Staff Not Motivated?

[Owen]

Alright, so I'm trying to start a company with a couple friends. Recently, they haven't been taking it seriously. When I try to talk to them via Skype, they're always off topic and playing Minecraft or something. It's starting to get annoying. I don't want to stop the company or fire them because if I do I have nothing for this. I'm so stuck. What do I do?

[vangogh]

Welcome to the forum itsowenftw. Sorry about your situation. Honestly, though if your friends continue to be disinterested there's only one choice for the business. You have to move on without them. Not everyone has the drive to start and run a business at all points in their lives. Your friends may one day have that drive, but if an opportunity is there right now and they aren't interested, it's unlikely they're going to be any time soon. It could be the specific business has become less interesting or they just aren't at the point where starting any business is interesting.

Is this a business you can do on your own or do you absolutely need several people? If you do need several people do you know others who would be interested? If neither, is there a way to scale back the business so you could start something on your own and hire as you grow?

I don't know if there was any legal paperwork filed to form the company in some way, but I'm guessing there wasn't. If that's the case you don't have to fire your friends. Just work on a business on your own. They'll have moved on to other things by the time you're ready to really start the business and get it out there. Even if there is paperwork my guess is it won't be hard to undo the paperwork in some way. If you're friends truly aren't interested they aren't going to get in the way of you starting something on your own.

[Enya Ko]

Business is business.just fire them.to find someone who can help you and grow up with you.in that case your company will be grow in a healthy way.Good luck!

[KristineS]

If this is how they're acting now when you're trying to get things up and running, how will they be when there's daily work that needs to be done, some of which won't be that exciting? I'd say they've lost interest in whatever it is you're trying to do. Your best bet is to cut your losses and move on.

[Harold Mansfield]

Alright, so I'm trying to start a company with a couple friends. Recently, they haven't been taking it seriously. When I try to talk to them via Skype, they're always off topic and playing Minecraft or something. It's starting to get annoying. I don't want to stop the company or fire them because if I do I have nothing for this. I'm so stuck. What do I do?
Ditch them. This happens a lot. Something sounds like a good idea at first, till it's time to actually put the work in and everyone looses interest.
If they aren't committed the project is dead if you stay with them. If it's something that you can do alone or at least start laying some of the foundation, I would.

Here's a wake up call for them; Let them know how serious you are and that you are unhappy with their lack of focus and that you are moving forward without them. Ask them to sign a simple statement saying that they have no interest in doing anything with the idea so that they don't try and sue you later after you've done all of the work.

If you don't think you need that and have no fear of a later lawsuit, I'd just stop talking about it with them and start doing it on my own.
I have no patience for people who do this. I've had more than one friend come to me with ideas, only to lose interest when I explain the work involved to get started.

Dump them from the project and move forward.

[Wozcreative]

When doing business, friends or not, everyone must be assigned clear cut roles and responsibilities. You then must collectively create milestones and timelines, tasks and to-do's for everyone.
When a to-do is not met, you must figure out how to fix the situation. Wether the person stays to work longer hours, or someone drops what their doing and helps that person out.

If you don't have a clear guideline to how a business runs, then no one knows what their doing and nothing will get done.

[David Hunter]

As Vangogh said... have you done any legal paperwork?? Are there clear cut roles? If not, move on without them. Someone who wants to play games than actually work isn't going to make it very far.

[raveekumar]

It is common with many working employees, 1st thing that works is keep them engaged and set deadlines. If you have to take out 9 hours work give them 10 hours work to build pressure. Have a clear business policy for monitory detection for any non-performance.