Do you remember your first hire? There is so much that goes into building a company, but few things matter as much the quality of the team you assemble. Given the immense importance of team building, we wanted to create a series where we ask entrepreneurs who have been there and done that, to share their stories and lessons with the community.

Tina Allen

When I first started I was a solo pet sitter. I didn’t really know at this point what I was doing except giving clients the best care possible for their loving pets. I started getting booked up fast but didn’t want to turn any clients down so I worked 7 days a week. If I wasn’t sleeping I was working. I am one that’s known for running with an idea. So that’s what I did! The idea was I would hire and keep taking on clients. All sounds easier than it is. I started off hiring my niece, Autumn Roberts. She new and understood that I was new to it all. It went very well but my niece couldn’t work for me forever. She went off to collage. I then started asking others that I was close to if they wanted to come on and help me. They all already have their own lives going on. That’s when I turned to Facebook. I found so many great people on there and some of them are still with me.  Read more>>

Jenny Chen

We’ve learned a lot along the way and continue to learn more each and every day about building a high performance team. But some key lessons have been: – Invest the time in finding the right people. Being in the service industry means that it can feel painful to not fill an open position on our front of house team right away, but it’s more important to not hire because we “need” to fill that position now, rather hiring someone because they are the right fit. It’s also important to invite folks to leave who don’t end up being a good fit, even if that means we’ll be short staffed in the short term. Read more>>

Wanda Walborn

I was asked to create a program for women, so I put immediately invited a diverse team of 12 women to join me in the process. The team’s diversity in age, ethnicity, educational background, philosophy of ministry and experience brought rich discussion about how to create a developmental program that would benefit all women in whatever stage of life they were in. Our team met and worked for a year to come up with a developmental program that would best serve a variety of women from the stay-at-home mother to the corporate vice president. We’ve been in existence since 2012. If I were to start again today, I would again go after a wide range of people to work with me. Read more>>

Kristen M. Olson

Building the right team is EVERYTHING! If there is one piece of advice that I would give new entrepreneurs or myself starting out- build the right and invest as much as you can in them. That being said, it does take some reps to find out who the right teammates are and then, continue to learn who you need (and what qualifications) to hire, at the right time. Starting out it was all me- like most first time entrepreneurs. It’s not the worst thing to do everything starting out and learn all the inner and outer workings of your business. I believe that you can’t fully lead a position until you have held that position, so knowing your own ropes will help you find the right person to fill your open positions when you are ready to hire. Read more>>