In recruitment we know that growth comes from placing more people.

But you can’t create a butterfly by making a caterpillar bigger – it needs to transform first.

Recruitment companies are the same.

Unless you transform your business at certain key points additional growth can lead to lower service levels; a drop in percentage profit and a hike in people leaving.

So, what’s that bear-trap I mentioned?

Simple: you feel guilty when you aren’t working ‘in’ your business so you don’t make the time to transform.

In other words, transformation comes from working ‘on’ your business and it’s easy to not spend enough time doing it.

Many people aren’t even sure what working on their business means. Maybe this will help: –

  • Quality: understanding how you clients and your team believe you should improve.
  • Research: exposing yourself to new ideas, tools, techniques and technologies.
  • Planning: working out how to use the things you’ve found to improve your business.
  • Team: taking the considerable time it takes to build an empowered management team.
  • Floorwalking: informal interactions with all your people

There are plenty of other ‘on’ activities but these are a great start.

With the right tools, organisation and people in place the less you work ‘in’ your business the more money you’ll make.

My advice is to avoid that bear-trap and spend more guilt-free time working ‘on’ your business because that’s how you create a scalable business.