As a solopreneur or small enterprise proprietor within the well being and wellness business, checking off every day’s seemingly infinite duties—from lead technology to shopper onboarding to precise teaching to invoicing—is difficult sufficient; with the restricted time you could have, creating (or fine-tuning current) methods and processes is probably going on the backside of your precedence record.
And moreover, aren’t methods and processes extra suited to large-scale corporations (suppose: Google, McDonald’s, Amazon) with hundreds or tens of millions of workers? Reply: No.
Techniques and processes are useful to all companies, regardless of their measurement.
Executed proper, they may allow you to step away from the trouble of day-to-day menial duties to give attention to high-value actions that’ll quickly scale your corporation and income.
On this article, be taught what methods and processes are, the particular advantages they could deliver to your well being and wellness enterprise, and, most significantly, how, precisely, it is best to go about constructing—and implementing—efficient, environment friendly methods and processes.
What Are “Techniques and Processes”?
Whereas methods and processes are sometimes used interchangeably, they’re distinct ideas. To elaborate: A system is a set of processes, instruments, folks, and methods that work collectively to resolve an issue or obtain a enterprise aim.
Take, as an example, your email marketing. Your system might appear to be this:
- Processes: Develop a content material calendar, draft emails, and create automated gross sales funnels.
- Instruments: A content material calendar platform (e.g., Trello, CoSchedule, or Asana), phrase processor (e.g., Microsoft Phrase 365, Google Docs, or Apple Pages), e mail advertising and marketing service (e.g., ConvertKit, Drip, or Mailchimp)
- Folks: You (should you’re a solopreneur)
- Methods: Your focus is on brief, scannable e mail content material to catch the reader’s consideration, so your key messages get learn and remembered.
Alternatively, processes discuss with all of the steps you are taking to finish a process. For instance, listed here are the steps you could take to develop an e mail content material calendar:
- Analysis trending business subjects.
- Evaluate generally requested questions from purchasers.
- Record eight e mail subjects.
- Plug them into your content material calendar platform, together with their publishing dates.
Backside line? Any time you could have a selected method of doing issues in your corporation (e.g., shopper outreach), that, in itself, is a system. And chances are high, you in all probability have already got a number of methods arrange and operating in your corporation—with out even realizing it.
Advantages of Techniques and Processes for Companies (When Executed Proper)
However this is the factor: Not all methods and processes assist your corporation.
Extra particularly, some methods could also be pointless, counterproductive, overly costly, or too time-consuming—in the end that means you find yourself doing extra however with much less to indicate for it. Consequently, you can finally end up burned out, overwhelmed, and exhausted.
Evaluate that to efficient, environment friendly methods that break down duties into documented, repeatable, step-by-step processes that allow you to:
- Enhance productiveness: With all the things laid out, you don’t must reinvent the wheel each time you want one thing achieved, serving to you do extra in much less time.
- Ship a constant expertise: Say goodbye to forgetting about scheduling check-in sessions with purchasers or accumulating fee. Properly-documented methods and processes assist you to create constant experiences for all potential and current purchasers, driving shopper loyalty.
- Scale your corporation: There’s typically a direct correlation between the variety of efficient, environment friendly methods operating in your corporation to the period of time you must spend on creating new services that cater to totally different buyer segments (e.g., branching into online personal training as a Certified Personal Trainer), so that you improve your income.
- Decrease labor prices: Prepared to begin hiring (or already operating a staff)? Properly-documented methods and processes assist even new workers hit the bottom operating as they’ve a set, unambiguous method of doing issues. This implies you’ll spend much less time (and cash) coaching new workers, supervising their work, and requesting edits.
The right way to Create Techniques and Processes That Work
To reiterate: When the fitting methods are in place, you’ll enhance productiveness, cut back stress, be higher in a position to give attention to revenue-generating work, and improve revenue margins.
Now, the one query is: How precisely do you go about constructing probably the most streamlined, environment friendly, and efficient methods and processes primarily based on your corporation objectives? There are 4 steps to it.
#1: Doc Every little thing You Do
Step one is to doc all of the actions you do to run your corporation.
This might embrace duties you do usually (e.g., happening shopper discovery calls, publishing weblog posts, sending out invoices) or a single exercise you suppose you’ll doubtless repeat sooner or later (e.g., writing an e-book, providing free trials, or launching a brand new service providing).
Here is a tip: As a substitute of attempting to recall all the things you do for your corporation in a single sitting, go about your day as typical for every week and make a remark of all the things you do. This manner, you are much less more likely to overlook one thing necessary.
To assist add extra construction to your methods, contemplate categorizing your actions when it comes to enterprise capabilities:
- Operations: These are actions you do this handle your corporation’s “internal workings.” Examples embrace enterprise aim setting, e mail administration, and private web site upkeep.
- Gross sales and advertising and marketing: These are actions you do to draw and convert purchasers. Examples embrace content marketing, automated gross sales funnels, and product launches.
- Finance: Every little thing to do with cash, together with invoicing purchasers, paying workers, and filing taxes.
