small business units - ten tips to success -

Survival Guide for New Leaders of Small Business Units

By Spiros Arvanitis – Head of e-Business Unit, GENIKI Bank (Athens/Hellas)


This will be your team to win or lose in the future, so be extra careful when you make the line-up selection. This is not football and you will have no substitution option soon.

Look for “young age”, “intelligence”, “discipline”, “ambition”, “multitasking”, “speed”, “efficiency”, “flexibility”, “punctuality”, “precision”, “good temper”, “thirst for knowledge” and “creativity”. Try to combine as much of the above with “experience” if that is possible.

Important: Your team. Your responsibility. Your selection!

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In zero time, you will have to plan a daily routine of operations, which should be as efficient and time saving as possible.

Don’t let the daily flow do that for you!

Study your work, make a schedule, divide the tasks, assess efficiently and make changes of improvement.

Important: Daily operations are the basic need but your higher purpose is business development. Minimize time for the first and increase time for the second!

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Don’t spend all your energy trying to think how do all various daily tasks will be done. Instead, focus your creativity in order to invent ways for things to be done without your effort.

Identify what can be produced automatically. If it is possible implement it immediately. If you need to, propose it and push for implementation. Do it yesterday.

Important: Fight for your and your team’s time. It is your ammunition. Don’t let it go to waste or you will be loosing you daily battles.

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There is no room for “stars” in your team. And remember: You have no way to know who will not come to the office tomorrow.

Additionally, you would not want to have days that a person carries all the load while other sit with no work to do.

If all people can handle all tasks you will only have to assign work equally or based of the need of the day. No worries about “only John knows that” problems.

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Small Departments can not function properly with one person taking all decisions for all matters.

All members must know their limit of independence and act on it, without requesting approvals or directions for every case which occurs.

The “safety limit” is the “red line” of an issue, after which you should be consulted. Give directions about it and examples in every day’s work so that it will be clear for all where it starts.

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An informal hierarchy must be created within the members of the team in order to:

A. Assure work flow in the absence of the Head.

B. Avoid conflicts for day to day matters.

C. Create incentives for improvement.

Important: Office life will create a hierarchy of its own. If

you don’t intervene you may end up with the wrong one.

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It is very important to make your team feel and act like “one”.

During difficult situations and times of pressure and stress, the feeling of “all for one and one for all” will be the key to make it through.

When a member of the team can not operate in his/her

usual standards there will be need for the others to cover for him/her, to keep the overall level high.

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Many times the load of work will be more than you will be able to handle.

Evaluate the importance of the tasks and prioritize. Some things can wait and other can not.

Make your selection, give directions and be prepared –your team also- for changes of the plan.

Don’t forget: Cases which have your Management’s attention, always have a “top priority” rating.

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When you lead small teams it is only natural that you are in a constant interaction with all the members and need to prove your self case by case.

To keep everybody’s respect, you must have an excellent knowledge of all aspects of the Unit’s work.

“When the going gets tough” everyone will be expecting for you to “push the wagon out of the mud” and this will require more than your leadership skills. It will require your knowledge also.

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You may implement all nine previous points successfully but you must never neglect to adequately supervise operations and control the quality of work.

Even the best employees lose their pace from time to time. Don’t let the level of your unit deteriorate. Act with the first sign and wake people up.

Even if you see that everything is going as planned, be absolutely sure that there is space for improvement. Keep looking for it every singe day!

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Thank very much for reading this brief presentation!

I hope you found it useful.

If you have any questions, feel free to contact me using

my LinkedIn page:

http://www.linkedin.com/pub/spirosarvanitis/3/517/6a7

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http://www.linkedin.com/pub/spiros-arvanitis/3/517/6a7