Employees with the drive and imagination required to build revenue and boost business are risk-tolerant people. They aren’t afraid to suggest new tactics, even when it calls for additional spending. Management can discourage these people and make them risk-averse by discussing each idea to death or sitting on suggestions until all the original energy drains away. To encourage creativity, give your staff quick answers.
“I worked for a boss a long time ago who would green-light an idea immediately if he liked it,” recalls Mike Hatch, owner and managing partner of Brandermill Country Club and Birkdale Golf Club near Richmond, Virginia. “He’d say, ‘Great, go do it.’ He understood that effective ideas get copied, and he wanted to be the first one to implement something worthy.”
In order to respond flexibly to staff suggestions at his clubs, Hatch lets his budgets “change daily.” New managers will express surprise at how quickly he gives a thumbs-up or thumbs-down. “Not every idea is going to work, we know that going in,” Hatch says. “But you’ll have no innovation at all if you don’t give quick approvals.”