When Is It Time to Hire an Employee?

It’s very easy to become overwhelmed when running your own business without even realizing. You’re so used to adding each new task onto your to-do list that before you know it, that to-do list has totally taken over. 

But just because you’re used to doing everything yourself, doesn’t mean that you should continue to do so. After a while, as your business grows, you reach the stage when adding an employee makes much more sense than keeping all your current tasks on your to-do list.  

Not only will a new employee help to take things off your plate and allow you to breathe a little, they will also allow you to get to a point where your business can serve more clients without you needing to work longer hours yourself. After all, isn’t that what all business owners want to be able to do? 

To help you to decide when it’s the right time to hire a new employee – whether it’s your first new team member or adding to an existing team – here are four signs to look out for.

When is it time to hire an employee?

Saying no to ideal clients or projects

The first sign to watch out for is that you’re turning down contracts with the kind of customers or clients that you would love to work with – who are totally aligned with what you want to do as a business – purely because you don’t have the time to serve them. 

This doesn’t mean that you’re saying no to clients or projects that don’t lift you up. Being selective about what you say yes to is important. But if you’re turning down dream clients, you should definitely sit up and take notice.  

By hiring a team member at this point, your business can then take on these additional projects or additional clients because they can help you to serve these new clients. Or they can help you do the back-end tasks so you can serve more clients.

You’re losing customers

Losing customers is the second sign that it might be time to hire an employee, because this could mean that your quality of service is slipping as a result of you being stretched too thinly. 

People want great customer service and if you’re not able to give it to them, they’re going to take their business somewhere else. Even if your service hasn’t slipped, it might be your communication that’s suffering – you’re doing the work, but your clients aren’t getting the communication they expect. 

Losing customers also means losing customers before they sign with you. If someone doesn’t get a response to their inquiry quickly enough, by the time you respond to them, they might have taken their business elsewhere.  

So, if you’re losing customers, you need someone to help you reduce the time that it’s taking to respond to people and to increase your customer service levels. This could be hiring someone to free up your time so you can do that work or it can be hiring someone to help with those inquiries.

You can’t expand

Another sign to look out for is holding back from starting new projects that you’d like to do but can’t because you have such limited time.  

For example, I recently spoke with someone who wanted to start a podcast, but they knew they couldn’t start it in the time that they wanted because they couldn’t do everything themselves. So, they decided to hire someone to allow them to get that podcast to market more quickly.

Another way to think of this is to consider running your business from a brick and mortar location: you personally can’t work in two locations at once. 

If you don’t have time to do everything and if you can’t expand your business in the way you want, it could be time to hire a team member. Start looking for someone who can either take the lead to get those tasks done or someone who is going to take work off your plate so you can do them yourself.

You lack skill or knowledge

So far, we’ve focused on a lack of time as the driving force behind the need to hire an employee, but skill and knowledge is also a reason to take this next step.  

Remember that your time is valuable. If you’re spending time learning or struggling to do certain tasks, that’s taking time away from the tasks you could be doing to bring in revenue. You need to make sure that you’re getting the most out of your time, and sometimes that means delegating to a new team member who is an expert in that particular area rather than learning something new. 

So, sign #4 that it’s time to hire is that you lack a skill set or a knowledge base that’s needed to run your business. You’re never going to know everything, and you can’t grow your business as a Jack of all trades. Instead, you should focus on your own area of expertise and surround yourself with people whose expertise complements yours.

Is it time for a new team member in your business?

Are you ready to hire a new team member for your business, and want to ensure you hire the person who can succeed in the role, make you happy, and positively impact your bottom line?

Growing Your Team can take the work off your plate by helping you determine what skill sets and qualities need to be dug into during an interview. We also provide you with a bespoke hiring strategy which includes a custom-made interview guide that focuses on your hiring needs.

So let’s set up a time to chat! Click here to book your free jump-start consultation