Why can the founder make money for the company but not be able to manage it?

The founders of small and medium-sized enterprises are all superheroes who can support the entire company by themselves. However, the founders can make money for the company but are not capable of operating and managing it. Why is this? The author of this article analyzes this topic. Let's take a look.

Many small and medium-sized enterprises appear to be thriving on the outside, but are actually very fragile.

The core business of these companies is extremely dependent on the founder. All the money is earned by this one person, and others are just helping out.

However, the founder did not have the ability to run a company or manage a team, and many problems accumulated, and the company was even in a state of disrepair.

01

Why is the founder so good at making money but incapable of managing the company?

This is normal. Most founders of small and medium-sized enterprises are superheroes. With talent, strong execution, and a little luck, they can build a successful business and sustain their company.

In the process of business expansion, some founders grow very fast and are able to keep up with the development of the business. Today's well-known entrepreneurs have all passed this stage.

However, most founders either cannot keep up with the pace of business development or have serious shortcomings in their capabilities. In this case, problems will arise in the business management.

02

Tell a true story.

There is a small MCN company that started its business on a university campus. It has been 10 years now and has developed smoothly. The founder is very young and has outstanding ability in perceiving user needs and content sensitivity.

But I had no sense for numbers and money, and I had no idea about management. I was very emotional and self-centered, and made decisions at will, which led to more and more problems within the company. At that time, I felt that it was only a matter of time before the company exploded.

Sure enough, later on, due to complicated reasons, the founder and his partner fell out.

It may be related to interests, thinking that the partners control most of the company's resources; or it may simply be that they want to reduce costs, increase efficiency and solve the company's operational problems.

But no matter what, the result is the worst case scenario, because she doesn't know how to deal with it and doesn't have the skills.

This skill can also come from the team.

As long as there is a professional role in the company that the founder trusts, this won’t happen, for example, an HR who has worked in a large company, or a consulting consultant.

03

Why is there no such role? This brings us to the next question.

In such small and medium-sized enterprises, most employees are relatives, classmates, and friends, and they belong to family or quasi-family businesses. There is a trusting relationship between the founders and employees, but professional ability is often insufficient.

This cannot be blamed on the founder. When he first started, it was difficult to recruit talent, and only relatives and friends were willing to help.

It's not just small and medium-sized enterprises. Most of the world's top 500 companies are family-owned.

Therefore, the structure of the company is centered around the founder, who arranges his relatives in key positions, such as finance, procurement, and administration, and then recruits a few less important employees from outside, and a company of dozens of people is up and running.

04

I'm working as a consultant for a client and this is their model.

During a chat, he frankly said that he knew his cousin took kickbacks during purchases, but he did not want to pursue the matter. After all, his cousin had been with him through all the hardships, and even if he had no merit, he had worked hard, so he let him take it.

I can totally understand that this is how this kind of company is managed.

The biggest problem for this client is how to get rid of the company's business dependence on him.

To put it nicely, we have reached the next stage of growth, from individuals to platforms; to put it bluntly, it is too easy to fail, and the anti-fragility ability is zero. What if something happens to the founder...

Some companies have made it through this stage and become big companies that make a lot of money.

Some companies did not make the jump, and either died or managed to survive with difficulty.

Logically speaking, I am a "professional" who can help them. Can't I solve these problems?

cannot.

I can only solve the path problem, not the gene problem.

Author: Han Xu

Source: WeChat public account "Operation Dog Work Diary (ID: yunyingriji)"