18 July 2024
3 (Creative) Ways to Get Your Business to Run Without You
If you aspire to build a valuable company, one crucial factor is to ensure your business can operate independently without your constant involvement. Embarking on this journey can feel daunting.
Three (3) cost-effective and simple strategies to set your business on a path to autonomy and allowing it to thrive without your constant presence.
1. Replace Yourself by Niching Down
The reason most owners can’t replace themselves is that a substitute would be too expensive. Trying to replace your breadth of experience would likely require a very high-salaried employee. If you can’t afford to replace all of what you do, niche down your core offering.
Take inspiration stories like Casey Cavell’s D-Bat Academy. Although Casey’s baseball business could have catered to a broad range of players—professionals, softball players, slow-pitch beer leaguers, fast-pitch players—he got specific about his target market: 5- to 10-year-old kids.
Sure, catering to elite athletes might have brought in more per customer, but those athletes would expect a hitting coach with years of expertise, meaning Casey would have had to staff for that. On the other hand, providing a fantastic experience for an 8-year-old’s birthday party can be managed by an entry-level employee. By narrowing your offering, you can bypass the high salary associated with someone with a wide breadth of experience.
2. Create a Question Diary
When Jodie Cook was building her social media agency, she made a conscious choice every time an employee asked her a question. Instead of simply answering, she wrote each question down. This question diary turned into a comprehensive business manual, documenting how to perform every single task required of her employees.
Her manual, an Excel spreadsheet with 50 tabs, each detailing a specific process, became the go-to reference for her team. Challenge yourself to do the same: When an employee asks you a question, resist the urge to just answer and move on. Document those queries and turn them into standard operating procedures (SOPs) that enable your staff to develop expertise in their roles. This makes the manual the go-to reference instead of you.
3. List Your Employees Alphabetically on Your Site
Most companies list their employees by seniority, with the owner and CEO at the top. However, this signals that you are the most important person in your company, which encourages everyone—from salespeople to suppliers and prospective partners—to go straight to the top by calling you.
To downplay your role and encourage others to step up, list employees alphabetically rather than by seniority on your company’s website. This approach minimises the spotlight on you. Additionally, using titles like “Head of Culture” and “Head of Product” instead of “CEO” or “Owner” can further obscure your seniority, making it less likely customers will default to contacting you.
Conclusion
Getting your business to thrive without you gives you the freedom to cherry-pick the projects you want to work on or simply own your business and collect passive income. A business that runs without you is also a valuable, sellable asset if you ever choose to move on to a new chapter in your life. Niching down, creating SOPs, and downplaying your role on your website are all practical steps you can take today to get your business running more independently in the future.
By following these strategies, you can ensure that your business is not only self-sustaining but also positioned for long-term success and growth.
Michael loves the company of family, friends, work mates and clients. Weekends are spent with family — watching his boys play sport and enjoying life. He’s played table tennis and cricket at the top level locally, and these days spends plenty of time on a bike and at the gym.
Michael works as a business coach for our clients, as well as growing our business in the SME advisor sector.
Bachelor of Commerce, CA, LinkedIn