Holistic Human Resources Consulting
5 Ways to Build a Solid Business Culture That Attracts Great Employees AND Customers
By Delmar Johnson
Business culture is imperative for entrepreneurs. Don’t sacrifice it just because you’ve only been in business for a short time. Read below to discover the 5 ways to build a solid business culture to attract customers and employees to your business.
The culture of any business is one of the most important things to have established from the beginning, way before you have clients or a team. It creates a foundation for the type of workplace environment you want, even if you operate an online business.
Maybe you’re asking yourself, why is building a business culture so important? Simply put, a company’s culture can potentially make or break the enterprise. With the world watching, the perception of your brand and business is a big deal. As the saying goes, people like to do business with those they know, like and trust.
However, without the presence of a company culture, the brand’s image and reputation suffers, and few will have you on their list to work with you or buy from you. When businesses shy away from investing in their culture for long periods of time, in both time and money, consequences can be detrimental to its growth.
So how can you begin to build your culture and create a reputation that attracts your ideal customer and team? Let’s jump in and look at five points that focus on developing a culture that you can create and nurture!
1. Be clear on your core values and what those values are.
Maybe your values include a company of integrity, innovation, creativity, strong customer service, fun atmosphere, and open communications.
Great!
Whichever ones you choose, just make sure you have clarity on them, so you can adequately explain them to customers and future employees. There are several things that could be identified as core values in your business. All of these will set the foundation you’ll want to build your company on and will result in the kind of environment you want as your business evolves.
Whether you have a brick and mortar or a virtual business, the core of your culture drives how you do business.
It will always start with YOU.
2. Be clear on your expectations. Clear expectations require you to ask yourself several questions like…
- What are you expecting in your business?
- What are your goals?
- What are some of the standards you’re setting? (These come from your core values).
- What are your expectations for the people that you bring on to support you? Are you expecting that they be committed to the vision?
- Are you expecting your business to grow to a certain level over the next 1, 3, 5, or even 20 years?
See what I mean?
Maybe you have a brick and mortar that you’re looking to expand, or maybe you have a thriving online business. Either way, it’s important to know what your expectations are in your own business.
3. Be proactive in establishing processes from the beginning
Take the time to be proactive and create the needed processes for your business. When you’re in the beginning stage, a lot of times small business owners think, “Oh, I don’t need that yet because I don’t have employees.”
Wrong.
The key is for you to create those processes before you have team members, so you can begin establishing those standard operating procedures or processes to stay consistent and organized with your operations.
Maybe you started out, as most of us have, as a solopreneur. But now you’ve evolved into a growing small business and have your CEO hat on.
Congratulations!
But processes are even more imperative when you reach this stage of business because everyone needs to be on the same page.
So, go back and think about the daily activities you complete each day and write them down on paper or type them up on a Word document on your computer, iPad, or whatever’s most convenient for you.
