One of my specialties is helping business owners “clean up the mess” with regards to their business. Most business owners can identify—quite frankly, it’s very easy for the details associated with running a business to spiral out of control, and the result is usually chaos.
So what do you do when you find yourself losing control? The first step is to take a deep breath and do your best to relax and clear your mind. Don’t panic, don’t stress yourself out, just take action. You won’t develop good long-term solutions if you’re rushing about madly—in fact, that behavior is usually what creates the problem in the first place.
So, now that you have taken a deep breath, here is what’s next:
1) Identify what’s working. Somewhere, in the midst of all the chaos, you’ve got systems and procedures that are working well. (If you didn’t, you wouldn’t have a profitable business!) Start by identify what’s working. For one thing, you want to be sure that you don’t interfere with these processes that are already working well. And for another, it is often encouraging to be reminded of what you’re doing right! (For instance, many of my clients offer amazing customer service.)
2) Identify what’s not. Step two is identifying what’s not working so well. Now, the key is that this must be an orderly process. It’s easy to become frustrated and emotional when things are not going right, but for this process to be successful, try to remove emotion from the equation. Then create a list. (For instance, my clients are often struggling with bookkeeping, inventory, records management, etc.) Don’t stop until you feel that you’ve identified all of the systems and procedures in your business that aren’t working the way they should be.
3) Identify priorities – which of the “not working” functions are most critical? Chances are, the list that you have created in the previous step of this process is long and intimidating. The good news is that you don’t have to fix it all at once. Instead, take a look at the list and identify which functions are the most vital. It may be bookkeeping. It may be customer service. Whatever the case may be, spend a few minutes arranging this list in order of priority.
4) Commit time to replacing the “broken” processes with new systems. Now that you have created your list, it’s important that you dedicate time to fixing each issue. This is where many business owners go wrong. Replacing “broken” processes with effective systems takes time, energy, and creativity. You simply can’t “squeeze it in” at the end of a long day. Budget plenty of time to evaluate each situation and come up with the best possible solution. And when you’ve determined how you want to improve each process, document your solution so that you and your staff can refer back to it.
While cleaning up the “mess” isn’t always easy, it can be done. It takes commitment, and it takes a plan. But it’s worth the investment! Please contact me today if you’d like to learn more.