Over the holidays my father and I were "talking shop" across the breakfast table while he and Elizabeth were visiting. Our wives were giving us a look that entrepreneurs know well. It was the can't-we-talk- about-anything-but-business look.

You see, my father and I both possess something we call Entrepreneurial Spirit. Basically... we love this stuff!

Later that weekend, Dad and I moved our conversation to a more appropriate venue, in front of a football game where neither of us cared about the outcome.

We posed to each other the question "What single factor has the most influence on ultimate success for a private duty company?" Our consensus answer was "Entrepreneurial Spirit". The chief executive must be a leader, must love business in general and home care specifically, and must be a visionary.

Chief executives who are driven by an internal entrepreneurial spirit are frequently successful in this business. Let's face it, private duty home care at its core is a pretty easy business, the demand for your product is increasing with no end in sight. Driven executives find ways to reach out to their audiences and recruit talent and improve efficiency... and the rest takes care of itself, right?

On the other hand, private duty home care has also been likened to juggling. I have a good friend who is a professional juggler. He talks about the "seventh ball". Juggling starts with three balls. Next you add a fourth, which is only two for each hand. You increase to six, which is fast-paced but definitely doable. The seventh ball however is the one where most jugglers fail. Each ball after number six becomes exponentially more difficult. The worst part about the seventh ball is that only professionals know how difficult it is. Juggling six and juggling seven look virtually the same to the audience.

The non-medical home care business is surprisingly similar. As your business grows, the challenge of keeping all the balls in the air increases exponentially. True entrepreneurs actually begin to thrive in this environment.

It's my belief that entrepreneurs aren't taught, they are grown. Here are six tips for determining if you have "entrepreneurial spirit", and helping you grow it.

Know your weaknesses, and strengths -- Most people know their strengths. Successful business leaders also know where they are weakest. This could be a personal weakness, or weakness in their business. Are you an idiot when it comes to technology? Do numbers boggle your mind? Perhaps you're not a "people person". Is your company making poor hiring decisions? Top executives admit their weaknesses and find ways to improve or eliminate them altogether.

Surround yourself with people who complement you -- I'm not organized and I don't pay enough attention to details. I admit this weakness. My right-hand person, Kyley Hoffman, is amazing with the details. I literally say "what's next?" and she tells me. Since she came on board my life and my work has improved dramatically. I enjoy creative people, big picture thinkers, and visionaries. But if I surrounded myself exclusively with these people, I'd never get any actual work finished. Find people who possess complementary skills and surround yourself.

Hire people who are smarter than you, exclusively -- Our company recently hired a lead web designer for our Web-Centric Marketing and Recruiting program. I only had one requirement for the position "the successful candidate must be smarter than me." I'm not suggesting that you pass out an IQ test at the interview. But make sure you hire people who bring something to the table. I interviewed 14 individuals for the position. Many of the first 13 were quality candidates who could have carried out the job requirements. The 14th interviewee, however, was the only one who clearly demonstrated that he would be able to improve our company capability in dramatic fashion. Every new hire on your administrative and support staff team must be able to bring something new.

Ask more questions, offer fewer answers -- John Hamm of Harvard Business Review recently wrote an article called "The Five Messages a Leader Must Manage". He talked about how many small business leaders understand their business better and are more passionate about it than anyone else in their company. For this reason they tend to be teachers and mentors rather than students. This, however, is a mistake. If you become a student your company can grow. If you are exclusively a teacher and mentor your company growth will cease the very moment that you get the "seventh ball" in the air. Now that you've surrounded yourself with people who complement your skills, and hired people who are smarter than you, it's time to become a student of them. Start asking questions rather than offering solutions. Questions generate ideas. Ideas create long-term growth.

See the Big Picture -- Several years ago Leading Home Care did a research project where we asked home care executives to identify the most important factors of leadership. The number one factor was "seeing the big picture". Executives need not only to understand their company, but need to have a vision that's bigger. How does your company impact your clients, your employees, your community, the home health care industry in your state and across the country? How important and significant is your company? Furthermore, you need to be able to communicate that big picture to your team and to demonstrate how individual tasks are critical to this big picture. Dedicate yourself to growing a company that is important and significant.

Finally, Be Hands-on -- You've identified your weaknesses, hired smart staff to complement you, asked lots of questions and given them the big picture. You've developed a well oiled machine ready for future growth! Congratulations! Now it's time to get to work. Get involved. Sit in on team meetings. Get to know every aspect of your business. When things get busy, pitch in and help. Then, when the time is right toss that seventh ball into the air!

Whether you're ready or not for the "seventh ball", Stephen Tweed, CEO of Leading Home Care, can help. If you think you might be ready, call Stephen Tweed and bring his knowledge and experience to your table.

Strategic planning for the future can help you grow your company. Stephen's industry knowledge, coupled with his experience in the strategic planning process is unparalleled.

To learn more about our consulting and coaching process for private duty CEOs and chief executive teams, please visit the Leading Home Care website.

