Undoubtedly, preparing teams for the busy holiday season is a vital task that most businesses have to take on in their different niches. Irrespective of whichever industry you belong to, the holiday period is always known to be a season with a rapid increase in customer demand, which means teams have to be ready to handle them.
Moving further in this article, we’ll discuss four ways through which you can prepare your team effectively for the busy holiday season.
1. Improve Overall Team Effectiveness
Most people are aware that the holiday season is coming, and we must prepare. Particularly for business owners, it’s vital to ensure they have processes in place, as customers will need their services more than ever this time. This is why improving your team’s effectiveness is vital so they can be trained and ready to handle customers for the busy holiday season.
Since you don’t want rivals or other business owners to overtake your place in the industry, it’s imperative to improve overall team effectiveness. You can do this by providing them with the necessary tools, ensuring they are guided on every step taken, and investing in their growth and education. Improving team effectiveness will help them deliver effective results during the holiday season, and this, in turn, will help you make more customers and develop a solid fan base.
2. Bring in a Fractional Executive
The holiday season is always a busy time, meaning that you’ll need all available hands on deck to help ensure that you don’t miss out on meeting targets. Some of your top executives may even take a break to be with their families, and that may leave you needing to fill that void. Well, you don’t have to worry much about that, as there are some individuals known as fractional executives who can make sure things run as usual in the company, even during the busy holiday period.
Fractional executives are often known as fractional integrators, and they hold key leadership positions like the chief executive officer (CEO) or chief operating officer (COO) in an organization. Many times, their period of experience can be as much as 20 years, which makes them very skilled and well-ready to take on demanding roles in a company. When you bring in a fractional executive during the busy holiday, you can provide teams with effective leadership, which helps them stay on their toes and get set to achieve a particular goal.
3. Set Attainable Goals
Speaking of goals, during the normal working period, business owners must set goals for their teams to work effectively and avoid confusion in business. Now, imagine if you don’t have a particular goal for teams in the holiday season; there’ll be many problems that can be detrimental to the health of your business. And that’s why it’s vital that you set attainable goals to help teams prepare effectively for the holiday period.
This helps your team know what they are to do, how to do it, and the level of expectation. For instance, you can set goals that are smart, measurable, achievable, realistic, and time-bound for teams to properly focus and be committed to meeting them. Teams that have realistic goals to work with during the busy holiday period can be very motivated, and this helps them to have a clear purpose and sense of direction.
4. Use Onboarding Checklist
As time passes, you’ll hire new employees to come and take on some specific role and continue the way things go in the organization. In fact, it’s even possible that you hire these new employees during the holiday period, and one thing that you’ll surely expect from them is to hit the ground running from their first day! However, without adequately onboarding them, that may not happen, and this will impact both their level of commitment and period of stay in your business.
Aside from hiring new employees during the holiday period, you may bring in temporary workers to ensure that the activities of your business aren’t stunted during the holiday season. This is why you need an onboarding checklist that can help boost their productivity, help them integrate quickly into the business, and ensure they are set up to become successful. You can set up an onboarding checklist by outlining a schedule and training strategy, use communication platforms, and assign buddies to temporary workers.
What’s Next?
The holiday period is one of the best times to meet your target and achieve the goals that you’ve set for your business. That’s why you should take preparations very seriously, as it’s a busy period where employees will have a lot on their plates, and the last thing you’ll want from them is errors and unexpected challenges. By improving overall team effectiveness, bringing in a fractional executive to fill in temporary leadership gaps, and using an onboarding checklist, you can prepare your team efficiently for the busy holiday.
