This week is all about process & systems

As your business grows, it is common to find that the operational processes, which previously worked well, become strained as they scale to meet increasing customer demands or a pivot in strategy.

In this section we will explore how refining your operational processes can deliver: efficiency for growth, value for customers, and competitive advantage. In addition, we will explore various software platforms to help manage this growth.

Keep in mind...  your quest for operational excellence will fall into three categories
PROCESS / PEOPLE / TECHNOLOGY

We will cover...

Whether you offer a product or a service, and whether your offer is business-to-business (B2B) or business-to-consumer (B2C), it is important to audit every area of your business.  For each of the below areas, you should be consistently asking yourself and your team... What can be systemized? What can be automated?  What can be outsourced?

Step One - Process Mapping

The objective of process mapping is to explore how you can improve a process to make it more efficient.  

Here is what you're looking for...

1. Faster Process Completion
This could mean you can deploy fewer people, or reduce the time taken to produce a product or serve a customer. Both of these can result in increased availability or improved service.

2. Cost Reduction
Efficient processes often require fewer raw materials and less time, reducing the total cost of delivery. This saving can be passed on to your customers, increasing competitiveness. 

3. Higher Quality Outputs
The more efficient a process becomes, the less likely it is to produce outputs that are defective or of inferior quality. This enables you to focus on process or product changes to improve your quality standards, rather than focusing on maintaining existing standards. This could enhance your competitive advantage in the marketplace.

To understand a process, you need to look in detail at every step. Each stage of the process may seem obvious to you. However, by taking the time to assess each step in detail, you'll be able to identify areas where your processes are not as efficient as they could be. You can then evaluate how to get the most out of your business. 

Let's consider an example of a process.

These are the steps a client must take to hire a lawyer from this example law firm. 

1 – The prospective client calls the main contact number for the firm. 

2 – A receptionist records basic contact information from the client, and passes this on to the first available account support officer. 

3 – The account support officer contacts the potential client for further information about their needs. 

4 – The support officer then passes this information to the relevant department within the business, for example, commercial law or family law. 

5 – After a department has been assigned, support staff provide an overview of appropriate services. 

6 – When a service is agreed, they confirm the terms and price of the service. 

7 – The support staff then sends the client a contract to confirm the hiring of the lawyer. 

When a process is broken down into its component steps, it becomes easier to identify which steps require improvement, and which ones are essential as part of the service delivery. 

One way to approach this is to assign each step one of three categories:
1 – Value-Added steps
2 – Non-Value-Added steps
3 – Necessary Non-Value-Added steps

Value-Added steps enhance your product or service by meeting a customer need. By investing your resources in these steps, you can make your offer more attractive to customers.

In the example, the overview of appropriate services offered by the law firm adds value for the customer, enabling them to make an informed decision.

You may also find Non-Value-Added steps in your processes. These steps drain business resources and time while providing no value to the product or service. When you map your process, it may highlight stages that could be made more efficient with small adjustments.

In this example, the prospective client has to wait for an account support officer to be assigned before being able to provide detailed information about their needs. This wastes time and adds no value to the service of the firm. By training the firm's receptionists to assign the client to a department, this waiting time could be significantly reduced.

Although some steps do not add value for your customers, they are still crucial to the process. These are called necessary Non-Value-Added steps. It is often impossible to remove these steps, but you may want to consider how to reduce the resources that you invest in them, to maximize your operational efficiency. In the law firm example, collecting information from the prospective client does not add value but is necessary to the process. To maximize efficiency, the firm could ensure that its receptionists have a standardized list of information to collect, saving time later in the process.

Consider process improvements

When you evaluate each stage of a process, consider the following questions:

• • Will this change make the process faster?

  • Will the costs reduce without a change in quality?

  • Will this improve the quality of the product or service without increasing cost?

If the answer to any of the above questions is "Yes", then the process change is worthwhile.

Duct-tape and email is how most businesses still run operations

So what does this general lack of an operations home system lead to? In most scenarios, a combination of task managers, status meetings, emails, spreadsheets, and calendars stand in as a makeshift solution to stay organized and deliver work.

Though still considered “the standard” by many, this approach is massively time-consuming to maintain, difficult to prepare, hard to track, leads to varying outcomes, and doesn’t scale without introducing more and more layers of management.

Speaking of email... Here is Felena's "system" for calendar and email management.

YOU ARE ALWAYS THE BOTTLENECK!  DESIGN SYSTEMS THAT (IDEALLY) DON'T INCLUDE YOU!

