2015. It’s here, folks. It’s the first week back after the holiday season; it’s a week that has a lot of potential for productivity because we’re all in this “fresh start/get serious” mindset.
In finishing up last year, we shared information on prepping your marketing for upcoming year. The Fashion Business Financial Checklist and the Fashion Business Marketing Checklist have been hits with making that happen.
So if you’ve been following along, you’ve probably done your 2015 planning and your budget analysis for how you’re going to make this year even better than last year in the eyes of the brand and the consumer. But there’s one more thing to consider…do you have the team to pull it off?
The people who make your brand; the people who surround you each day; the people who help achieve the 2015 goals…they need to be awesome. There is no good reason to settle for “she’s sort of awesome”…you want “she IS awesome,I need her!” Because when you have an incredible team, it shows. Your customers will feel it and see it through the quality of the work you put forward.
So if you’re in the growth stage of your fashion business, let’s make the team a priority in 2015. If you are a brand in today’s fast moving technologically savvy world, there are 5 types of people you want on your team to help you build your brand:
The Analyst: The person who gets nitty gritty. He or she is in the weeds and making sure the numbers follow suit. Are we really where we’re supposed to be? Is that campaign really a success? This person will help us be realistic about our goals and endeavors.
The Project Manager: The person who keeps us all in line and on schedule. We all need one of these to make sure we’re delivering on time.
The Go-Getter: The person who doesn’t just do what we ask, but brings awesome ideas to the team. She’s the one who comes to meetings with things we haven’t even thought of doing yet–but love that she has!
The Innovator: The person who won’t settle for where we are today. Because why should we? This person will help us think into 2016 and 2017 today. They’ll help get us there through future thinking so we don’t get left behind.
The Fearless: The person who wants to challenge the brand. This person isn’t afraid of being told “no, you’re wrong.” If they are wrong, that’s ok. They’ll try another idea next week or month and see if that works.
The Treat Bringer: The person who comes to meetings with lattes, macaroons, and/or cupcakes. Just kidding. (not really).
OK, we’re not all ready to add 5 new team members in our business (that’s freakin’ expensive) but we can look for these qualities in the people or person we are ready to bring on board. This is a list to keep on hand so that when we’re ready to add a new member, we reference what we’re missing and look to fill in the blanks.
Marci
Thank you. This was a great read and a right on target for where I am in building my brand. Now on to finding these individuals that I have been looking for. I pray to find the best group to start a successful launch.
rupali
hi, this article sure was helpful. but as a fashion designer I started my brand named pralii, I’m at a growth stage , just opened my showroom but it’s not in main market area.I want to hire a team but I am extremely unsure about the same : do I hire a business development manager , sales team , a merchandiser .I have hired a PR and marketing firm so marketing is taken care of. But I am more concerned on the selling bit , bagging big orders, placing my products in multi designer stores etc basically what should be team composition of a new brand looking at selling perspective . please suggest what shall I do . 🙂 your help will be much appreciated