Over the past several weeks, we have been sharing research and data with you regarding our new caregiver pre-employment assessments and the powerful effect that this new technology can have on your bottom line. The biggest areas for improvement using these assessments are in caregiver retention, and in client satisfaction.

Our research shows that the two most important factors for clients of Private Duty Home Care are:

1. Dependability - your caregiver shows up on time as scheduled
2. Continuity - the same caregiver comes every time.

You can increase caregiver dependabilty, and therefore continuity of care by doing a better job of selecting your caregivers. An effective tool you can use as part of your selection system is our Leading Home Care Caregiver Assessments. These assessments include the following three components, which have been proven by research to be the most effective in predicting job performance, job satisfaction, and retention.

1. Contemporary Integrity Assessment

Measures three core traits:

1. Dependability – Measures the risk that an applicant will be undependable, careless, lazy or disorganized
2. Honesty/Integrity – Measures the risk for dishonest behavior
3. Hostility/Aggression – Measures the risk of a person being aggressive, hostile, disruptive and have poor control of their anger

With three optional scales:

• Substance Abuse – Measures the risk of substantial use of alcohol or illegal drugs
• Sexual Harassment – Measures the risk of behaviors that are likely to be considered harassment by others
• Computer Misuse – Measures the risk of using computers in ways that are unrelated to work

2. Personality and Behavior Assessment

Based on “Big 5” personality research, the most effective available tool compares applicants' scores with scores of successful caregivers. The developers of this powerful tool have already benchmarked the scores for the Home Caregiver job. This portion of the assessment can be administered to current employees to produce a coaching report that will help your current employees be more effective in their job. The personality and behavior section measures six core traits:

1. Conscientiousness – the degree to which the person is persistent, motivated, and organized
2. Tough Minded – the degree to which the person is pleasant and agreeable, warm, tolerant, and tactful
3. Conventional – the degree to which the person is predictable, follows rules, and is structured
4. Extroversion – the degree to which the person is outgoing, dominant, ambitious, and sociable or introverted, shy and quiet
5. Stable – the degree to which the person is emotionally stable and resistant to stress, ranging from well adjusted and calm to being sensitive and anxious
6. Team – measures the person’s attitudes toward teamwork versus individualized work environments

3. Cognitive Reasoning Assessment

This is a general reasoning scale that measures problem solving and learning speed.

The integrity and personality assessments both include a distortion index, a validity scale that measures the degree to which the applicant responded frankly to the assessment items or responded in such a way as to make a good impression (in other words, a “faking” scale). All assessments include behavioral interview questions to follow up on assessment items of concern. These suggested behavioral interview questions will be really helpful to you as you interview prospective caregivers.

Assessments, scoring and reports are available on-line. They can be given on paper, if necessary, and then keyed into your on-line administration area for scoring and accessing reports. Applicants can complete all three assessments in about a half hour.

When you sign up to take advantage of this new technology, you will receive a Leading Home Care training e-manual and my personal assistance by phone to help you get started. The manual includes an in-depth explanation of how to do behavioral interviewing, how to get applicants to open up, how to increase job acceptance rates, and how to improve your reference check process, among other things.

For a complete description of our new process, assessments, reports, pricing and logistics, click on this link. To sign up, email me at Kathy@leadinghomecare.com or call me at (502) 339-0653.

You've heard us say that state and national home care associations are the grass roots of home care in America. We're committed to working closely with all of the associations in our industry to serve their members.

On January 22, 2007, Stephen Tweed, our CEO, will be in Scottsdale, Arizona for the Private Duty Home Care Association Leadership Summit. He'll be leading a panel discussion on selling home care to baby boomers, and another on how Medicare certified home health agencies can benefit from Private Duty.

On March 12, 2007, Stephen will be in Orlando, Florida for the National Private Duty Association Annual Conference. Stephen has spoken at three of the four previous NPDA conferences.

This year, Stephen will be presenting the results of our research on selling to and working with Long Term Care Insurance companies. You won't want to miss this program if you do any work at all with clients who have LTC insurance.

Private Duty Today! is published every other Wednesday by Leading Home Care . . . a Tweed Jeffries company. We invite you to pass this newsletter along to your friends and colleagues in Private Duty Home Care by clicking on the link below.

• Publisher - Stephen Tweed, CSP
• Circulation Manager - Diane West
• Editor - Jason Tweed
• Recruiting & Selection Editor - Kathy Clater

Permission to Reproduce: Permission is granted to home care companies, home care associations, and home care related publications to reproduce articles from this newsletter as long as appropriate credit is given as follows: "Printed with permission from Private Duty Today! Copyright 2006 Leading Home Care ... To sign up for your FREE Subscription, log on to www.privatedutytoday.com."

You may also sign up for your FREE Subscription to Stephen Tweed's Leading Home Care Report. This bi-weekly electronic newsletter is written for home care company CEOs and senior executives who want to grow their businesses and multiply their performance.