Episode 367: Is it the people or the process?
In this episode, Fiona shares the distinction between people and process challenges. She also talks about the success and efficiency within your business. Tune in!
Topics discussed in this episode:
Introduction
Highlighting the significance of process
Suggestions on initiating process planning
Automation and personnel training needs
Encouragement to invest in effective processes
Optimizing business processes for the coming year
The importance of efficient processes in staff management
Addressing common frustrations in business
Conclusion
Get in touch with My Daily Business
Resources and Recommendations mentioned in this episode:
Welcome to episode 367 of the My Daily Business podcast. We are well and truly into the silly season, and for many of you, I know that this will be coming at a point where you are like, “I have got much on my plate right now,” I hope that this tip helps and maybe just need some time to digest in your mind, especially ahead of whatever planning you're doing for 2024. Before I get stuck into that, I want to acknowledge the traditional owners and custodians of the land on which I record this podcast, and that is the Wurrung and Wurundjeri people of the Kulin Nation. I pay my respects to their elders, past, and present, and acknowledge that sovereignty has never been ceded.
The other thing I wanted to mention is that if you are a very last-minute shopper and you have a business bestie or somebody in your life who has a small business, we do offer gift cards for any of our services that can be used against coaching, Group Coaching, any of the courses and you can find those plus anything else over at My Daily Business Shop. You can also find a copy of my first book Passion Purpose Profit which we can sign and put a nice little message in for the recipient of your gift. As long as you can let us know that in the notes when you order. I would get onto that sooner than later because of course books need to be posted out. Let's get into today's quick tip episode.
This is a hectic time for a lot of people reading this podcast, but I also understand that there'll be a lot of people for whom this time of year, and I know this will annoy busy people, but this time of year is kind of quieter and this is where they might spend more time on kind of planning out and figuring out what they want from this business and even what they want from their life in the coming year. One of the things that comes up all the time for me when I'm working with people, particularly those who have staff, is just frustration around staff doing XYZ or not doing XYZ. When they go through that challenge, I will relay this quote, which is from W. Edward Deming who once famously said that 85% of the problem is about the process, not the people, but something around that 85% of the time it's not a people problem. It is a process problem.
If I can offer you nothing else, I'd get you to start thinking about having the people that I've hired, whether they are subcontractors coming in full-time, casual, have they been set up for success in terms of my processes, are they in place? Do they work? Are they foolproof? Are they being explained properly to the person that's coming into that job? Especially as we're heading into a new year, think about how you might create better processes. What part of the process might be automated? What part could be delegated to somebody else, and which parts of what you're doing are just a big old waste of time? What is inefficient in your business? Whether it's using AI, whether it is putting better processes in place, how can you create a system that is going to help whoever it is that is in that role?
Even if you do have to fire staff or remove people, or manage people out, you have a process in place that somebody else coming in has sufficient onboarding for that process, and understands how to update if it needs to be updated because they're the person who's going to be carrying it out and they may have good tips and insights to change it for the better. Also how you are going to manage all of that. The frustrations internally that people have with business come down to the process. I can honestly say that after eight years in this business and helping thousands of clients, big small people just getting started, people with a hundred thousand even employees in some of the corporate places. It's often down to there's a process problem, not always there's a people problem.
That is it. It's a very quick tip today and let you get back to your busy silly season. If you can get clear on that and if you can look at your processes and if you've never done any kind of process planning, the very easiest simple place to start is to just draw a line across a piece of paper, just like a horizontal line and this is the start of the process, whatever that looks like. If you are updating images on a website for an e-commerce brand, you might have the product come in, or we have the samples that come in, or we have the images that come in, wherever that process starts. Then the ideal end. Like the left hand of the page, if you had it in front of you, you would have the starting point and then you have a line. Then the ideal kind of nothing ever ends with processes, but the endpoint that you can think of, which would be, in this case, incredible images online or even that you've activated your new product marketing campaign for those images once they are up online.
In between though, you've got all these things that need to happen. The product needs to be photographed. If it hasn't been photographed, it needs to have its product detail information. It needs to be uploaded, it needs to be whatever inventory management system needs to be connected. You need to be checking all these different points. For each business that's going to be slightly different because some things have to be outsourced to an agency, some things come back in-house, and everything's done in-house. It's figuring out how does that all happen?
Just on that line marking in those different points and then looking at, is this a people where a person has to actively do something or is this an automation that we can make? Is there a software tool that we're using for this? How does that work with the person who's doing the management of this? Do they need training? All sorts of things can go on, but the starting point should be as simple as literally a line across the page. Where are we starting from? Where do we hope to end up? Then let's try and pinpoint all the things in between. If you need help with this, we do offer a course titled How to Set Up Your Systems. You can find that at My Daily Business Shop. You can also book in for a one-on-one coaching session.
We are closed as of 2023. However, we have sessions well and truly open for 2024. If you want to get in the new year, please just email us hello@mydailybusiness.com or you can find all the business coaching options at My Daily Business Shop. Thank you so much for reading. Keep that in mind 85% of the time, it is a process problem, not a people problem. How can you increase the odds that people could do their work well and that you have a great business and a team that runs efficiently and effectively because your processes are in place? I'll leave it with that. Good luck with the rest of whatever you're getting on with today and I'll see you next time. Bye.
