Small Business Operations Manager: What They Do, How to Know if You Need One

According to a Guidant Financial study, small business owners are, on average, happy and confident in what they are choosing to do. More than a third rate their job happiness at a 10 out of 10, and a whopping 84% give it a rating of at least seven out of 10. But that doesn’t mean that owners of growing small businesses aren’t facing challenges, and hiring a business operations manager is becoming one common solution for many entrepreneurs. Discover exactly what an operations manager does and whether it’s time for you to extend your staff to include one.

Also check out our complete guide to operations management, how it helps your small business, and how to master it!

What Is a Business Operations Manager?

The role of operations management varies depending on the industry or size of company, but in a small to midsize business, a person in this position typically takes on a number of roles. Mathilde Collin, the Co-founder and CEO of Frontapp.com, notes that a good operations manager can cover five critical growth positions for a small business or startup:

• Human resources
• Office manager
• Finance and accounting
• Executive assistant
• Customer support

Some tasks that business operations managers might perform include creating and implementing new policies; handling administrative functions such as payroll, managing PTO requests and office supply acquisitions; managing inventory and invoicing; providing routine customer service and ensuring everyone else on staff has what they need to get jobs done.

Skills typically required or provided by staff in this position include administrative management and attention to detail, project and time management, communication, leadership, customer service and logistics management. Operations managers must have a broad understanding of the industries in which they work, how to lead various groups of people and business and office management. Their work can range from ordering toner for the copy machine to creating an expense budget for the entire business. Good candidates for these jobs tend to be analytic problem solvers who work well with others.

Potential Benefits of Hiring an Operations Manager

According to Guidant Financial, the top challenges faced by small business owners include:

• Lack of capital
• Marketing or advertising
• Time management
• Recruiting and retaining employees
• Handling bookkeeping tasks
• Managing employee benefits

Setting aside the first item, which is related to funding, you can see that an operations manager provides assistance with every other item on this list. He or she takes that burden off of other staff, who can then concentrate on growing the company, developing products or handling specific tasks dedicated to certain business goals.

For the small business owner or CEO, this shouldering of the day-to-day administrative burdens can be enough of a reason to hire an operations manager. Top reasons for entrepreneurs to start a business include a desire to be their own boss, pursuit of a passion, or dissatisfaction with corporate structures. When Guidant Financial asked business owners why they started a company, no one said it was because they enjoyed paperwork or the day-to-day tasks required to keep an office or other facility in working order.

But operations managers offer benefits that extend beyond freeing the owner from tasks that they don’t want to perform. Here are just a few.

• Operations managers aren’t tied specifically to one business goal; their purview is the overall health of the business. That frees them to plan for and attend to matters everyone else may be too busy to handle, such as the uncomfortable temperature in an office or the fact that the break room supplies are running low. Handling these small issues on a consistent basis helps boost the morale of everyone on the team, which in turns helps drive up the likelihood of success with production, revenue or other bottom-line goals.
• Hiring an operations manager doesn’t have to be budget-busting. While some companies look for someone with a bachelor’s degree and relevant business experience, smaller companies that want to bring in an operations manager early might consider someone who is less experienced but has the organizational skills, communication ability and work ethic required.
• Since an operations manager can fill a few roles in a growing small business, it saves you from having to hire multiple people right away. That lets you manage your budget better and use what funds you do have on the best staff and supporting growth.
• Operations managers can take on critical customer service roles even before you’re able to build out customer success teams — which is important, since 14% of small businesses fail because they ignore their customers. Collin recommends hiring for this position before you hire marketing and customer support positions — at her own company, an operations manager was her 11th hire.

Is Your Company Ready to Take This Step?

Many small business owners balk at the expense of hiring an ops manager. One of the biggest reasons SMBs avoid filling this type of role is that it’s not directly tied to revenue generation. If you own a bakery and you hire more bakers, those people are tied to increased production. That’s in turn tied to increased sales. If you own an app company and you hire more developers, the same is true.

But if you hire an operations manager, how can you ensure you’re getting return on your investment? Colin Hewitt, the CEO and co-founder of Float, writes about his own struggle with this conundrum. When he did hire an ops manager, though, he says it was a game changer.

He notes that the operations manager was the first person he brought on that actually took things off his plate so he could concentrate on growing his company. “If you’re the CEO of a startup and you’re planning to grow beyond 10 people,” says Hewitt, “Stop thinking you’re saving money and go and hire the smartest, most adaptable person you can to work with you on this.”

Here are a few questions you can ask yourself to understand whether hiring an operations manager is the right step for your business.

• Are you so busy with day-to-day management of administrative tasks that you can’t spend the time you need to put plans in motion to grow your company?
• Do you end each day feeling exhausted, unfulfilled with your business endeavor and as if you have more things on your to-do list than when you started that morning?
• Are your staff members taking on jobs you didn’t intend for them to do because no one else is available to handle critical support tasks?
• If you’ve hired specialists to handle product development or any other aspect of your business, are they unable to give 100% attention to those tasks because they are constantly being pulled by other company obligations?
• Do you have the revenue or capital to pay for another professional on your staff without jeopardizing the company?

If you can answer yes to one or more of these questions, then it might be time to consider hiring an ops manager. According to Hewitt, this one decision made the biggest positive impact to his life as CEO at Float. And while Hewitt and Collin both support making this hire as soon as you’re able and have the need, remember to take time and find the right person. If you’re going to have one employee taking on multiple critical roles, quality is definitely important.

Once you hire your new operations manager, you’ll have more time to invest in developing practical and positive business partnerships to grow your company. Consider becoming a Groupon Merchant and joining more than a million local businesses that have used the platform to grow their customer bases and increase revenue. With a capable operations manager at your side, you’ll be able to scale up and meet the demand that Groupon marketing can create.