that you just love doing. Maybe you just love writing your captions or love writing the quotes you add into your reels. You can definitely hold on to that role if it's something you absolutely love doing and it brings you joy in your business. You want to have some of those things that bring you joy because in the long run, you get to have fun. You get to enjoy the process. You're not going to love everything, there's going to be some things in that copywriter role that you don't love. Maybe it's all of the sales page copy and the email copy. You can start to delegate those things out. Start to fill and put some of these items in those different quadrants. Anything that's in the bottom two quadrants, the things that you dislike, I would start to delegate those right away to that next team member when you start to hire them.

If you're hiring your first team member, maybe it's a virtual assistant, do this same exercise. Anything that you dislike, regardless if you're good at it or not, those are the things I would start to delicate first. For example, I absolutely love to make my own Instagram stories in Canva. I have so much fun with it. I'm not the best artist, but this is me getting creative. I absolutely love doing it. So even though I do have a graphic designer, I will still do a lot of my Instagram stories because I have fun with it and I want to hold on to those things I have fun with. Again, at the end of the day, there are going to be a lot of things that you don't love. You do not need to love everything in your business. Start to map out some of those things so that you can start to delegate to that next team member. Today we have touched on how to decide who to hire next in your business, where to find your next team member, my favorite exercise to determine what to delegate to your next team member, and so much more. We are already getting excited and ready for next week's episode and I cannot wait to share it with you. We will see you next week and another brand new episode of the Fierce Business Babe Podcast bright and early next Monday morning.

Topics we cover include:

Getting time back
Filling key roles
Growing your business

And so much more!

Times to check out:

(08:09) Who you should hire next

(17:15) How I built my team

(18:49) Finding your next team member

(24:16) Deciding what to delegate

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