Operating Systems

Why is this item important?

The main rewards of running a healthy process driven organisation come down to 4 categories:

1. Team Certainty: When clear task instructions guides all the work in your business your team will know what a good job looks like, empowered to achieve excellence every single time. This will not only boost their own confidence, but your confidence in them.
2. Sustainable Expansion: It’s not that fast growth is a problem, it’s that uncontrolled operations are risky. Effective process management will help you avoid the dangers of workplace confusion, time wasting, high error rates, team burnout, and exorbitant expenses, making your operations rock solid and your business growth sustainable.
3. Lifestyle choices: You didn’t start your business to work longer hours with increased stress and deteriorating health. When your business workflow is managed properly you will be able to care for yourself, expand your vision, and reconnect with your Why.
4. Proven System: Facilitating well organised processes proves the profit-generating value of your business. Not because of the staff, but because of the staffing system. Not the sales, but the sales system. Not the customer service, but the service system. Not the brand, but the marketing system. Your Operations Manuals provide structures to turn your operation into a sellable, scalable asset. 

How can I tell if I meet this item in my business?

The most obvious way to check this item is to consider the way you and your team work, then be honest about how much of this work is actually recorded in your business. If you can say that there are instructions and procedures available to guide the majority of tasks done in your business, then you’re doing well. The vast majority of business owners could not say this was true. Most would have to admit instructions are given verbally, people are left to work things out themselves, and most of the company’s operational knowledge is stored only in people’s heads.

What do I need to do to meet this item?

There is no point creating process documentation if no one will be able to find it. This will only add to the confusion and create extra work that is quickly made redundant. Start with organising your business departments so you create centralised, cloud-based storage locations for your new resources.

 Then ask your team members to write up steps for the most common tasks they do. Have these steps tested by a colleague, preferably someone who doesn’t know how to do that task. Store all of this documentation in the appropriate business department filing system, using a logical naming convention for the docs so they can be retrieved easily.

 Complex issues will arise. How to clean out your files? How to manage the volume of files? How to best capture a complex process? How to manage access and privacy? How to document a creative task? How to get the job done fast? Seek expert help if these become roadblocks which prevent you from success. This is the most important development project you will do this year.

 Why is this item important?

The research says it all. A 2017 ReportLinker study revealed 83% of employees with opportunities to take on new challenges say they’re more likely to stay with the organisation. Three quarters of the people who responded to PWC ‘Workforce of the future’ study in 2017 said they were “ready to learn new skills or completely re-train in order to remain employable in the future.” Companies that offer comprehensive training programs have 218% higher income per employee than companies without formalized training. But it doesn’t stop there. These companies also enjoy a 24% higher profit margin than those who spend less on training.  Enough said!

 How can I tell if I meet this item in my business?

If you’re doing well with staff training, you’ll see that your staff are more happy and satisfied because they enjoy the intrinsic rewards of working exceptionally well. As the owner, you will have set out clear pathways for training and development which leads your team members through a journey of professional learning from their induction right through years of career progression and professional advancement. You will have a register of this professional development to record each staff member’s progress, and you will celebrate their achievements along the way. You will meet with them at least quarterly to share mutual feedback and set new goals. Most importantly, you will give your staff enough time to invest in this training and make it relatively straightforward for them to complete.

What do I need to do to meet this item?

There are some staff training items which simply need to be taken care of for the company to maintain industry compliance and meet their professional responsibilities. These items should be identified then mapped out on a staff training planner, scheduled on a calendar and allowed for in the budget. Leading your team through these items should not only involve mechanical administrative purposes, but a discussion around the reasons this training is genuinely important. Then execute! Make a record of progress as you all move forward, and retain the required documentation in well managed resource retrieval systems to stay on the right side of the law.

 Developing a more values driven approach to staff training starts with finding where the needs of the company intersect with the interests of the team member intersect. Establish what your business needs to achieve its medium and long term goals, then overlap these with the knowledge and skills that your staff want to expand on for their own growth. Set out a schedule of professional development like a smorgasbord for your team, and invite them to take up the opportunity to engage in valuable, rewarding professional development. Celebrate learning as a core value of your company culture by encouraging your team members to run in-house learning sessions to share their newly acquired knowledge. Ask your team members to develop new systems to apply this new knowledge to the daily workings of the business, documenting these well so the company retains the knowledge for collecting advancement over time.