How to find the right tool?

Ask yourself these 10 questions to find an automation tool that works for your unique requirements, timeline, and budget

1. 1. What is the total implementation time of the tool?
   2. How easy is it to implement changes within the tool?
   3. How easy is team onboarding and change management for using the tool?
   4. Does it integrate with your existing system landscape?
   5. Can you integrate with your suppliers / partners / customers?
   6. What is the upfront investment cost?
   7. Can you execute work directly in the app, or is it primarily a documentation system?
   8. Can you customize it to fit the specific needs of your processes / operations
      (generic solutions that cannot be configured to support real-life operations are unlikely to help)
   9. What is the functionality and feature depth of the tool?
   10. Where can it be used? (Mobile/Desktop/Tablet)

Once you have audited all your processes and know what needs to change, you'll also want to look at software platforms that can allow you to operate more efficiently. 

Have you ever woke up in the middle of the night and thought... Did I drop the ball on _______? Who is managing that and where does it stand?  That can be solved by great systems and good software.

Automation simplifies all areas of a business by automatically accomplishing tasks that you or an employee would otherwise have to do manually. You don’t have to look any further than your inbox for automation examples.

It’s the “sorry I missed you” email from a salesperson who just left you a voicemail. The birthday coupon from a restaurant. The reminder from a retailer that you added a product to your shopping cart but never clicked “buy.”

The KING of automation tools is Zapier.

Zapier is one of the easiest tools to automate your work and unlock the full power of automation with the app interconnections. This powerful app reduces time you lose on repetitive tasks while letting you focus on what matters for your business.

Zapier comes with predefined example templates that help you create these workflows and automations with ease for your small business.

Below is a video that will link you to a playlist from Zapier.

Time to go back and reflect on your matrix from step one - Vision.  What was on your delegate list?  How will you get these things off your plate?  Who will manage?

Outsourcing part of your process can not save you money but may also allow you to allocate more of your time and resources to your company’s core competencies.

There is a two-fold benefit that you can get from outsourcing:

• • You maintain the high morale of your team as they could focus on the primary work you assigned them to do.
  • You get peace of mind by letting a team of specialists handle those minor tasks that are also important for the welfare of your business.

First, understand your employees’ roles and the weight of their current responsibilities. Then you can arrive with a better and more sensible decision for your company moving forward.

Make a List of Common Tasks

We recommend taking a hard look at how you’re spending your time currently, and adjust based on what the data tells you.

To get started, we recommend you track your time on a spreadsheet or via an app like RescueTime. It’s a simple app that lives hidden on your computer and tracks your productivity.

It may be obvious to outsource your accounting, tax prep, and legal needs but we also recommend looking at other aspects of your business...

Outsource Auxiliary Business Tasks

The best place to start with outsourcing is by letting someone else handle auxiliary business tasks.

These are tasks that are an integral part of your core business, but aren’t part of your competitive advantage.

While these don’t always have to be outsourced, it can be a wise idea to do so.

Repeatable Tasks

If you do something the same way every day, there’s a good chance you can find someone else who can do it for less, give it more focus, and improve your efficiency.

To calculate these tasks, I recommend calculating your wage per hour.

Estimate how much time you’re spending on your most important tasks, and whether or not you could hire someone for less than you’re effectively getting paid for those tasks.

Once you know what your least critical tasks are, and delegate as you see fit.

Simple projects like data entry, calculations, and formatting can be handled by others. To get this started, find a task you do often.

Then, create a screencast of the project. Once you have the procedure recorded, have another person write it up. This is a document you can use as a resource moving forward.

With this process, the person you outsource the work to can complete tasks quickly and painlessly — and get them off your plate!

Website Design and Maintenance

Unless you’re a website development firm, there’s really no reason to maintain your own website.

This is something that another company can do for a better, more cost-effective measure and you can pay for with the economies of scale.

If you’ve already designed your own website, look to outsource this work next time you need to update.

Content Generation

Perhaps the biggest opportunity for outsourcing is through content generation. This is a great way to start with outsourcing,  especially if this is a new area for you.

The most common outsourced content marketing activity is writing, with 44% of marketers using it.

It takes a lot of work to write and promote content that goes viral. Having an experienced writer or promoter do the heavy lifting can save you tons of time.

How to Find the Right Freelancer

If you want to get a great freelancer for a specific job, there are a few steps you can take to make sure the person you hire does an excellent job.

1. RESEARCH HOURLY RATES

Before you look to hire a freelancer, you need to have a budget in mind. Understand that while outsourcing is cheaper, you shouldn’t be looking for the cheapest option.

