Most Common Business Process Challenges

What's stopping you from building that business? I don't know if you've got a little internal dialogue or a little voice that pops up that goes, yeah, but you don't know my business, Dave. My business is different. This won't work for me because of this and that, or I tried to do this and it didn't work. Or like any number of excuses. I mean, I can come up with hundreds of excuses, but really, you know, one good excuse is enough to make you not do it. We need to start to squash some of those and really get you to lean in and commit to it. Because I think really what is stopping this working for you is you like, it's, it's what's in your head and how you're getting in the way of this whatever head trash you've got going on in there saying, yeah, but I'm not a systems guy, but I don't like technology, but this, you know, I don't like writing processes or whatever. The excuse, again, you can come up with excuses, it's all in here. The fact is, at some point you're going to need to put systems in place. Whether it's you documenting it or someone else documenting it or something. There's no way around this. So you need to figure out how to solve that. I think one of the biggest pieces of advice I can give you is you need to change that internal dialogue in your head and we need to get to the point where you say, I am the owner of a systems driven business. You don't need to be the systems person doing the documentation, but you, you need to believe that. Now, in the early days, I get it, you might just sound like words, I am the owner of. The other voice in your head goes, yeah, whatever you reckon, you don't follow process. We don't have any processes. What will need to happen for you to get there is you'll have to start to build evidence. And it's having a little checklist here, it's following a process there, it's reminding a team member to look at process, it's talking about process on team meetings, it's celebrating process wins. You, you start to put all of these bits of evidence in your business until the point, wow, there's so much evidence that we do have a systems driven business, but at the start you don't have any of that evidence and you're just going to have to really lean into this and we need to get you to the point where you've got some really strong beliefs around systems so I've written down just a couple of my beliefs around systems. I believe that business systems are essential building blocks of business. I think at the core of all great business are systems. I believe that your business isn't broken. I don't think you need to go out and buy some magical new system to solve a problem. Just make your business repeatable. Your business isn't broken. Let's just, we can continue to optimize and you are where you are. Let's capture what you're currently doing and then go to work on it. Every business problem is a systems problem. We talked about that. I believe that if something goes wrong in the business, it's not my team member's fault. We first look towards the system. Did the team member follow the system? Maybe that's a different discussion. But if it's not clearly articulated what it is that you want and the outcomes that you're looking for, it's very hard to hold someone accountable to it. So we always look towards the systems first. I believe that you can get extraordinary results by putting ordinary people into well designed systems. Like if there are great systems like McDonald's, you can get a 15 year old kid making hamburgers because they've got an extraordinary system. I think with the right systems you can plug average people in and still get an extraordinary result. I believe that systems development isn't a one and done scenario. It's an ongoing process. This is a permanent cultural change to the way that you think about and look at business. You need to inject this into the DNA of your business. I believe that accountability, transparency and measurement produce a results driven business. Part of why we get systems and processes in place is when we say this is our standard, then there's less wiggle room for team members to say, yeah, but I didn't know. I didn't know that's the way that you wanted things done. I didn't know that was the way we were meant to set up the equipment. I didn't know that we were meant to email the client after the job or to collect this particular information on site. Getting a documented system is one step closer to this accountability and transparency because you clearly define what it is that you expect to be done. And then we assign someone that responsibility. And when we give them that particular task, they know that there's a system that outlines what it is that your expectations are. It gives someone less wiggle room and gets everybody on the same page. I believe that the financial benefit of great systems far exceeds the cost of their implementation. That's a big one because it's really easy to go. This takes time and money to develop systems and processes and yes, it does. And we'll talk about allocating resources and team members to help drive this, especially because you're really, really busy. So there is an investment cost here, but I believe the payoff significantly outweighs the investment cost. And you're investing in an asset that will grow in time and continue to pay dividends for many years to come. Some of the systems that I've got in place today, I did the work once and we still use it to this day. Systems have this compounding effect. So I believe it's worth it. And I believed it was worth it even before some of the AI tools have come out. AI have actually sped up the process of documentation and getting some of this work done and developing policies and handbooks and things like that is a lot easier than it used to be. So it actually costs you a lot less to get done. But I thought it was worth it, even when you had to do it the good old fashioned way and write it out all by hand. So the value of the business is found in solid systems that consistently produce desired results. And I believe that business systems are your most valuable asset. Now you probably argue and say, what about your staff? Aren't they the most valuable asset? Or your clients or something like that. But I think clients and staff can come and go. Your processes, they're yours. That's your ip, that will remain with you and you can take it to your next business. You've got them for life. As you build this up, imagine having a suite of systems and processes for every new business that you set up. You're already 80% of the way there. Once you've proven and tested some of these systems and you're able to get to the result that you're after much quicker because you've already captured your way that makes it possible to duplicate success. So that's what I believe. Now my question is if I believe that the financial benefit of great systems far exceeds the cost to develop them. And I believe that the value of systems, the value of a business, is found in those solid systems. And I believe that systems are the most valuable asset.