#2: Break Down Every Exercise
Upon getting a listing of actions (i.e., methods) your corporation must perform, break down each in keeping with the method, instruments, and folks wanted to finish it from begin to end:
- Course of: The step-by-step sequence of actions
- Instruments: The required units, apps, or software program you employ
- Folks: The individual (or folks) accountable for every step of the method
- Methods: The ways, suggestions, or strategies you employ
#3: Search for Methods to Enhance Your Techniques
Earlier than you leap proper into overhauling each system in your corporation, know this. You solely need to rework a system if—and provided that—it will provide you with a big strategic benefit. In order you are evaluating potential tweaks, ask your self:
- Will it present a direct worth to purchasers?
- Will it make issues simpler and extra environment friendly for me (and my staff)?
- Will it cut back prices?
- Will it improve income and/or revenue margins?
When you aren’t going to hit a type of issues, it is best to in all probability go away that system as is and focus your consideration elsewhere.
However as soon as you have recognized a enterprise system that is a superb candidate for an overhaul, one of the vital necessary issues to do is decide the place you are ranging from (i.e., your baseline) and the place you hope to finish up.
That is the place key efficiency indicators (KPIs)—like income, bills, revenue margins, gross sales conversions, and different monetary ratios—are available in.
The right way to Enhance Your System
Then, with the specified outcomes or outcomes you need, use the next framework to brainstorm methods to enhance your system:
- Delete: What are you able to eradicate from the system as a result of the processes, instruments, folks, or methods are time-consuming, pointless, redundant, now not related, or unproductive? For instance, do you actually need to pay for a premium accounting device whenever you solely use its most elementary options (which you can simply get from one other free device)?
- Defer: Which features of the system might be useful however do not actually should be a part of the system proper now? For instance, upgrading to a pricier e mail advertising and marketing software program that enables you entry to options like pre-built automation workflows, break up testing, efficiency stories, and SMS push notifications might sound like a good suggestion, however you’re unlikely to see constructive (or dependable) outcomes with a small subscriber depend.
- Automate: What duties are you able to automate utilizing software program, apps, or different instruments? A 2017 McKinsey report on productiveness and automation suggests about 60% of all occupations have not less than 30% of constituent actions that might be automated. As an illustration, a few of the best personal training apps and software programs might help you handle administrative duties (e.g., shopper reserving), fee processing, and purchasers’ exercise applications—multi functional centralized location.
- Delegate: What duties forestall you from taking advantage of your time, power, abilities, and experience (e.g., chasing purchasers for fee)? What duties do you dislike doing (e.g., individually combing by suggestions varieties)? These are sometimes the duties it is best to delegate or outsource to others (every time doable).
- Consolidate: Is it doable to consolidate your duties or batch them so as to full them sooner? Combing by generally requested questions in your social media posts might assist provide you with loads of concepts for potential weblog submit subjects, as an example.
#4: Roll Out, Consider, and Refine
You’ve recognized a enterprise system that needs to be overhauled, outlined your best consequence, and developed a plan to enhance its processes. Now, it’s time to implement.
And whereas it could be tempting to suppose “mission completed” and pat your self on the again for a job effectively achieved, as soon as a brand new system is in place, it is best to take time to guage it. You probably have a staff, be sure that they know your new enterprise course of is not set in stone and also you welcome trustworthy suggestions in regards to the adjustments.
You and your staff (the place relevant) ought to take into consideration the next questions:
- Did the brand new system resolve an issue or attain a aim?
- How a lot enchancment will be attributed to the brand new system?
- If there wasn’t any enchancment, what was the trigger? How are you going to treatment the state of affairs or maybe return to the best way issues have been?
Every time crucial, return to the drafting board and proceed to tweak and refine your system.
And that is your first system overhaul. Now, do not forget to repeat the method with one other system:
- Evaluate your record of potential enterprise methods.
- Choose one with the utmost potential (e.g., most vital influence in your revenue margins) and create the brand new system.
- Check the system in your corporation—and refine it to work out any bottlenecks, glitches, and hiccups.
- Repeat the method once more.
#5: Retailer Your Enterprise Techniques Someplace Protected
At this level, you should have documented not less than a dozen methods that’ll assist your corporation run like a well-oiled machine.
Think about should you misplaced them since you wrote them on random sticky notes and scraps of paper. Past losing your time, you can lose useful data since you’ve forgotten your methods.
To forestall that catastrophe, it is best to doc all methods—meaning all processes, instruments, folks, and methods—utilizing organized, well-designed instruments.
Examples embrace Evernote, One Note, Google Drive, Asana, Trello, and Notion.
When you use a couple of platform (e.g., you employ Asana to retailer your course of checklists), ensure you arrange one central reference level with hyperlinks to all different related documentation. Sure: Meaning it is best to think about using platforms that work effectively collectively.
Takeaway
Constructing the fitting methods to help your corporation will be extremely useful.
They assist you to run your operations easily and effectively, liberating up treasured time you can make investments elsewhere.
Whereas establishing new methods—and fine-tuning current ones—takes effort and time, it’s all price it when all the things comes collectively to be just right for you.
