My Passion for Streamlining Processes
I like streamlining processes and making things easier for myself, my team, and partners.
As a small business owner you are usually going in many directions every day. It’s our job to decide what is a priority and how we are going to improve our daily operations.
3 Key Options to Growing
There are key options we usually have:
- Hire more people
- Find New Tools that can help you be more productive
- Improve the way we do things
Hiring More People Without a Plan is a big Mistake
When you hire more people you are able to buy more knowledge, time, and experience. But as a small business owner the biggest challenge is finding time to build that team. If you build it, how do you improve the probability of someone delivering on what you need?
Yes it starts by training people. But more importantly, you have to communicate clear targets, objectives, and goals. Even before hiring them, you have to make sure that they align with your business strategy. Surrounding yourself with the right team can be overwhelming and most people have a hard time knowing where to start.
Which are the Right Tools?
Another obstacles is identifying which tools are the best for the jobs you need done. I recommend looking into what is taking a lot of your time and using efficient tools.
I use tools in my business for:
- Invoicing
- Proposal Creation & Management
- Small Business CRM
- Time Tracking
- Project Management
- and other business functions.
The details of how I receive value from these tools are topics for my newsletter.
Look at the Process First
But no matter what tools you choose or the people you hire, I always recommend to look at process first.
Many business managers buy software without understanding if it fits their business model. They usually do the same when hiring.
You can’t recommend a tool without looking at the process of how things work and how this will affect work flow.
Why does the probability of failure increase?
When humans develop certain habits, they might assume they are being productive; we get used to doing things in one way. Because most of the time we have repeated certain tasks we usually increase productivity. As technologies and client’s needs changes, we should constantly reevaluate processes.
We also learn in different ways and are usually resistant to relearn. Even if there are 100 other ways of doing something, we stick with the usual way.
Adding Value and Maximizing Resources
Building and improving the process will always add value and save on resources. It may increase productivity and save money.
So why are most people not focusing on the process?
When I visit a clients and listen to some of the problems they face, I start to identify process issues. There are some people who will continue to suffer for sometime because they continue to operate the same way. They end up digging their projects and businesses into a deeper hole. I am all about looking into how to dig people out of the hole.
The main reason why people ignore processes is because of past experiences. As humans we usually reference things from what we experience. We make decisions based on what we think is important. Some scenarios involve having someone with a vision and some guts to face certain risks. Those risks might be critical for helping the business grow and learn new lessons.
For most small business owners, they feel that they can only control how much they spend in resources. They know they can put so much time or money into something.
Rarely are they able to see how much money they are throwing away, how much money is not coming in because they have overlooked fixing the process, or how much money a process saves them.
Realizing the Right Infrastructure and Planning will help You Succeed
As a process oriented business consultant, it is hard for me to understand why others continue to run their businesses without the basic infrastructure.
If you read up to this point, you might want to read more of some of my process improvement experiments I run in my business and for some clients.
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In the coming weeks I will be sharing practical examples of how to setup a process oriented business.
What process are you having issues with?
Get In touch with me directly. I might be able to find a solution.