Cannabis Business: What Do Your Employees Need?

Cannabis business owners have a ton of responsibilities that reach far beyond acquiring a license to sell.

Owners are responsible to know the legal expectations of the business, defining work relationships that protect employees, creating a safe and motivating environment to prevent employee turnover, knowing how to properly train and maintain employee efficiency, and hold themselves and their employees accountable for their actions.

Our last two posts have discussed the various things that cannabis business owners need to do in order to build a compliant culture.

And in today’s post, we want to go deeper into what the employees need and how the owners can provide them with what they require in order to create a successful and long-lasting business.

Referring to Episode 3 of Ask The Regulator podcast, BuildMySOP’s Kady Cravens and Tom Mohan sat down with the cannabis industry’s “BS detector” herself Kristen Yoder to discuss the issues that are creating toxic environments for ‘Cannabusiness’ employees and the ways that owners can establish successful operations.

In this post, we wrap up the important points from the Episode 3 AskTheRegulator podcast and discuss how cannabis business owners can provide tools for employees to perform well and the benefits of investing in a system of standard operating procedures.

HOW TO HELP YOUR EMPLOYEES THRIVE IN YOUR CANNABIS BUSINESS

Provide Employees The Tools They Need To Perform Well
Incorporate An Employee Review Process
Invest In Standard Operating Procedures
SOPs Support Employee Accountability
SOPs Keep Record Of Employee Training
SOPs Set Clear Paths Of Communication
Benefits Of Having BuildMySOP

This is the third installment in a series of posts exploring cannabis business owners’ responsibilities to their business, to their employees, and to their consumers.

Provide Employees With the Tools They Need To Perform Well

The cannabis industry is no longer in its earliest stages of life. Now beyond its infancy, more and more tools have been developed to assist employees to perform tasks more efficiently.

But if employees do not have access to these tools or the proper training in how to use them, then they are not being supported to perform as well as they can and are not as well protected as they should be.

Employees should have access to step-by-step processes to perform the required tasks and feel supported in asking for help or further training to ensure they’re performing well.

And one way to provide employees with everything they might need to perform well is by using a set of standard operating procedures (SOPs) specifically designed for cannabis businesses.

SOPs help protect the business, the employees, and the consumers by documenting all reports, procedures, training, and important job-related information in one manageable and accessible place.

SOPs are a great way to manage employee onboarding and training for every position within the facility, and can help streamline operations, ensure that employees know what is expected of their job, and provide proper tools to help them perform tasks efficiently.

Incorporate an Employee Review Process

Again, owners have the responsibility to give employees the tools they need to exceed and have confidence in their performance.

But employee performance should be reviewed and discussed between owner/manager and employee to measure performance, create goals, celebrate wins, and simply check-in to see how the employee could be better supported.

Too often, employees feel overlooked and rarely have face-to-face time with business owners, and have little feedback on their overall performance.

By scheduling quarterly or 90- day reviews, owners can build relationships with their employees and ultimately benefit the entire business.

In these reviews, owners can take the opportunity to look over the recorded data in the SOP- incident reports, write-ups, and even customer service reviews and comments- and give appropriate feedback and praise.

It’s always good practice to give employees praise for things they’ve done well and set a goal for something that they can work towards to be reviewed in the next meeting.

It’s also a great opportunity to have a conversation with employees to know where they need more support from you and how to get them the tools they need.

This type of employee support makes employees better all around and creates a compliant work culture of employees that are trustworthy and work with integrity.

Why You Should Invest In Standard Operating Procedures

There is a lot of loss when cannabis business owners choose to operate without having standard operating procedures in place.

More than just losing money from start-up costs and basic business costs, owners lose money from lost product and employee training especially if there is high turnover rates.

By implementing standard operating procedures (SOPs), you are protecting your business, your consumers, and your employees.

SOPs Support Employee Accountability

No one likes working in an environment where they are unclear about what their role is, what is expected of them, or leaving them feeling completely unsure if they are performing their job correctly or not.

SOPs document all employee training, list procedures and operations that can always be referred to time and time again, and verify that the employee has been trained and agrees to the procedures with signed documents.

Thereby holding employees accountable for their roles as well as owners and managers for theirs.

Without having employee accountability, the work environment can feel unstable, unpredictable, and untrustworthy. The business is much more vulnerable to loss when employees are not held accountable to their actions.

SOPs can protect both the business and the employee by having documentation that protects both parties and holds everyone including owners, managers, and employees, accountable for their actions.

SOPs Keep Record of Employee Training

When a business is just starting out, employees may have to perform a multitude of jobs in order for the business to grow.

But as it continues to generate revenue, it’s important that the owners hire support to ease the workload that is on their employees and themselves and help create a more balanced work environment.

In the event that you hire more staff or lose a team member, having SOPs can help fill the gap while in the hiring process and then onboarding a new employee because you’ll know how to train their replacement and trust that other employees can follow the SOP procedures to perform the tasks efficiently.

When developing SOPs that are clear and concise, procedures need to be broken down into steps from start to finish and consider how to describe each step to someone who has never performed that task before.

SOPs Set Clear Paths of Communication

When something does arise in the workplace, employees need to know who it is they are supposed to report to and trust that they will feel supported in doing so.

To often employees are not given clear paths of communication and are unsure of who they can go to for extra support or questions, and often will leave the issue without any resolution, putting the business in a dangerous position.

Clear SOPs should provide points of contact for employees in given situations or departments and offer assurance in their need for support or clarity.

Benefits of "Build My SOP" Products

As founder and CEO of BuildMySOP Kady Cravens shared, “We’re following the rules so that we can play the game so that we can grow the weed so that we can sell the weed. And the more responsible practices that we create, the more power we give the plant. And that’s why I’m here at the end of the day.”

BuildMySOP is a standard operating procedure system that is specially designed to help support small cannabis businesses with their business operations including employee management.

Having standard operating procedures is an investment, but it’s an investment that saves your business money from all the risk it faces not having SOPs in place.

When regulators audit your business or when incidents occur that require investigations, the Regulators will always look for the business SOPs in place to see how they’re being utilized, how updated they are, how much training employees have, etc.

Oftentimes, the SOPs can save a business from having violations or even a suspended license because they’re proven their due diligence and efforts in creating and maintaining a compliant cannabis business.

BuildMySOP was created specifically for the cannabis industry and priced to serve small to medium-sized businesses so that they have access to a great system and can thrive in their operations.

Starting your business with the SOPs in place from day one will help create the compliant culture you need to succeed.

Next Steps

Business owners have a ton of responsibility in their operations and it is their job to implement practices that will protect their business, their employees, and their consumers.

Yoder believes there is hope to build a better industry, but everyone must do their part saying, “we have a long way to go before we have a fair, science-based, equitable industry. We must all do our part to be and teach the change we want to see.”

Knowing the regulatory laws in their city and state is crucial in order to protect their assets and build a safe work environment.

Cannabis business owners also need to know how to build a compliant culture in order to make and save money and protect employees and consumers.

Creating a safe environment is key to success, and there are tools available to help owners in their quest for a thriving workplace environment, including BuildMySOP.

Standard operating procedures help protect the business, employees, and consumers and should be a top priority for owners to manage and invest in.

For additional product and pricing information, visit our website.

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