Episode breakdown
In this episode, barbara and matt take a closer look at some of the human resources roadblocks that business owners may come up against when taking on the task of growing their business.
During this episode, we take a look at the importance of not only finding the right people for roles within your business but making sure they are the right fit for the role and bringing them onboard at the right time.
Let us know what your key takeout has been from this episode and join the continuing conversation over in the Virtual Success Facebook Group.
- Understanding which seats you are going to need and when you are going to need them
- The importance of mapping out your organisational chart and understanding not only where your business is now, but more importantly, where you want to take your business in the future – and planning for this
- Deciding whether you have the time and resources to train up an existing employee or bring on board someone who already has the skills you’re looking for
Sometimes you’ve got the right people in the wrong seats... maybe we’re just not playing to that person’s strengths, you can just blow something wide open. Suddenly, somebody comes alive in the right role.
In this episode
00:00 – Introduction
Matt and Barbara kick off the episode on a beautiful Sydney day, sharing casual conversation about the weather before diving into the topic. They express excitement for another episode of the Virtual Success Show and set the tone for a practical, experience-based discussion.
01:02 – Right people, right seats, right time
They introduce the episode theme—getting the right people in the right roles at the right time. It’s a follow-up to a previous discussion about choosing between VAs, project managers, or operations managers, emphasizing that business growth depends on deliberate hiring and role placement strategies.
02:14 – Right people
Barbara shares her experience misplacing highly capable VAs into project management roles, leading to mismatched expectations and difficulty transitioning from task-doers to delegators. Matt adds that as businesses grow, the need for more skilled individuals arises, but founders often lack time to train new hires adequately.
04:24 – Skilled people vs training people
As a business scales, leaders must decide between hiring experienced professionals or training existing team members. Barbara emphasizes balancing money and time as resources, sharing how she invested personal time when budget constraints prevented her from hiring senior talent early on.
05:58 – Right seats
Matt stresses the importance of creating a forward-looking org chart to avoid reactionary hiring. Planning the team structure for one, two, or five years into the future clarifies what roles are needed and when—ensuring the right people are placed in appropriate positions for growth.
07:15 – Which seats you need to fill and when
Barbara shares how Matt’s advice to build a 100-person org chart early on significantly changed her hiring approach. She realized many roles she thought she needed weren’t necessary, while others became clear. That proactive planning helped her grow from 15 to nearly 100 team members.
13:00 – Right time
They discuss when to bring on team members like VAs, project managers, and ops managers. Early on, solo founders may need only a part-time VA. As complexity grows, project managers become necessary. True operations managers typically come later, once the business is consistently profitable and stable.
16:13 – It’s easy to do and easy NOT to do
Matt emphasizes the simplicity yet importance of creating an org chart. Though it only takes an hour, many avoid it. Barbara adds that the exercise helped her avoid hiring the wrong people at the wrong time and plan for long-term roles like HR managers and team leaders.
20:18 – Wrapping things up
They summarize the key message: business growth hinges on hiring the right people, placing them in the right roles, and doing it at the right time. Barbara advises considering role changes over replacing good people and teases their next episode focused on hiring operations managers.
