How to Run a Small Business Without an HR Department

When you’re starting a small business, you usually don’t have the luxury of making an HR professional one of your first hires. More likely than not, the first people you hire will be folks who can help you build products, serve customers, and market the product.

Businesses need revenue to survive, after all.

You might not have enough money on hand to put together an HR department right off the bat, but just because your team is small doesn’t mean you should neglect HR responsibilities.

Where Do Employees Go With Their Problems?

Imagine one of your greatest workers has a problem with the way you manage. Unless your company is radically transparent, that person can’t exactly go up to you and speak their mind. Who would tell their boss they’re a jerk and expect to remain employed?

Luckily, small business owners who don’t have the funds to establish an HR department just yet aren’t completely out of luck. By investing in the right tools and technologies, managers — even if they’re thinly stretched — can serve as HR professionals in at least some degree.

For example, managers of small teams stand to benefit tremendously from using pulsing surveys. Instead of soliciting feedback from employees on an annual basis, pulsing surveys are designed to measure employee sentiment in real time. That way, managers can identify problems as they are emerging. They can then take immediate steps to nip them in the bud before the fester out of control.

What About Small Teams?

Worried that your small team will be nervous to share their opinions with you? Don’t be. Pulsing surveys are administered electronically and are completely anonymous. Your employees will have the cover they need to speak their minds, as they should.

And because pulsing surveys are administered electronically, you also don’t have to spend a ton of time figuring out how your employees are feeling. Whereas, in the past, managers might have had 30-minute conversations with each of their employees to assess the state of their operations, pulsing surveys don’t take up much time at all — both for managers and employees. The surveys can be completed in a handful of minutes, and managers can take however long they want to analyze the results.

How This Helps Businesses Scale

You can never underestimate the importance of HR functions. When employees feel they are unable to enact meaningful, positive change at the office, they’re unlikely to be super excited about heading to work every day. This translates into a dip in worker productivity — something that smaller companies simply cannot afford.

Even if you suspect your team gets along swimmingly, chances are there are at least a few areas of your operations that could be improved. Using pulsing surveys makes it extremely easy for you to identify precisely where those areas are.

By making use of pulsing surveys, you start down the path that leads to being able to afford an HR department in the first place. Together, the entire team collaborates to improve work culture — new initiatives don’t simply come from the head honcho.

The end result of all this? A stronger company with even more engaged workers. What’s not to like?

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