Before you get started, do your research. Understand exactly what you should pay for the project you want done, and know what a fair price range is.

It’s also a good idea to make a list of what features are most important to you.

Do you need someone proficient in English? Is clean code important, or do you only care if the final software project works?

These are important questions to decide before you start receiving bids from freelancers.

2. EXPLAIN YOUR PROJECT FULLY

What a lot of entrepreneurs don’t realize is that the success of freelancers often depends on the project specifications they write.

A pitch for a job with a vague description may end up with a variety of quotes.

Choosing the lowest price may ultimately mean choosing the freelancer with the least amount of understanding of what the project entails.

Rather than undergo this kind of chaos, explain the precise deliverables for the project you’d like the freelancer to complete for you.

How to Make Ongoing Outsourcing Projects Successful

When you first venture into the world of outsourcing, you might hear horror stories of ongoing freelancers who rack up massive bills, deliver work long past deadlines, or give up on a project halfway through.

This is easy to prevent for a quick foray into freelancing with a small task.

But what if you have a larger, ongoing project? How can you ensure quality work while still maintaining a fair price?

The answer is just as simple as landing a quality freelancer for a small project: there are a few key steps to ensure a perfect fit.

Invest More in the Outsourcing Selection Process

Since you’ll be working with someone for a longer period of time, it’s important that they are a good fit for your projects.

To do this, you’ll want to set up a more rigorous process for finding the right freelancers.

We recommend adding a random test question to your application to weed out anyone who won’t follow directions.

Requiring a unique subject line or another kind of “password” is a simple way to see who is willing to pay attention to small requests.

To get the right person, you also need to expand your entries. Have at least three people in your sights, then choose the one that works best for your project.

We recommend requiring a paid test project from at least three people. Yes, it can be expensive to pay multiple people for the same work, but think of it as an investment.

It’s better to find out early on that they aren’t able to handle a project before entrusting them with mission-critical work.

Finally, conduct a video chat interview with your shortlisted candidates. This ensures they can show up to an appointment and make sure you get along.

If you're willing to remove yourself as a bottleneck, create rock-solid systems, and stay organized then you may be able to save 75% on labor by hiring an off-shore assistant (also known as a Virtual Assistant or VA).

If this interests you, please watch this webinar on best practices.

Looking for offshore talent you can trust?  Try GigVillage.com
Other primary sites for hiring freelancers are - Upwork and Fiverr

If you're ready to hire offshore support, we've put together a list of possible tasks.

We have also put together a list of best practices when working with an overseas support team.

1. 1. AGREEMENT – Send your VA an agreement to solidify the relationship. Here is view access (you will need to download or make a copy) to a Sample Agreement.

       

   2. REGULAR CALLS – It is imperative that you schedule daily or weekly calls with your VA via Zoom or a similar platform you can record.  Meetings are a great way to establish a constant flow of information and ideas. Just as in a face to face meeting, you may ask for results, give new responsibilities, explain processes, make sure they are ‘on board’ with your ideas and production. All conversations should be recorded and labeled for their future reference.  Remember, make your VA responsible for this.

       

   3. WORKING HOURS – If you're working with someone in Asia or India they will be 12-15 hours ahead.  Some Assistants will agree to work during US business hours.
   4. COLLABORATION – Decide on what platform you will use for ongoing communication and collaboration – examples: Teamwork, Asana, Trello, or good old fashioned Google Sheets.

Tracking Time

• • If you want your VA to track his/her hours – suggestions are…
    • Zoho Invoice (Screencast outlined on this page)
    • Due
    • Harvest

Payment Process

• • We suggest paying your VA via PayPal (in arrears) on the 15th and the last day of the month.  Have your VA send you an invoice to trigger this process.  Please ask your VA to follow the directions on this page.  (You, of course, may choose a different time tracking tool)
  • Screencast on how to do this in Paypal.  Do note, you will incur a $4.99 fee for each payment.
  • Another payment platform Remitly – Screencast

Documentation

• • It is recommended to screencast everything you do for the VA and have them do the same for any new tasks.  Be sure they are tracking this in your collaboration platform! 
    • Loom

Password Protection

• • We recommend utilizing a password keeper so you can grant access (and revoke it) for all access to online accounts – such as email, social media channels, CRM systems, etc. Suggestions above.

An intern is a short-term solution and can be great for projects you need moved forward.

If you have any questions, please read this article on this topic and be sure to watch the video below.