Building a small team has always involved a trade-off. While large companies have the luxury of affording specialists for just about every function, most founders, entrepreneurs, owner-operators and growing SMBs need to be more strategic in their hiring plan.
When you’re hiring employee number three, five, 10 or even 20, every person needs to contribute more broadly than their job title might suggest. The ideal hire may be someone whose skill set allows them to comfortably move between projects, solve problems independently and take ownership of work that falls outside their formal remit, rather than the best designer or analyst.
Qualifications aren’t the only indicator of versatility. Experience and attitude still matter. But certain courses and qualifications consistently produce graduates with skills that transfer well across departments and stages of business growth.
Communications has become one of the most commercially useful disciplines in business, largely because almost every business function depends on it and the ability to communicate clearly can have a direct impact on outcomes.
This is a big reason why graduates holding a masters in communication are often valued and versatile employees, especially within smaller organisations.
Many communications programs expose students to a broad range of disciplines, including strategic communications, audience analysis, media relations, digital publishing, research methodologies, stakeholder engagement and content development.
They also tend to emphasise presentation skills and understanding how different audiences consume information. A communications graduate can assist with anything from developing marketing campaigns, writing customer-facing materials, improving internal communications and supporting leadership presentations, all within the same month.
Business degrees have sometimes been criticised for being broad. Too broad? Well, for founders and managers, that breadth is often precisely the point.
When you look at your small business, can you say you operate in neat departmental silos? There is typically a lot of overlap in roles and departments, like someone working in operations may need to understand sales forecasts or a marketing coordinator might be expected to help prepare reports for management meetings.
Often, business graduates can adapt well to these environments because they have already been introduced to multiple business functions like finance, operations, marketing, human resources, economics, strategy and organisational behaviour during their studies.
When hiring, look for business candidates who have coupled their education with internships, volunteer positions, freelance projects or entrepreneurial ventures, because they’ve demonstrated a stronger ability to apply concepts in practical settings.
Marketing education looks very different today than it did a decade ago.
Traditional advertising concepts still have their place, but today’s marketing programs have a stronger emphasis on technical and analytical capabilities.
Students are often introduced to practical, applicable tasks like search engine optimisation, customer journey mapping, campaign analytics, marketing automation, content strategy, social media management and user behaviour analysis.
Marketing graduates now leave university ready to win customers, which is particularly attractive to small businesses. Rather than employing separate specialists to manage content, analytics and digital channels, businesses can often rely on one capable individual who understands how these activities connect and contribute to broader growth objectives.
Every founder has experienced the frustration of being unable to move on good ideas because no one owns the implementation process. This is where project management backgrounds can provide massive value.
Qualifications in project management tend to focus less on specific industries and more on universally applicable skills. Graduates often develop capabilities in scheduling, resource planning, stakeholder communication, risk identification, budgeting, process improvement and documentation.
These skills transfer very well across different business environments, whether you’re launching a new product, implementing software, redesigning a website or improving internal workflows.
Customer feedback, website traffic, sales reports, operational metrics and advertising data all provide insights that can influence decision-making. But you don’t need to look solely for data analysts.
Qualifications related to business analytics, statistics, economics, and data science can all help organisations make more informed decisions without needing a dedicated analytics department.
When hiring, remember the employee who can explain why customer acquisition costs are increasing or identify patterns in purchasing behaviour often creates more immediate value than someone capable of building sophisticated models that nobody else understands.
As businesses become increasingly dependent on data-driven decision-making, analytical literacy is likely to become an expectation rather than a differentiator.
Design qualifications are typically linked to things like aesthetics, logos, brochures and visual branding. These can all be helpful when setting up your business. But in reality, many contemporary design programs focus heavily on problem-solving, user experience and understanding customer behaviour. Graduates now have skills in website design, visual storytelling, interface development, brand consistency, customer journey mapping and presentation design.
For smaller companies, these applications can influence far more than visual appearance. A designer who understands how customers interact with products or websites can help improve conversions and strengthen brand perception. In businesses competing against larger and better-funded rivals, thoughtful design decisions often have a huge influence.
Discover how a qualification from UTS can help you achieve your career goals.
As one of Australia’s leading universities, UTS is known for its progressive approach to education and groundbreaking research. Our world-class research centres span disciplines including science, engineering, design, nanotechnology and sustainability, driving real-world breakthroughs that shape industries and communities.
