Attract Top Talent for Your Interior Design Business

As an interior designer, you are your own brand. Because your brand is so personal, hiring the right employees is an extremely important part of building your business. You'll want people who share your core values and really get under the skin of your objectives. Here's how to attract top talent for your interior design business.

Find people aligned with your core values

The first step is to identify your core values, both as a person and a business. There are many challenges that come with being an entrepreneur, but the primary challenge is getting your team right. You need to be clear on the culture that you want to create within your company. You then bring people on board who understand your core values and have similar core values themselves, because that makes everything else easier - from team synergy and good energy to achieving goals.

Once you’ve got the team right, everything else will work around that. For example, if one of your employees needs training in technical drawings, they can go on a training course. If they have the right attitude, they will learn - and they will have the right attitude because they will share the value that you place on learning.

So now you know the kinds of people you want to employ - but how do you attract them? Here are our top tips to attract top talent for your business.

Write compelling job descriptions.

A job description should be a snapshot of what life looks like working in your company. The more accurate and specific you can be in your description of the role, the more likely you'll be to attract the right person to fill it. Potential candidates want to feel properly briefed on what is required so they can gauge whether to not they're suited to the job. They also want to get an idea of the company culture and personality. If your style is laidback and informal with casual clothes and a chilled attitude, write the job description to reflect that. You want people to know what they’re getting themselves into as much as you want to know if they're right for the role.

Know the right time to hire

Many designers are reluctant to hire more people because they fear the increased overheads. This is a valid concern, but the concept is also a bit chicken and egg - hire too soon and you might run into financial difficulties, but if you don't hire when necessary, you run the risk of being overwhelmed by an increased workload and have existing employees leave as they become unhappy with impossible expectations.

You'll need to monitor the workload of your team and listen to their feedback so you know how much is too much. If you have to push deadlines back in order to finish elements of your projects, you need to hire additional help. It will also help you to think differently about hiring - hiring more people is not purely an expense. It's an investment to drive more revenue to you so that you can take on more clients. If necessary, take a course in business and finance that will help you to understand profit and loss and forecasting in order to accurately assess your financial situation and available budget.

Build an attractive company culture

Everyone wants to work at a place where they get recognition for their successes and opportunities to learn. Openly acknowledging and expressing appreciation for your employees' work plays a huge part in attracting people and also in retaining them. Simply put, it pays to say "thank you." Another key element of successful company culture is the idea that there are no wrong answers. A collaborative environment where everyone is encouraged to be creative and present ideas freely, regardless of their job title or experience, is a happy one. If your employees can try something without fear of failure, it will open your business up to a flood of ideas and creativity. If you try something and it doesn’t work, you learn from it and try something else.

Create learning opportunities

Investing in learning opportunities for your team not only makes them happy, but it also makes them more skilled and therefore better at what they do. It's a no brainer then that the more you can facilitate learning opportunities, the better your team becomes and the more profitable your business will be. Explore different types of learning, not just shunting them off to a training course every few months. Get people to come in and talk to them about skills like leadership, communication and project management. Set up a mentor system within your company so everybody has a trusted person to talk to - even if you have to mentor each employee for the first several years.

FCI London's Trade Services

You may not know this, but FCI was started by an enterprising married couple with a deep passion for furniture and design. From humble roots that included driving around Italy with a translator to find beautiful furniture to bring back to the UK, to gradually growing into one of London's largest luxury furniture and interiors brands, we know a thing or two about building a business. We'd love to be your support as you grow yours. Read more about our story here or sign up for a free trade account here and let us help you on your journey.