Why is this item important?

When my fiance started working as one of hundreds of pick-packers in one of Australia’s biggest supermarket warehouses, we were excited because we’re both process nerds keen to see how an operation of this size functioned. We’ve been blown away by the company’s ability to manage fluctuating demand periods and shifting circumstances whilst offering all their team members training across all areas of warehousing operations.

 Over the years we’ve continued to see anew that the scalability of this and any business hinges on its ability to create agile staffing arrangements. A scalable business trains staff to respond quickly to demand variations, both over time and in the moment. At the same time, this training creates opportunities for career progression in the team. Everyone wins when team members are empowered to serve across multiple functions at any given time. The staff get to become a progressively more valuable member of the team, and they’re remunerated in kind. The company gets to employ a loyal body of staff who can be rostered according to the diverse skill sets they bring to respond to shifting needs. With this approach you will rarely face overstaffing problems. When demands are seasonally low even a skeleton staff can move across tasks as needed when they’re cross trained. This means employees can rely on their rostered hours.

How can I tell if I meet this item in my business?

Many sole traders can tell you with gusto that being a one man band lets them do what they want when they want, moving quickly between tasks to keep up with business demands. Of course, the challenges of sustaining growth are prohibitive for the solo business owner, but the principle still applies. You’ll be able to tell if you’re maximising the efficiency of your staff if they are cross trained to serve across multiple areas. Even the specialists in your team can be trained in some of the basics to maintain the flexibility and responsiveness required to roll with the punches in business. When you next roster your team, pause to see if your members offer multiple skill sets which allow you to mix and match as you require. If your staffing puzzle can only be constructed in one set way every single time, you’ll be in trouble when things change. 

What do I need to do to meet this item?

Regardless of the size of your team, cross training your staff is an essential ingredient of the business growth recipe. Create a robust, highly skilled team by implementing these strategies:

1. Have each team member document the steps they follow to complete their main tasks
2. Buddy your team members up to start the cross training
3. Have each buddy train their partner in the tasks they have documented
4. Roster your newly trained staff to swap work days with their buddy. If a whole day is not viable, swap half days
5. Regroup to reflect on what worked and what didn’t. Collaborate to decide the best ways to progress additional training. Your staff should be confident in varied work situations
6. The real test will come when the buddy is asked to replace their partner when they are absent. Then you’ll really know how flexible your staffing arrangements are!

Why is this item important?

Business leaders need to set the bar high by enforcing accountability for results. When it comes to staff, a workplace is unsustainable if any of the team resists being accountable, even if they work well. When business leaders fail to address their employee’s accountability problems frustration, underperformance and toxic distrust will come. This environment will cause a drop in product and service quality, productivity, worker retention, and overall employee wellness.

When your accountability systems work well your staff are rewarded and supported as needed. Your technology brings lucrative returns, and your performance is stable, predictable and reliable. In this setting you can confidently make promises and set goals confident that they will be achieved. If you can quantify the performance of your current systems, you can begin to track how things are improving or diminishing over time. That’s where KPIs come in.

How can I tell if I meet this item in my business?

If you’re systematically tracking optimum performance in your business you’ll have documented processes in place to itemise exactly what needs to be done to collect, collate, analyse, and distribute performance data. This work will be scheduled for completion and reviewed on a regular basis. All key decisions about the management and future directions of the business will be informed by the data, and a commitment to refining tracking systems will lead the way.

What do I need to do to meet this item?

Developing systems to maintain optimum performance, then actually following those systems, requires a focused investment into exemplary outcomes. To craft KPI’s which directly support the achievement of your company mission you’ll need to be clear about what your company has promised to customers, staff, and partners. All business aims are unique, so all KPIs will be too.

 Setting the actual targets for measurement will see you establishing exactly what items are pivotal to business growth. Invest time into exploring the lay of the land when it comes to the sort of indicators that are going to serve your business best. Once these are established, using the SMART goals formula will help you cset targets which are Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic, and Timely (have a deadline).

