One of the most vital steps a franchisor can take to ensure the long-term profitability of one of their franchises is to provide proper training and support to their franchisees and their franchisees’ staff. The goal of proper training is to minimise the amount of time required before the franchisee can get their franchise up and running and thereby generating revenue for themselves and for the franchisor, while appropriate support from the franchisor can aid in minimising any problems the franchisee might experience in the day-to-day running of the franchise.
In this article, several aspects to the training and support processes will be discussed and guidelines suggested for franchisors, based on advice from the franchising bookGrow Smart, Risk Less by Shelly Sun.
Before signing the franchisee
Before you can begin training your franchisees, you must create the necessary training procedures required to fully train someone in how to run a franchise of your company. Your intuition may be to create these training procedures yourself – after all, you are a senior person in the company (if not the founder), and who could be more qualified than you to explain how the company works?
However, this intuition can be misleading; many companies can benefit from bringing in an outside consultant to develop the training procedures, as an outsider with no prior history with the company may be able to identify parts of the business which may prove confusing or difficult for a newcomer, and which may hence require more training than you might initially believe. Think of it like a musical instrument: an expert musician has an excellent grasp of their chosen instrument, so much so that they may not be able to put themselves in the shoes of someone who has never played the instrument before; whereas a music teacher may have a better understanding of the hurdles and obstacles that will present themselves to a novice musician.
As with all things, this depends heavily on the industry and sector of the franchise: a retail franchise, for example, may not require a great deal of highly specialised training, whereas a more technically-oriented franchise can greatly benefit from the perspective of an outside consultant.
Support from signing the franchisee to opening the franchise
The period after the franchisee has signed an agreement with the franchisor but before the new franchise is trading are the most vital to ensure the new franchise becomes profitable: every minute wasted is burning through both your resources and the franchisee’s without generating revenue at the same time. Below are some useful guidelines for this period and some common pitfalls that tend to befall inexperienced franchisors.
Introduction and point person
For companies that have only recently begun franchising, the point of contact for the franchisee will likely be a senior person in the company, such as the CEO. This approach has its benefits, especially for young companies with limited resources, but as the company grows and the number of franchisees increases, the benefits of having a dedicated franchisee “point person” become impossible to ignore.
If the CEO has to respond to innumerable queries and requests from franchisees on a daily basis, that will hinder their ability to run the company as a whole effectively and ensure its smooth operation. It is much better in the long run to hire an individual (or even create a field support department within your company, depending on its size) to specifically handle dealing with franchisees, and the sooner you can bring this individual into your company and have them exclusively deal with franchisees, the better. The head of field support will have much closer contact with franchisees than the CEO could, and can identify potential issues in advance of their causing problems for the franchise.
Training programs
Obviously, franchisors must provide a training programme prior to the opening of the new franchise. However, one useful method suggested by a franchisee was to split the training programme into two parts: a couple of days’ training within 30 days of the franchisee signing the franchise agreement, and a supplementary training period 60-90 days thereafter, when the core staff is in place and the franchise is ready to open. Using this method, the franchisor can provide initial training to the franchisee before they open the business, and later resolve any unforeseen problems they may have encountered immediately prior to the opening phase of the business. Every franchise in your franchise network is different and will face different issues and obstacles: by tailoring your training programme to the specific needs and requests of each franchisee, you can help to ensure that each franchise runs as smoothly as possible. The exact time and duration of the training periods should be left to the discretion of the point person, who has primary oversight on franchisees.
Some franchisors, mindful of the costs associated with training multiple people (such as by providing them with bed and board during the training periods), will attempt to cut corners by only offering training to the franchisee themselves, and not to the franchisee’s core team as well. In the long run, you will almost always be better off training the core team in addition to the franchisee, so that every core member of staff in the new franchise will be familiar with the ins and outs of running the business.
Finally, training should not be limited to the official training periods either: wherever possible, you should afford franchisees the opportunity to learn “passively” in their own time. A good way to do this is by creating a learning management system (LMS), a platform in which you can upload training materials that franchisees and their staff can consume at their own pace. These can consist of training manuals, sample business documents, presentations, videos or even interactive materials. The sooner you create your LMS and begin adding content to it, the faster it will grow into a comprehensive and detailed repository of training materials, which will help to streamline the training process and will cut down on the costs associated with classroom learning.
Ongoing support
When designing the support network that will assist your franchisees, make sure to hire several subject matter experts (SMEs) with their own specialisations relating to the running of the business (operations, financials, sales etc.). Some franchisors make the mistake of creating support programmes which are overly sales-focussed, which unintentionally results in lost productivity and revenue down the line, as franchisees are not fully equipped to deal with financial or operations issues. By hiring SMEs with diverse backgrounds and areas of experience, you will ensure that the support you provide covers all aspects of the day-to-day running of the business. By the same token, when evaluating prospective franchisees, make sure not to only select individuals with sales experience; individuals lacking in sales experience but with relevant financial or operations experience that they can bring to bear on a franchise can also be worthy of consideration.
Support centre
Once you have several franchises up and running, consider creating a support centre for franchisees. The support centre should focus on addressing technical questions and small requests relating to the operation of the franchise (e.g. payroll, billing clients and so on), and can be an excellent tool to improve franchisee satisfaction and ensure each franchise runs as smoothly as possible. Support centres are particularly advantageous for franchisees with sales experience, as they can remain out in the field making sales calls and delegate the operation of the franchise to their staff, with assistance from the support centre. The support centre can also keep track of how many calls they have received from each franchisee: if a particular franchisee is becoming too dependent on the support centre for assistance, you can send a field support agent to the franchise (see below) or suggest that the franchisee and/or their staff attend additional training sessions.
Field support
In the hierarchy of support you provide, technical questions and small requests should be dedicated to the remote support centre (as mentioned above), while field support will meet with the franchisee in person and will focus on reviewing a franchisee’s operation and developing an action plan with the franchisee. The most important skills for a field support agent are leadership, the ability to establish mutual respect and trust, and the ability to have difficult conversations with franchisees.
However, field support agents should also have strong financial acumen and an understanding of the financial aspects to running a franchise. To this end, you might consider hiring a franchisee financial services director (FFSD), who can train your franchisees who are lacking in financial skills and experience. By doing so, you can direct all franchisee queries about cash flow, payroll etc. to the FFSD, the most qualified person to offer advice and guidance.
Technology options for supporting franchisees
Numerous technology options are available to assist you in offering training and support to your franchisees. The technological solution you choose should be a stable, regularly updated platform, on which you can host your LMS, automate as many business processes as possible, and allow your franchisees to communicate with each other and work together collaboratively. Useful examples of platforms such as these include WebEx and SharePoint.
Concluding remarks
Appropriate training and support can be the single most important decision affecting your revenue: a properly trained franchisee given all the resources they need to resolve issues and answer queries will be a valuable asset to your company, as opposed to an improperly trained franchisee who is left to fend for themselves as soon as their franchise opens. By investing in training programmes early on and designing them to suit the needs of your franchisees, you can potentially save yourself thousands in lost revenue, lost productivity and wasted resources.