Outside of conferences where people are inundated with sales garbage, there’s not a lot of conversation happening between leaders. But that doesn’t mean there aren’t...
Stress is about as inevitable as death and taxes.
It’s also a major productivity and creativity drain, so also like death and taxes, it can seriously impact your bottom line.
And this isn’t just a personal problem, stress among your employees is equally or even more detrimental to your business than personal stress.
Here are three ways to help combat stress in the workplace.
Employee Compensation
Salaries are great because they help workers support themselves and/or their families and allow them to spend the well-earned money however they want.
But, due to that whole “supporting themselves” part, often that money isn’t spent on things like taking relaxing vacations to recharge.
This is personal preference, of course, but one way to help ensure that employees take much needed time away from the job is by including paid vacation as part of their compensation.
For an entrepreneurial company that’s just starting out, this may not seem feasible, though. So, there are a couple of other ways to help tone down the stress level on the job.
Job Accountability
In a startup or other small business, employees tend to wear a lot of hats. That by itself isn’t necessarily a bad thing, but problems can quickly crop up when you aren’t entirely sure which hat(s) each person is wearing.
It helps to make an accountability chart to map out exactly who plays what role in the company. If you articulate exactly which hats each individual is sporting, no one gets confused about who’s on first or what’s on second.
“Create an accountability chart at double the size you are now. That will guide your hiring plan.” –Bart Lorang
There’s no doubling up (unless it actually makes sense to do so) and people aren’t tripping over each other to do the same job while other projects fall through the cracks.
If you really want to get ahead of the game, create the job accountability chart imagining the company at double the size you are now.
This will help you see what roles still need to be filled. It gives you a road map for future hiring as you scale up, so that you aren’t wasting payroll by having nine people essentially fill the same position.
Partnerships
At some point in your business’s growth, you might start thinking about acquiring other companies that specialize in areas that complement your core business.
Even if you aren’t at that sort of level yet, it’s a good idea to look around for other companies to work with closely to increase the functionality of your product or service.
“There are so many companies that do one thing particularly well, and you can’t do it all alone.” –Bart Lorang
The data world in particular is complex, and you can’t do it all alone.
Instead of stressing over how to fill in the gaps or even build from scratch, partnerships can take some of the weight off, which also keeps from stretching your employees too thin.
Conclusion
Stress isn’t the sort of thing that you (or your employees) can escape in any career field, and especially not in a bootstrap environment.
But, by taking some time out to recharge, making sure everyone knows what’s expected of them, and possibly working with other companies to make your business better, you can cut down on some of the inevitable stress.
This article is based on an interview with Bart Lorang, CEO of FullContact.
Listen to the interview on The Corporate Data Show Episode 12.
