Know when your business is investor ready
This happens when a business value chain is bigger, and the logistics are increasing. For instance, you may be getting many more clients, the processes are becoming more complicated, and you need more employees.
For example, you might be in the transport business and you want to buy trucks. You will get to a place you feel that the money you are getting from the business is not enough, so you need to inject more capital into the business.
In a small business, you might be working by yourself or with one more person at your restaurant, and it is doing well, but you realise that you need temporary staff for some extra tasks or you realise that you can start another branch but you don't have enough money to do so. You want to scale it up and leave a legacy. You may need more money than you have at this point.
Take care of your employees
Employees could be the weakest link in your business. As a small business, you may not have the funds that big corporates have to just pay people. They must bring in something.
You can also give them so much work that they feel that it is not a conducive place to work. Most people working in such small businesses will leave that job for a bigger organisation or the government. You need to treat your employees well and ensure they understand your vision and where you are going with the business. As the business grows, promote them. Do not bring in new people and impose them as managers on someone who started with you from scratch.
Listen to your employees. You might know what they do but as the business grows, there are some things that you will leave for your employees to do. When you hear something, there is a challenge or a problem that you are trying to sort out with the business, hear out the employee first.
The way you treat your employees will reflect on the way they treat your clients. If you treat them badly, they will treat your clients badly. If you treat them well, they will be excited to serve your clients and your business will flourish.