By Jennifer Hahn Masterson

New businesses are meant to grow quickly, but managing every area of change and expansion can be overwhelming. More sales, more cash flow, and more brand awareness are all fantastic, but you must learn how to stay on top, and not let it all get away from you. Read on to learn how to effectively manage and prepare for change.

Invest in your key team members

At the core of your management success and overall success, will be a well-trained team. The more reliable, experienced, and responsible staff you have, the more they will innovate, and will be able to manage themselves to some degree. You should recognize who is valuable amongst your workers, give them incentives, and create pathways for their professional growth.

It’s important to keep them doing what they are great at doing. Remember, if you look after them, they will look after you. Try to avoid high turnover as this means you will be losing experienced staff to rival companies. Also, you will waste time and resources training new team members.

Have the best support

Many business owners attempt to take on the world and refuse to delegate tasks out of pride, the need for control, or having a great but impossibly futile work ethic. Trusted managers are essential as they will take a load off your plate, leaving you to focus on the overall company vision and any smaller tasks that come up along the way.

Another high ranking member of a team would be a mentor. Many of the most successful entrepreneurs often consulted with their mentors and of course, made good use of their words of wisdom. Don’t underestimate the power of the experience that you might be turning a deaf ear to.

Learn to be flexible

Yoga classes aside, as your startup rapidly expands, many changes will occur across the board.

Expansion and tending to the new company needs will require more finances, more space, and more employees. Going by what this undergraduate program in business design says, you must be able to adapt to diverse situations in order to stay in control, and to make the most of any opportunities that come your way.

You can gather essential finances by holding sales, claiming any debts that you are owed, and by offering discounts to customers who pay promptly. Now that you have some revenue, you can rent extra space on a short-term lease, and employ staff on temporary contracts, or even make use of recruitment agencies.

Run with what works

As a business grows, the focus is on ‘more,’ but the solution is to think about ‘less.’ Something that worked out for you in the very beginning might not do so well now, or in the future. Don’t be afraid to cut loose anything that is holding you back. Find out what’s really working and invest your time and energy there.

Many companies have already narrowed down their selection of products to just a few, or even just 1 top-selling item, and it has worked wonders. It’s allowed them to become somewhat ‘experts’ in their field, and they really stand out from the competition.

Listen to your customers

They might not always be right, but they will tell you honestly how they feel about your service and will often offer very insightful information as to how to improve your company.

Not opening clear channels of communication with your customers can turn out to be quite costly. It can be hard to make consumers aware of your brand and products, and it can be even more difficult to get them to give you a chance in the first place. As long as you are listening and acting upon feedback with positive change, you will have no problem keeping them happy for a long time.

We all know how difficult it can be to transition from a small, humble startup in to a flourishing corporation, but if you implement the above stratagems, you can maintain order, and ride the wave to success.

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Jennifer Hahn Masterson is a senior business strategist, always in search of inventive ways to help her clients find their place in the ever so competitive business arena. When she is not busy pondering about the design principles of unity, space, hierarchy, balance, contrast, scale and similarity, she likes to immerse herself in a good book and satisfy her perpetual wanderlust.