Creating the right team is imperative to your success. A team is comprised of people who can bring necessary skill sets to the venture. A team is different from partners. Partners are financially and legally tied to the venture while team members are brought in to create and continue the process. Team members can be employees or sub-contactors.

These are people you can control – you get to pick them. You can use their services for as long as you like. If they don’t work out as planned, you can find a different team member or you can find a place on the team where this person can be more effective.

Creating the right environment for the team is equally important. People will give their best when they feel that their services are being valued and that they are entrusted with producing a part of the success of the venture. Team members must have the same values as that of the venture and they must follow the same code of conduct consistent with your desired outcome. They must truly want the venture to be a success and feel that they are a part of that success. They must work well with the other team members.

Differences are encouraged only if they are presented in a positive fashion, recognizing the efforts of the others. Each team member must give more than they are asked for in their areas of expertise. This does not mean extra hours; it means working with heart and soul, working with the creative minds flowing, working with a positive mental attitude, and working together with the others so that all are winners.

What ideas do you have that will create a positive, successful team? How can you create this team and have each person feel that they are as important a part of the success of the venture as you are? Study successful entities to find out how they treat their team members. Find out what motivates team members in successful entities to keep them successful – is it money, power, trust, fear, etc.? Thinking these things out before you create the team will help you in putting together the right team for your venture.

You should write out all the positions of your team and keep updating it as you grow as when you grow you will need to change out some positions on your team. This is a big mistake that people make as they grow. They keep the same team members that were effective when they were small and they do not re-evaluate the need for replacing members who have not grown to levels where they are now needed. Therefore the overall team growth is limited by the lack of ability of one or more members. Just like upgrading your peer group, always be open to and active in upgrading your team members.

You must strive to place the right people on your team. This goes for all positions you pay for, including lawyers, accountants, advisors, sub contractors etc. Be clear on what is a must upfront and make the positions open as specific as possible.

If you are just starting out then make your team as simple and complete as possible. Just be sure that your team members are able to excel and have knowledge in the industry and direction you are going in. The last thing you want to do is to have to micromanage your team members. If you find you are doing so you have made a mistake and replace them right away.

Your team members must be proactive to your needs and outcome. If not replace them or place them in a position where they can be more effective. Please always keep in mind that in most cases you are paying for their services in one manner or another. Never pay a team member 100% upfront for their services as this always gives them something to aspire to. Placing the right team members in the right place will make your endeavor soar.

Last week’s article covered the likely responses of three “Janes,” Jane Dough, Accidental Jane, and Tenacity Jane. This week, we explore the reactions of Go Jane Go and Merry Jane.

Go Jane Go is a successful female entrepreneur who has grown her business to the point that she may struggle to get time away from work. She’s confident and organized, and is likely to have put systems in place to get her work done in an efficient manner—which may have something to do with why she’s four times as likely as the average female business owner to hit the million-dollar. Accounting for 14% of all women entrepreneurs, Go Jane Go types are the least common of the five Jane types.

Because Go Jane Go has grown her business to the point where her she has plenty of work coming in—and the right systems in place to accommodate that work—the loss of a single client (or even two or three) does not pose a serious threat to her business.

However, because Go Jane Go tends cares so much about her clients, the loss of one or more of them may set off some serious alarm bells anyway. If the customer had been a good one with whom she had a relationship, she may feel guilt about whether she failed to provide the right level of service and almost obsessed about what she might have done wrong or what she might have done to prevent the loss. This “looking backward” approach can take up considerable energy from Go Jane Go and keep her from being able to see all of the good she has done.

It is also possible, again depending on the relationship, that Go Jane Go might actually feel relieved. In these cases, it is likely that the relationship wasn’t working for Go Jane Go but because she is committed to good service and doesn’t generally like to engage in what she may see as confrontation, she may have been quietly suffering the relationship. When this client goes, she may actually feel liberated.

In either case, Go Jane Go has an opportunity to remind herself to depersonalize things somewhat and focus on re-investing her energy. In the case of the “bad” customer, she is now free to spend her time focusing on stronger and better relationships. In the case of the lost “good” customer, she should:

1. acknowledge that sometimes things happen that are out of our control,
2. give herself credit for all the things she did that were right
3. acknowledge any lessons learned and commit to improving next time
4. and finally, release any guilt feelings and reinvest her energy in a happier way.

Our last entrepreneur, Merry Jane, is very committed to running her business in a way that helps her be master of her own time. She realizes she may not be making as much money as she might, but she’s happily running her company in a way that works for her lifestyle. Roughly 19% of women business owners are Merry Janes.

Merry Jane cares about her customers and wants to keep them, but at the same time she knows that she only has so much time to invest in any given customer. Therefore, when a customer leaves, she is likely to see it fairly pragmatically, knowing that sometimes these things happen in business. She’ll quickly turn her attention to identifying the next new customer to replace the loss.