HOW HIRING AN OPERATIONS MANAGER ENDED MY CYCLES OF BURNOUT
NOVEMBER 7, 2024
MISTY WILLIAMS
Founder, Marketect Media
In 2016, I experienced the most epic bout of burnout of my career.
I had a marketing agency and a team of 15 who were responsible for delivering for my clients.
I was working so hard, feeling responsible for everyone’s deliverables and the quality of their work … my team was made up of contractors that legally, I couldn’t require to track their time, use our project management system or work a set schedule.
Coordinating deliverables for my clients across the team was very challenging, particularly as the business grew.
My expenses were growing as fast as my income, and payroll for a highly-skilled team was expensive.
I wasn’t getting the ownership of project deliverables and deadlines that I needed from the team, and truthfully, they weren’t getting the care and attention that they each needed from me.
I was spread too thin. And firefighting was exhausting.
There were a hundred excuses why tasks weren’t completed on time … and no ownership ensuring this wouldn’t keep happening.
I would find out tasks were behind because they were past due and someone was upset. No notification, request for extension or for more info so the task could be completed on time.
I felt “at the mercy” of team members’ “generosity” to collaborate, ask questions and complete their tasks, while clients rightfully had expectations that their work be completed ON TIME.
There’s so much to the growth that happened for me during these days, but one change I made to how I managed my team was game-changing.
My Turning Point: I Hired an Operations Manager
I needed someone besides me whose job was to provide accountability to the team for deadlines and deliverables and to support each person on the team in succeeding in their job.
I wanted my team to build work habits that aligned with consistent performance, which meant they needed consistent leadership.
I wanted everyone logging in on time, attending meetings, collaborating well, asking for support if they needed it and working transparently so that the right hand knew what the left hand was doing.
I wanted every team member to feel supported in performing at their best.
Mostly, I wanted the smoke to clear and the stress to lower … for me and everyone else on the team.
I hired an Operations Manager from the Philippines. There are many alternate titles for this role, each with its own nuance of skills: Chief of Staff, Director of Operations, even Human Resource Manager.
Why from the Philippines? Filipinos are excellent English speakers, highly skilled, with a strong work ethic and a deep understanding of Western business culture. And the cost for top talent is about 20% of what you’d pay for North American resources.
What Does an Operations Manager Do?
An Operations Manager provides the framework of support and accountability to ensure things are running smoothly and staying on track.
Here’s how an Operations Manager can maximize the productivity of the team:
- Hiring & Team Management: They work closely with leadership to determine hiring needs, manage onboarding and offboarding team members, and train the team on our protocols and best practices.
- Human Resources & Project Management Tasks: They review and approve payroll, oversee reimbursements and coordinate time off. They track the team daily: ensure everyone is logging in on time, following our break protocol and putting in their hours productively.
- Building SOPs & Structures: Operations Managers work with team leads to ensure SOPs (Standard Operating Procedures) are developed, projects and timelines are tracked, and daily or weekly sprints are completed to keep everyone aligned.
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Accountability: An Operations Manager ensures each team member knows what’s expected of them and has the support they need to excel (whether they’re giving that support directly or working with their managers to ensure the team is supported).
They handle performance planning when team members aren’t hitting the mark and they cheer everyone on to complete projects on time, with excellence.
- Meetings & Team Check-ins: From leading daily or weekly meetings to handling 1:1s, my Operations Manager keeps everyone aligned and organized. They monitor daily recaps and weekly scorecards submitted by each team member to track progress to keep everyone producing at a high level.
- Performance Reviews: We don’t wait until someone’s job is on the line to give feedback. Regular 30-day, 90-day and 6-month reviews keep performance on track and give team members the feedback they need to keep growing with the company (and earn raises annually for great performance!).
- Communication Bridge: An Operations Manager acts as the main communication hub between me and the team. This has been crucial for our remote setup—my entrepreneurial fire can be a little hot sometimes. Working with an Ops Manager to share my expectations and frustrations, and trusting them to give feedback and get better performance from the team has lightened my load, reduced my stress and improved our outcomes company-wide.
Knowing the team is performing well and can be trusted helps me to focus on leading and growing the business, confident that my team and projects are in good hands.
Hiring the Right Operations Manager
Hiring the right person for this role is critical.
Here’s what I personally prioritize:
- Team management experience including hiring, performance reviews and terminating team members
- Strong team management and coaching skills, to include active listening that allows for balancing the goals of the company with the needs of team members to find win-win solutions
- Strong attention to detail, time management skills and excellent team working skills
- Experience working in a fast-paced environment with weekly deadlines
- Composure under pressure and thrive in stressful situations so the team has a strong leader they can trust
- Experience with remote team tools like Time Doctor, Slack and Trello to manage team members and their collaboration with others.
- Comfortable in spreadsheets and documents, to both maintain data, compile data and review data for key learnings that impact company growth
- A solid typing WPM (ideally 55+ WPM) - fast typing reveals fast thinking!
Real Results: How We’ve Helped Businesses Like Yours
At Marketect Media, we’ve placed Operations Managers who have transformed businesses. Our success rate speaks for itself—92% of the candidates we place last past the 90-day mark and thrive in their roles.
Here’s what a few of our clients have to say:
"Working with Misty saved me so much time! Her team found an amazing Chief of Staff for me in the Philippines, who I absolutely love working with. I cannot thank her enough."
"Misty, Avril and their team helped us tremendously! They helped us to hire a chief of staff, graphic designer, and Keap expert! They communicated with us through the entire process and we were there to help with any onboarding and training. We highly recommend working with them!"
Our experienced team meticulously vets candidates and handles all the details of the hiring process, ensuring you find the perfect fit to streamline your operations and drive growth.
- Our recruiting process is thorough. We start with understanding the unique needs of your company to ensure we tailor the search specifically to your requirements.
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We vet candidates’ skills, English proficiency, work ethic and cultural fit. For an Operations Manager role, in addition to passing a written and two live interviews, our candidates have to pass an English test and a typing test, and we will do skills tests on software and leadership.
Some clients choose to give candidates a paid test project to further assess their skills.
- Our candidates must have adequate computer processing power and internet download speeds. We ensure each candidate has adequate computer processing speeds and storage and fast internet download speeds.
- Our candidates take robust personality tests so our clients know what they’re getting in their new hire.
- Our background checking is robust. We do skip tracing and reach out to recent references to learn more about their experiences with the candidates. And clients can have professional background checks conducted for skill roles like bookkeeping, where security is paramount.
If you feel like it’s time to level up your team with a dedicated Operations Manager, let us help.