In spite of unfriendly foreign trade policies, small businesses, organizations with less than 500 employees, are still a major force within the economic ecosystems and make up 99% of all businesses in the United States. Small businesses also provide 1.5 million new jobs each year in the US and represent 64% of all new job creation (Search Logistics). The mood among small business owners is stabilizing according to the latest Small Business Optimism Index from the NFIB, edging down just a point to 98.6 from May to June. Even with dark economic clouds hanging overhead, small business owners remain steady in attitude and as the global economy continues to chug along, albeit at a slower pace. In the current economic climate, small businesses are looking to maximize resources and opportunities and for some SMBs, leadership plays a key role in performance and productivity.

Bigger Sized Small Businesses

Small businesses are usually defined as organizations with less than 500 employees but in reality, most small businesses have just a handful of people handling all facets of the operation. Even organizations that have small teams need leadership to define goals and objectives and create strategies to meet those. Leadership can be seen at the visionaries of the business, thinking both about short term performance and long term growth. In many instances in small business, the owner is the manager and provides leadership capabilities and vision. Managers and supervisors are powerful assets for small businesses as owners are usually over burdened with backend type jobs. Depending on the business model, management can take different forms. Smaller organizations may have a veteran employee that is a key holder and in other businesses, there may be a day supervisor and a night supervisor to oversee operations. Owners, managers and supervisors play key roles in smaller sized organizations and have a greater impact on team and business results, making it essential to sharpen and improve leadership skill sets and organizational habits to maximize those results.

Much More than Delegation

Daily checklists are a key tool for managers and supervisors but the role of leadership goes far beyond building a task list and delegating jobs to employees. Leadership has a pivotal role in establishing workplace culture which can directly affect individual and team performance, motivation and workplace happiness. Evaluation of performance is another key priority for managers and supervisors. Development and feedback of employees is often overlooked in small business but addressing performance issues and upskilling and reskilling individuals will bring short and long term benefits to businesses with improving performance and reducing costs associated with hiring and training. Approaching employee development as mentorship can drive ‘ownership of the business’ among the team. Managers who embrace open communication styles and policies can really connect with their teams on a higher level to bring out the best performance and efficiencies.

Improving Leadership Skill Sets

Managing people takes a certain type of personality and level of confidence that assures workers the best choices for the business are being made. Managing and leadership skills can be quantified and using effective and advanced techniques will promote stronger connections and greater understanding between teams and leadership. Express Training Systems offers an effective, instructor-led Entry Level Supervisor Training course that is ideally suited to people just entering supervisory roles as well as veteran key holders and shit leads that want to sharpen their leadership skills and get more output from their teams. EL-ST covers key leadership skills such as:

Communication skills

Advanced organizational habits

Planning and strategizing skills

Frontline team motivation and evaluation

Culture building

Managers and supervisors are highly valuable assets in the small business ecosystem and their actions can impact all facets of the organization. Learning advanced and extended skills can make managers and supervisors much more effective when leading teams within a small business.

The Bottom Line

Resilience and adaptability are important advantages for smaller sized businesses when navigating uncertain economic landscapes. SMBs that have management layers can fine tune skills and improve leadership capabilities to maximize output and productivity. Managers and supervisors in small businesses have a far greater impact on motivation and performance versus larger organizations and can directly influence business performance and operational efficiency. Entry level managers have even more influence on frontline teams and can benefit from sharpening leadership, communication and organizational skills. Express Training Systems offers a dynamic and high impact entry level supervisor course in an engaging, instructor led format. Leading teams in small business requires higher levels of communication and employee engagement to achieve goals and objectives. New employees moving into supervisory roles as well as veteran managers can benefit from the concepts and skills delivered in EL-ST from Express Training Systems. Please click here for more information on EL-ST: https://expresstrainingsystems.com/course-descriptions-training-access/