This article is all about having the right systems and processes in place. Understanding how to scope up your projects and establishing the discipline that your employees don’t always have to come to you with their questions—because you make it easy for them to find the answers on their own. It’s about being aware and allocating your employees’ skills and experiences effectively.
As a sports analogy, if I own an American football team, I want the quarterback to be the one throwing the ball, the running back running the ball, and the linemen blocking for both. I don’t want my linemen throwing the ball, I don’t want my quarterback to block, and I don’t want the running back to go play defense.
So where do you start with allocating your employees’ skills and experiences effectively?
It starts with the triangle of success in any business:
Where do your staff measure in these three areas? Do you have dedicated sales and service staff, for example? If so, are they good at what they do, or do they need a bit of work as too much falls through the cracks?
For example, when a client or a prospect reaches out to your company, how do you engage them? Is it on the mark, close, or miles away from how you should engage them?
Do you have the right training, systems and processes in place so that your employees know what to do and what to say? Even with something as simple as answering the phone, do your staff answer as if they couldn’t be bothered or do they answer in a consistent and professional manner? Do they know what to say and do so while interacting with your customer, or do you have to be the one answering the phone all the time to make sure it gets answered the right way?
How would your company run if it was an efficient machine? What do you have in place right now to make it run? Where do you still need to involve yourself, and where can you step back so that someone else can run that part of the machine? Which areas are taking all your time, the ones that you would have someone else take off your back completely if you could, NOW?
Let’s begin by looking at what needs to be learned. Is it sales? Is there a process to attract, engage and convert qualified prospects that you can teach your sales staff, so that the calls and the meetings don’t always have to go through you?
Is it service? Do customers only want to go through you whenever there is an issue, or can you get them comfortable talking to your staff for any and all of their issues?
How about design? Are you creating all the bells and whistles yourself, or do you have great communication with your staff who face your clients daily, the kind that could be key to you enhancing your services to the next level?
To summarize, you want to create and implement the systems and processes that allow your triangle of success to run and feed off each other. To do that, you will need to know the skills and knowledge of your staff, where they can be allocated, and the gaps that need to be addressed through training or additional hiring.
Once this triangle is running effectively, you will take most, if not all, the time-consuming tasks off your back and be able to focus exclusively on growing your business to the next level.