 The next step is tracking! Tracking options vary but you may consider measuring manually with a pen and paper, displaying tallies on a staff chart, or setting up an off the shelf data tracking dashboard. The simplest way to get started with tracking your workplace KPIs is with a spreadsheet. They’re free, easy to use, and can be stored centrally in the cloud so team members can enter data themselves and make it available to team leaders at the same time.

With your data coming in, the essential last step is the developing routines to evaluate this data. Take a systematic approach to draw this data together to inform business decisions for growth. 

Why is this item important?

I have a current client who has to date, refused to use any task management software. After several traumatic years barely surviving the stressful chaos of failing to centralise their operations management, they’ve battened down the hatches on all fronts. Despite reaching out for help, they’re incredibly resistant to change. Now, I will guide them to a new day of effective operations management. But the lesson here is from first hand experience. Even your most diligent efforts to document and organise your business processes cannot tell people exactly when each task needs to be done. It’s one thing to have task instructions. It’s another entirely to create resource retrieval systems with task management software to activate consistent flow.

How can I tell if I meet this item in my business?

Pause to reflect on how you and your team members know what to do, when to do it, and how to do it well. If tasks are managed by memory, sticky notes, calendar reminders, email tasks, verbal instruction, memos and urgent crisis calls, you have poorly managed processes.

If your work is driven by automated systems which consistently update you and your team with the day’s requirements, you’re on the right track. If you and your team can retrieve information about any area of the business from a well organised filing system, you’re doing better again. If your company keeps these systems up to date with finely tuned maintenance routines, you’re really on a winner! The ultimate is when all these elements work in concert to turn your business into a well oiled machine that can not only run without you, but thrive.

What do I need to do to meet this item?

There are five phases you can lead your business through to create stable, reliable operational systems that run like clockwork:

Phase 1: Structures: Start the development of your systems with your organisation chart to establish your business departments. Then map out your business processes to identify operational bottlenecks.

Phase 2: Roles: Identify the specific roles required to achieve core business functions. Team members might work across multiple roles, so clarify business roles as distinct from those performing them.

Phase 3: Document: Create records of how things are done at work. Develop a centralised bank of task instructions using written documents and videos to support staff in meeting the requirements of their roles. Use task management software to bring tasks to life every day.

Phase 4: Accountability: Set up standards of performance for every member of your team, including yourself. Track your progress against these standards, and offer both support and rewards where warranted.

Phase 5: Maintenance: Keep your systems up to date with maintenance routines that are documented, scheduled and reviewed regularly for correction and improvements.

Why is this item important?

Regardless of niche, industry or size, one of the first things that needs to be done when cleaning out the operational systems of every business is a comprehensive filing overhaul. It’s like waving a magic wand when people are shown how to collate all of their resources and files into one central place where things are easy to find. Studies show that 17% of workplace productivity is lost simply from people wasting time looking for the things they need to work. Bringing all the stuff out of people’s emails, desktops, sticky notes, filing cabinet, voice memos and cloud storage into one well organised space often redeems 10-15hrs of lost work time each week. But the best bit is seeing stress replaced with calm, confusion replaced with confidence, and output levels soar!

How can I tell if I meet this item in my business?

Take a look at your work desk, your computer desktop, your phone messages, inbox, notebook, social media messages, and the bottom of your work bag. Do you have resources, information or files tucked away “in a safe place” there? Are you working from information stored in your head? Do you or your team members have to ask questions to know what to do at work? Would anyone else be able to replace you if you were unwell or holidaying? How would the business fare if the worst happened to you? If these questions are ringing alarm bells for you, read on …

If you have a clean, clear workspace and all your business resources can be found in one centralised resource retrieval system you are all systems go! You know you’re on a winner when your files are in the cloud and organised into business department folders. You will know you’ve arrived as a business leader when one of your staff asks you how to do something at work, and you simply direct them to a process management resource stored in that system.

What do I need to do to meet this item?

Use your Organisation Chart to set up your resource retrieval system in your online platform of choice, then begin moving house. Each folder is like a room where different types of resources will be stored. You will likely have a ‘room’ for Finance files, another ‘room’ for Marketing, and another for Team Care. Every business is unique, so every filing system is different.

