How to Embrace Leadership and Develop Your Team Members Into Leaders

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As a bookkeeping firm owner, it’s easy to get wrapped up in your work and forget to embrace the leadership aspect of running a team.

When you started your business, you might not have expected to even hire a team.

But once you got traction and hit the ceiling on how much you could handle on your own...

Hiring a team became a no brainer.

Managing a team as an employee is one thing - but leading a team as the OWNER of a company is a different story!

And yeah, it’s easy to doubt yourself. Just remember that you’re capable of AMAZING things!

So in order to embrace your role as a leader, you’ll need to implement a few of our favorite ways to model good leadership and support your team.

But it doesn’t stop there! Because modeling good leadership will also help your team members see how they can step up as leaders in the company, too.

Maybe they’ll even be able to take over the operations of the firm so you can focus on big picture strategy (it’s possible, I’ve done it).

8 Ways to Level-Up Your Leadership Skills

When you’re leading a team, you have to remember that everyone’s looking to you for guidance.

Guidance on how to approach the work, how to interact, and how to prepare for their future in the company.

These are the best ways to show up as a great leader and model what you’d expect from future leaders of your firm!

1. Make yourself accessible

First, set boundaries and stick to them. Then, let your team know when you’re available and be consistent!

Keeping an open line of communication with your team is crucial. When you don’t have a team member in a leadership role (yet), your team needs to know that they’re encouraged to ask questions when they hit a roadblock. And that you’re actually there to support them!

By being a great communicator, you’ll help your team understand that it’s okay to share ideas or give feedback too.

2. Get to know your team

Most of us work in a virtual setting, so it can be hard to connect with your team. Find ways to learn more about each other and connect on a personal level.

You don’t have to be best friends, but taking the time to learn more about who’s working for you might actually help you uncover their hidden talents. Someone might have a secret zone of genius just waiting to emerge! (and if that’s ok, embrace these traits and find ways to let them shine)

3. Embody your company culture

Once you establish a company culture, make sure you’re following through! You’ll expect the team to live and breathe the culture, so make sure you’re embodying it too.

Make sure you walk the walk and your actions match your words. Nobody’s perfect, but forming that habit will make you a better leader.

4. Provide resources and education

We’re big on making sure our team always has all the information they need to be successful.

So if you find that you can invest in a program or resource that’ll support your team member’s success - do it! Then, you can encourage that team member to take ownership of their new skills and share their knowledge with the team.

And don’t be afraid to allow your team to present different education they think will help them advance at their job. We allow our team to mention education to take and we evaluate whether it’s the right fit (and in alignment with the company goals) and we’ll usually purchase it for them.

5. Coach your team

When someone comes to you with a question, don’t just give them the answer! Ask them questions in return and coach them through the thought process to come up with a solution.

Yes, sometimes you’re the only one who can answer certain questions.

But if possible, create a database of common questions and answers that your team can reference later. That way, you won’t have to answer the same question again, and the whole team can benefit from it! Once you have a management team, build a specific FAQ database for management-related questions.

We use Notion to create a master database of typical team FAQ’s and it’s been such a GAME CHANGER for us.

6. Set clear expectations

When you assign a task to your team member, make sure they have all the information they need upfront. They’re more likely to give you the result you want if you clearly outline your expectations!

But for some tasks, you might want to give a team member more autonomy to see what they can come up with on their own. We like to assign Quarterly Projects and leave it up to each team member to bring their own flair.

This is a great way to help them build confidence and show what they can accomplish without a ton of guidance!

7. Explain the ‘why’

Anytime you’re giving feedback, training, or answering questions, it’s important to share your thought process. If someone knows why they’re learning this information, they’ll be able to use that logic to make decisions on their own in the future.

This is huge for giving feedback, but also receiving it! Learning someone’s ‘why’ is always going to help you and your team grow.

8. Keep an open mind

Sometimes, you don’t need to do the talking! Give your team opportunities to take the floor and share their ideas. They’ll probably be able to teach you a thing or two!

Always be open to hearing out their ideas and testing new strategies. It’s not easy to admit that you don’t know it all, but it’s sooo important!

Set Up Your Team Members to Take On Leadership Roles

If you notice that certain team members would be a good fit for leadership, the best way to show them what you expect is to model good leadership yourself.

Let your team know that there’s room to grow within your firm, and that following the principles listed above can help them get there!

Eventually, you’ll be able to develop your team members into leaders that can run your firm for you.

But if you’re not quite sure how to really shift into your CEO role and start training your people to lead - we’ve got you covered!

Breakthrough for Bookkeepers & Accountants is the group coaching program you need if you want to implement robust systems across your entire business.

I’m talking about systems for things like sales, operations, and yes - team management.

So...are you ready to create deep internal systems and level up your firm?

Hop on the waitlist to be in the next cohort of this incredible experience.