It’s one thing to start a Business; it’s quite another to keep it growing. At some point, it’s no longer enough to be your company’s number one employee. You need to be the boss.

One of the great ironies of entrepreneurship is that it’s not enough to be good at what you do. To grow your company, you must also be a good leader, goal setter, delegator, motivator, and visionary. Somewhere along the way, you must move your thinking from “me” to “us.”

Like caterpillars transforming into butterflies, entrepreneurs must evolve into leaders if their companies are to grow.

Responsibilities

When you take on the role of company leader, your responsibilities get bigger. You have a responsibility to your customers, employees, and community. Your job is to create a corporate vision and plot a strategy for achieving it. It’s up to you to determine what risks are worth taking. And only you can craft your company’s culture, setting its ethical and moral compass.

What Is My Role?

As their small businesses grow, many owners struggle to define their shifting roles within the organization. It’s a given that many business owners are great doers. After all, they’ve built successful businesses from the ground up. But as a business takes off, owners are suddenly confronted by tasks outside their skill set, such as hiring staff and creating administrative policies.

For many, this can be an uneasy process. But in order to grow, an owner must be willing to operate outside his or her comfort zone. He or she must make the transition from doer to thinker—i.e., from working in the business to working on the business.

As chief executive, your role is to keep a finger on the pulse of the business. It is to recognize opportunity when it presents itself, formulate company strategy, and make sure that you have the right people in place to seize those opportunities and implement those strategies.

You do not want to base future success on a fluky business strategy or a superstar employee. Your role is to dissect the ingredients of your company’s success and ensure the processes are repeatable.

That’s not all. Your role is to create your company’s culture. Is it a formal environment? A creative one? Is it one in which employees are encouraged to take risks or follow rules? More important—what kind of culture should it be?

Often, a company’s culture evolves haphazardly, springing from the founder’s personal style. But as your company grows, it’s wise to step back and evaluate the type of culture that is most likely to foster productivity and ensure success. If necessary, you can tweak your corporate culture to better serve your goals.

And obviously, it is your goal—always—to provide leadership. That means formulating strategy and communicating it clearly. Never assume your staff knows what you’re thinking.

Measuring Risk: Don’t Be a “Seymour”

Being in business means taking risks. As an established business owner, your job is to measure risk. That means reviewing possible actions and asking questions such as: What is the probability of success? Is this a risk I can afford to take?

When you first started your business, you willingly embraced some rather sizable risks. But here’s the problem: the longer you are in business, the more risk-adverse you are likely to become.

When you started your business, you had less to lose. Along with success comes a sense of caution, a natural inclination to eliminate risk. Don’t give in to it! That task belongs to your attorney and accountant—skilled technicians who are extensively trained to eliminate risk. When you start thinking like they do, your company will begin to decline. This is a sign that your company is approaching the end of the business life cycle.

If you want to keep growing, you need to keep your edge. That means you must continue taking risks. Evaluate them intelligently, but don’t turn the evaluation process into a reason for stalling.

In business, you cannot expect to obtain all the data needed to make a hundred-percent foolproof decision. You cannot delay taking action forever because you want to “see more” facts and information. In other words, don’t be a “Seymour.”

Instead, follow the advice of legendary business expert Tom Peters: “Ready, fire, aim!” Okay, that’s a bit of an overstatement. The point is, what you don’t want to do is: “Get ready…aim…check your sites…check the wind…aim again…check the elevation…and fire.” Why? Because by the time you finally squeeze the trigger, your target will be long gone.

One of the advantages of small business is flexibility. One of the disadvantages of small business is flexibility. Take charge of your flexibility—and accept that risk is part of growing a business.

Source: Ray Silverstein (2006). The best secrets of great small businesses: creative, innovative, and cost-saving ideas from great business minds