In every business, each department folder or ‘room’ will need spaces created to store things. These subfolders are like cupboards. For example, your Marketing folder might have a ‘cupboard’ for Social Media, another for PR, and another for Advertising. Each cupboard then will have subfolders like shelves. So for example, you would create a subfolder ‘shelf’ for Facebook and another for LinkedIn.

There will be some folders you can build in advance, and others you build as you move in. This is perfectly ok. The point is to set up the structure as best you can and start moving in. Type up scribbled notes, scanned documents, file audio recordings and drag and drop everything you already have electronically. Get it all in where it belongs, deleting copies and avoiding duplicates as you go.

Why is this item important?

Every thriving business has a core dedication to developing and maintaining systems which enable them to keep their company promises. They understand that perfecting their systems will allow them to consistently provide the highest levels of value to their team, their customers, and members of their business community. They understand that the most sustainable pathway towards lasting growth is found in making their business systems the number one priority.

 Letting your process management resources slip out of date has several detrimental effects:

1. It wastes the time and money spent on creating the resources in the first place
2. It sends a message to the team that process management is not a company priority
3. It creates more confusion and wasted time than not having the documentation at all. When the steps in your process management resources lead your staff up the garden path, they will understandably become frustrated, stressed and potentially resentful.

Happy staff enjoy a culture which puts process management at the centre of their routine work.

How can I tell if I meet this item in my business?

Companies who manage their process documentation well empower their team members to make ongoing corrections to all documentation to keep their systems up to date. Where this is not viable, there are well established practices (that are actually followed) to pass on the need for corrections to a responsible officer or team leader. They also have annual routines well documented and scheduled to ensure maintenance work is done regularly.

What do I need to do to meet this item?

Schedule the maintenance of your documentation at least annually, putting each department on rotation so all of the maintenance work doesn’t come up in one go. Then make steps like these to guide you or your team leader through the process of keeping your resources up to date:

1. Read every document, or watch every video entirely
2. Test every link to ensure they all still work
3. Check if the content is still aligned with the company vision and mission
4. Look for spelling, grammar, punctuation and formatting errors
5. Make as many corrections as you can yourself
6. Corrections should be left for your supervisor if you:
1. Are unsure about the item
2. Don’t know how to make the correction
3. Have concerns, advice or feedback about the content
7. If there are no corrections required after the first review, email your Manager for their approval to finalise the review

Why is this item important?

The investment every company makes into their plant and equipment is substantial. To a degree these purchases are risky. Tools are only bought to generate revenue, but the equipment itself makes not one cent. This is why the maintenance of company resources is an essential aspect of sustainable growth. Setting up programs to keep equipment in prime working order, and routinely evaluating when repairs and replacements are needed, are the only ways those investments can keep doing what they were purchased for: work to generate ongoing profits.

 It’s painfully simple that when tools break, they’re no longer an asset but a liability. Delaying replacement costs by looking after these purchases is a no-brainer for the owner looking to minimise expenses to maximise cash flow. The same logic also applies to keeping tools in optimum working order. Faulty equipment can result in the creation of excessive costs that are completely unnecessary. When you have schedules in place to keep equipment running well, your business is compliant, workers are safe, insurance premiums can be reduced, environmental damage is minimised, output is maximised, and you won’t be floored by bills which prove your tools are consuming more fuel than they’re meant to.

How can I tell if I meet this item in my business?

A business with effective maintenance systems has an equipment inventory listing all company equipment along with purchase vendor and date, warranty information, spare parts suppliers and authorised repairers. They also have well documented processes to show what checks need to happen, when they should be done, who should do them, how the results should be recorded, and what exactly is involved in each check. When the checks reveal an equipment fault, the documentation also describes what needs to be done to resolve that fault. The execution of these routines is assigned to a responsible officer(s) who are held accountable for submitting check results. A budget is allocated to maintenance, and the systems for this maintenance must themselves undergo routine review to keep them updated.

What do I need to do to meet this item?

This is how to develop, implement and continue an effective equipment maintenance program:

1. Set up a central location to store all your equipment maintenance files and certification
2. Collate the documentation you currently have including certificates and warranties
3. Create your inventory listing all equipment, vendors, purchase dates, warranties, parts suppliers and authorised repairers
4. Establish the regulations your company needs to follow to keep your tools compliant
5. Source a reputable external supplier if you don’t employ a qualified person for checks that must be done by a certified expert and develop a schedule for their visits
6. Plan all inhouse equipment checks and schedule these with task management software
7. Record the processes for all in-house checks as they are done to make them repeatable
8. Track your expenses over 6-12 months to set a realistic budget for ongoing maintenance

Why is this item important?

