I am a dentist. I felt strongly that half my staff was against me (4 of 7 employees). So I fired them. I inherited them when I bought my business a few years ago. I am very ethical but I do care about gross revenue (as any owner should). They never fully embraced caring about revenue production or understanding that bonus pay is tied to profitability. Nonetheless, I feel it is a failing on my part as a leader that they as a group were not on my team. What can I do as a small business owner to display better leadership and engender better office morale. I should mention that I pay above market wages, have better benefits than market competitors, work with my employees to satisfy the number of hours they need and I run a schedule that is very predictable 8-5 with a lunch and we do not deviate. Further, we take great care of our patients and the staff never has to worry about patient satisfaction or quality of care. Thank you for your input.
Best thing I ever did as a business owner was the Landmark Forum. The follow up class is about working with groups. And they have some side classes, my favorite one was the Money seminar (spoiler alert, it’s not about how to make more money, but I did as a result of taking that class).
If that is not your cup of tea, The Three Laws of Performance was written by the executive coaching side of the Landmark company.
And my last recommendation is Chris Voss.
All may recommendations involve some form of radical empathy and brutal self honesty, looking at your blind spots and how to clear your own hang ups and BS so that the things you create work. And by work, I mean getting others on board (and excited) with your vision, because the things we create live in the doing of others to bring them to fruition.
I was not a natural leader, I always saw myself as a driven supporter of leaders. It took actually doing classes with other students to hone leadership skills. Books are good, but the classes were a different level of self development.
If I was to sit here and type out what I think you should/could do with the other staff and how to get them to rally around the business, I would be making some shots in the dark.
Maybe start with a few short videos from Chriss Voss. If that clicks, get the Three Laws. If that clicks, do the Landmark Forum which I think is super cheap compared to Chris classes.