With about 2,000 employees, Vince Ruffolo has a large amount of employees to choose from for a promotion. The co-founder, chairman and CEO of A&R Security Services Inc. looks for employees who work hard and who are willing to go the extra mile for the security company, which posted more than $45 million in 2008 revenue.
“He or she is not a manager, but anytime you ask them to do something … the person is always willing to work and always willing to help the company out,” he says.
Smart Business spoke with Ruffolo about how to be a good leader and choose the best managers.
Q. What are the keys to being a good leader?
You have to be pretty good in picking people out. In other words, picking out the people that are eventually going to manage for you.
Myself and another guy started this business in 1967. We managed no one but ourselves. It’s easy to manage yourself. But, when you start hiring people, it’s a different story. You’ve got to treat everyone with respect. When it comes down to picking out those people that are going to be your managers — I want to tell you, I’ve picked out winners and I’ve picked out some losers. Especially, that goes for sales.
But, for the most part, I’ve picked out winners. I guess what you need to do to be a good businessman and to be a good leader, you’ve got to realize that when you have made a mistake with a person in a management position, and you promoted somebody beyond his or her capabilities, you have to part company.
That is probably one of the biggest obstacles is keeping somebody on a job and you know they are just not able to do it. You are just hoping they’ll change and you are just hoping that it’s going to work out, and, in the end, it doesn’t work out and you are not doing that person a favor. You are certainly not doing anything for your business or anything for your company.
Q. How long do you give someone before letting him or her go?
I think it depends on how bad they are performing, but I would say a year. I’ve kept people on longer than that thinking they’d change and they didn’t. … Again, it depends on how badly they are screwing up. Sometimes it’s real clear-cut, and that is the easy decision.
