Last week I wrote about the 7 biggest mistake organizations make when become systems driven. If you missed it, you can read it here.
I also mentioned that I would reveal a couple strategies often used when it comes to driving the process and making the transformation from a people dependent to a systems driven organization. So here goes…
The first thing to consider is that when becoming systems driven you and your business is making a shift in the type of work you are doing. Most people focus on tactical tasks and reoccurring events. These are important no doubt, but they are not strategic. Let’s put it this way. Most of the work being done in business is urgent important.
When becoming systems driven, we are engaging in important, non-urgent work. In other words, if you put it off for a day, week, month or year, the only impact is continued day to day frustrations, potential lack of growth, inefficiency, lack of certainty and a better quality of life.
If we put off the day to day, tactical, urgent important work it might mean a customer is not served immediately, payroll doesn’t get processed, office supplies don’t get ordered or the latest fire doesn’t get addressed. These are important and require attention. I get it.
So, here is the rub.
The urgent important work is always going to exist. It never freakin stops. Never, ever, ever. Believing there will be an opportune time to work on the strategic, business development work is faulty thinking.
So, what do you do?
You must disrupt the flow. I promise you; you and your team will get the urgent work done. It will get done.
Why?
Because you and your people aren’t working efficiently. Ouch. Hate me or disagree. It’s the truth. Unsubscribe below if you don’t believe me.
My proof exists in this very simple fact.
If I were to call one of your team members and schedule a call to discuss systems and culture development, their quality of life or even the weather, they will fit it into their schedule. They will still get their day to day work done. Every time. In 20 years of doing this work it have been my experience.
So, your people and YOU and have time to implement a systems development strategy.
The first part of the strategy is to recognize and be absolutely committed to disrupting the work that you are your people do every day and implement the systems development cycle.
Oh…one more thing. You must get your Master Systems List in place before you can fully implement either of the strategies. Simply said, a Master Systems List is your index of all your systems that are or need to be documented within your organization.
Here are the two most popular approaches to building systems driven business.
1) The 90 Day Challenge.
The 90 Day Challenge is a process where your intent is to move with as much energy, focus and speed as possible to get all your systems documented. The power of this approach is momentum and results. Your business will be quickly and effectively resolving problems and frustrations that you and your people experience. In addition, having a shorter timeline means that you keep the pressure on the process for a short period of time. As I suggested before, your business will be riddled with distractions and day to day work. Get it done and get it done fast is the key.
The disadvantage to this approach is the fact that your people are going to be under a lot more pressure to do their required share of the systems development process. You might be asking them to engage in several hours per week of system documentation, review and training. It’s worth it however.
Here is a scenario. Let’s assume your business has 200 systems to document and you have 10 team members. Each team member will be required to document 20 systems assuming they are all involved in the process. That decision is for another conversation. But let’s say they are all engaged. That means each person is going to have to document 1-2 systems per week over the 90 Day or 12-week period. That is reasonable expectation but will likely require about 2 hours of their time or more each week.
The advantage of the 90 Day Approach is you get it done and done fast. Businesses that utilize this approach make a game of it, have a reward system in place and people feel accomplished because the time period is more finite and compressed. It becomes a project to them that everyone engages in completing.
2) As Time Permits Approach.
The As Time Permits Approach in full disclosure is not really a strategy but a default method that many organizations take. I wanted to share it because, ultimately, I would encourage you to avoid this approach. This approach adopts a similar strategy as the 90 Day Challenge or even a longer term like 180 Days but doesn’t establish an environment of accountability, expectation and follow-through. There is no challenge, vision or game communicated.
It starts with good intentions but falls short, often way short simple because they is not energy that creates disruption to the current day to day workflow.
If an organization adopts this approach they might, make the shift to becoming systems driven but there is no guarantee of that. Which is really a shame if they don’t.
There is also another unfavorable outcome and it falls on the business owner. or leadership. You lose credibility, because at some point, a vision of becoming systems driven was likely cast by you and chances are your people were inspired by it. In my person experience people love the idea of what system driven represents to them. They love the stability, certainty and order behind the idea. They don’t necessarily want to do the work to get there but they like the vision. Every business needs a strategy to get people to engage in the work which is why the leadership needs to create disruption. If the leadership casts the vision but doesn’t follow though then people lose confident in them.
I’ve experienced that firsthand, so I know. I’ve also seen it countless times in business when the As Time Permits Strategy is employed.
Adopt the 90 Day Challenge Approach
My recommendation is to adopt the 90 Day Challenge or even a 180 Day Challenge Approach. In doing so your business and people will experience rapid and significant transformation, you will experience collective success and the leader shows up as someone who is genuinely committed to getting things done even when it is uncomfortable.
Interested in taking on the 90 Day Business Systemization Challenge? Let’s connect and see if you and your business and you are ready for it. Click here to connect.