A lot of my clients resist formalising their business routines, at first. I can understand this, it certainly isn't a sexy subject and there are usually larger, pressing, issues also at hand.
However, if you do a bit of root cause analysis you can soon trace back some of the bigger issues in your business to these smaller tasks that possibly aren't being handled in the right way...
One of my clients very recently grumbled about us looking at their 'trivial' tasks. A little bit of consequential thinking and lo and behold disaster was lurking around the corner.
Are these examples really trivial?
- Chasing up debtors?
- Checking the parameters of a process before starting a shift?
- Cleaning up the data in a computer system?
- Meeting with your staff to ensure that the day to day operations are running correctly?
- Reviewing the training records of your staff to ensure that any tickets or licenses are up to date?
- Updating the maintenance logs of key pieces of equipment?
I'm sure that you can see the problem that will creep up if you ignore these 'vital habits' for too long.
At some point my clients do come round to the idea of routines, when they see that they produce tangible results relatively quickly. They usually have some form of unwritten routine in place already, it's just a job to capture the bits that they aren't doing. Habits can cease when we get busy, and defining formal routines can be the aid we need to remember what is important and needs to be done, especially when our heads are spinning from the volume of work we are trying to handle.
Do you have formalised routines in your business?
Giles Johnston
P.S. If you are looking for some ideas on improving your business routines then check out my book 'Sunrise Meetings' in PDF format, or for Amazon Kindle.
