I like the expression that I have heard a number to times, that business owners need to find time to “work on the business, rather than just work in the business”.
By this it is meant that there ought to be, for the business owner, a separation of roles.
As an example I have the role “in” our business of being a Chartered Financial Planner but my role “on” the business is that of being an Executive Director.
The key benefit of the role separation in that it enables me as a business owner to think clearly about the strategy my business should adopt.
We have done five things in our business that provide us with focus as far as working “on the business” is concerned and it strikes me that it does not matter what sector the business is in – manufacturing, distribution or professional services – these five things might apply anyway.
Board Meetings
Schedule them, put them in the calendar. You might have two business owners or twenty-two business owners it doesn’t matter.
Not only schedule the meetings but run them to an agenda and minute the discussions.
But most importantly agree that all the important business decisions will be made at the Board Meeting and not “on the hoof”.
It is pretty certain that business decisions made when there is pressure to deliver to a customer will not turn out to be particularly good ones.
Separate the roles
We tell a story in our firm of Martin and me passing each other on the office stairs.
“Where have you been?” “I have been out delivering an advice report to a client”.
“What are you doing this afternoon?” “I am writing an advice report for a client”.
“Now what about you?” “Well this morning I wrote an advice report for a client and now I am off to present an advice report to a client”.
We sort of had a “light bulb” moment. Why are we both trying to do the same things?
Wouldn’t it be more efficient if I wrote the reports and you did the client presentations? And the answer for us was a resounding “yes”
Now in our firm all the roles are separate.
Technical people do technical work. Administrators do the administration and Financial Planners deliver financial planning reports.
Maybe look at the roles in your business do different people replicate what others do and is that effective and efficient?
Team based approach – multiple pairs of eyes
Ours is a risk management business and as good as the individuals are they are not all experts at everything.
By working on a team based approach we have multiple pairs of eyes looking at every piece of client output.
Honestly it doesn’t mean everything is perfect, but I reckon this gives us the comfort of knowing that the quality of the advice we deliver is very high indeed.
It means we are unlikely to get it so wrong that it results in a complaint about unsuitability of the advice we deliver.
Think about your own product or service; do multiple pairs of eyes review what you deliver to your clients?
Communicate with your team
I have thought in the past that we have over communicated with our team. By doing this you sometimes get the impression that everyone has a say in what the business does or does not do.
This clearly cannot be right after all a business is not a democracy. But that is not to say that the team opinions are not valuable and valued – they are.
Creating our own intranet site that can be accessed remotely and where everyone can post their stories and views and we can communicate important information was a great step forward.
SOPs
Standard operating procedures. We have 11 of these. They are mandatory and describe “the way we do things around here”.
If any team player does not follow one of the SOPs it becomes abundantly clear to everyone that this is happening. To a large extent the team based approach then kicks in and a form of collective management starts to take place.
Standard operating procedures, operations manuals and checklists are a great way of ensuring that subsystems and processes are followed and they help to drive effectiveness and efficiency, and of course profitability, into the business.
It doesn’t matter how big or how small the business is, these five steps are vitally important to business success.
Spending as much time working on the business as working in the business is a simple but important business decision.
