In a previous post, we dealt with what a system is. Systems help you to organise, document and manage your team and all the responsibilities associated with each role within the company.
You can have good systems and you can have bad systems. The best way to understand systems and their importance is to think of them as recipes for your business.
When a chef sets out to create a masterpiece, he creates a recipe. His recipe will detail what he needs to create his dish and it will layout the steps he needs to follow and the order of those steps. If he follows his recipe to the letter, he can create the exact same award-winning dish every single time he makes it.
On the other hand, if he does not create a recipe and instead he decides to just cook from memory every time, there is a huge likelihood that he is not going to have the same end result. There is the possibility that he could forget an ingredient – something small, like a pinch of nutmeg. Or he could forget to sift the flour before he mixes it in. Or he could set the oven ten degrees lower than before, or cook the dish for ten minutes longer.
A good chef will probably produce a great dish every single time – but he will not produce the same dish. They will all be variations of each other. If he is a bad chef, he is just going to produce multiple disasters. More importantly, he can never ask another chef to cook it for him, he always has to do the work himself.
Good business systems enable efficiency and growth. One of the reasons that franchises are so successful, is that when you buy a franchise, you receive a set of their standard policies, procedures and systems. You can simply replicate what is working everywhere else.
If you have systems and processes in place, you will immediately begin noticing the following benefits:
- Staff members will be able to do their jobs with minimal supervision
- Clearly defined roles and responsibilities – and accountability
- If an employee is absent, another member of staff can very easily fill in for them
- Training new staff members becomes much, much easier
- Your products and services attain a standardised level of quality
- You have far fewer losses from mistakes or inefficiency
- Decision making is easier and faster
- Freedom for you, the business owner, to work on your business instead of in it
Good systems enable your business to run without you, or without constant interference from management. They make your business streamlined and more productive and, they result in a happier and healthier working environment. By letting systems do the work for you, you free up your time to work on your business, improving your strategy and assessing the efficiency of your systems.
Ultimately, good systems will make your business sustainable and more profitable.
