StartUp Policy: The First Thanksgiving

In the United States, Thanksgiving tends to mark the beginning of the holiday season. However, while the holiday season can be a boon to a lot of small businesses, the chaos associated with it can disrupt your sales process, interrupt your marketing strategy, and throw the entire management team of a new company into disarray.

“Staffing Dilemmas” are one of the top chaos-causing disruptions. How do you keep enough staffers working when everyone is out and about?

Here are some tips I’ve heard from small businesses:

•  Establish a policy as early in the year as possible. Don’t wait until everyone is asking you for time off to decide what your policy will be.
•  Be inflexible. If you apply the same policy to everyone there’s a better chance of everyone following it.
• Apply the same rules to yourself as you do to your staff.

What are your tips for surviving the holidays?