Every thriving business has a core dedication to developing and maintaining systems which enable them to keep their company promises. They understand that perfecting their systems will allow them to consistently provide the highest levels of value to their team, their customers, and members of their business community. They understand that the most sustainable pathway towards lasting growth is found in making their business systems the number one priority.

 Letting your process management resources slip out of date has several detrimental effects:

1. It wastes the time and money spent on creating the resources in the first place
2. It sends a message to the team that process management is not a company priority
3. It creates more confusion and wasted time than not having the documentation at all. When the steps in your process management resources lead your staff up the garden path, they will understandably become frustrated, stressed and potentially resentful.

Happy staff enjoy a culture which puts process management at the centre of their routine work.

How can I tell if I meet this item in my business?

Companies who manage their process documentation well empower their team members to make ongoing corrections to all documentation to keep their systems up to date. Where this is not viable, there are well established practices (that are actually followed) to pass on the need for corrections to a responsible officer or team leader. They also have annual routines well documented and scheduled to ensure maintenance work is done regularly.

What do I need to do to meet this item?

Schedule the maintenance of your documentation at least annually, putting each department on rotation so all of the maintenance work doesn’t come up in one go. Then make steps like these to guide you or your team leader through the process of keeping your resources up to date:

1. Read every document, or watch every video entirely
2. Test every link to ensure they all still work
3. Check if the content is still aligned with the company vision and mission
4. Look for spelling, grammar, punctuation and formatting errors
5. Make as many corrections as you can yourself
6. Corrections should be left for your supervisor if you:
• Are unsure about the item
• Don’t know how to make the correction
• Have concerns, advice or feedback about the content
7. If there are no corrections required after the first review, email your Manager for their approval to finalise the review

Why is this item important?

A dedication to waste reduction which targets the optimisation of operations is a central aspect of sustaining profitability. The primary purpose of any business is to maximise profits for owners or shareholders by serving their customers. Every business does this by making sure the money coming in through effective sales and advertising is not wasted by poor performing staff, ineffective or outdated technology, inefficient processes, or excessive overheads. All of these deficits will waste the essential resources every business needs to manage well to preserve profits: money, time, and human effort. It might seem elementary, but waste control is the area of management most often overlooked by businesses struggling to grow. Running a tight ship with streamlined processes is the only way to maximise the cash left over for your bottom line.

 Diligence in developing and maintaining rigour with waste control is done best with a data driven approach. You can’t really know if you’re spending too much money on any business activity if you can’t quantify the amount being spent, then compare it against the amount that could be saved by employing other methods. This is also true for regulating the time spent on creating output, and (if this output is created by people), the amount of effort workers expend to create it.

 Evaluating these expenses to minimise waste and maximise output must happen regularly so the business can stay responsive to rapid technological advancement, so the data you have to work with is current, and so that variations can be identified in time for an appropriate response. Leading from the front with this demonstrates the high value your company attributes to waste reduction, which enables your staff and other business community members to come on board.

How can I tell if I meet this item in my business?

A systematic focus on continuous improvement requires ongoing collection and evaluation of data to identify operational areas where waste can be reduced to increase output. This ultimately leads to greater profits. A business doing this well knows the key data points which can be tracked to indicate performance, and the levels which reflect optimum performance. They monitor this data routinely to inform strategic management. Every business is vastly different, but to provide some examples, the items you might track in your business includes the amount of calls taken, units produced, jobs completed, stock moved, time spent, movements performed, or people needed for the job. An efficient business focuses on reducing the time, money and effort it takes to create output, and increase the returns from these investments.

What do I need to do to meet this item?

Driving continuous business improvement starts with establishing the data points critical to increasing output. Implement systems to track these data points on a regular basis, then look for ways to reduce the waste that comes from creating that output. Ask “How can we save money, time and human effort whilst increasing that output?” Develop methods to evaluate alternative solutions, and craft smooth pathways for implementation which minimise disruption.