When you run a small business, you often wear many hats, especially at the beginning. And because you carry out so many roles, it can be easy to try and keep all your essential business information in your head.
But, trust us, that’s not a good idea.
What happens when you need to scale and no longer have time to do everything yourself? What happens if you are sick and can’t carry out a task?
The same goes for your team. You can get stuck if you rely on one person to do a specific job, then suddenly they are away, and no one else knows how to do it!
So how do you avoid situations where no one knows how to do an important task? You document things. Paperwork might seem like a time-consuming chore, but it puts your business in a much better position in the long run.
Let’s look at some essential processes you might want to document and how to do it.
Five Essential Business Processes to Document
1. Onboarding clients
When you get new clients, onboarding is one of the first interactions they will have with your business. Getting this stage right is key to creating a positive start to your working relationship. Documenting your onboarding process ensures that no crucial steps are missed and that the process is consistent across all customers.
2. Complaints
No one likes dealing with complaints, but they must be dealt with professionally if they arise. A process document will help to clarify the appropriate responses and timeframes for different types of complaints. You could also include templated emails or phone scripts to help staff deal with demanding customers.
“It’s not that you’ve made a mistake that matters; it’s how you fix it”
~ Irene Bennetts, all the time, to our team.
3. Payroll
Paying staff is one of your most essential tasks as a business owner. It is not something that you want to get wrong! A well-documented payroll process ensures staff get paid on time and in full and reduces the chance of any mistakes being made.
4. Updates to key systems like your website, calendar or inventory management
Every business relies on systems. These systems can range from a CRM to your website and even things like integrations or stock management. Having a clear process document will make it easy for team members to understand how these systems work and how they can keep them updated.
5. Marketing
For a marketing strategy to work, you need to have a structured plan that is actioned and carried out consistently. A process document can cover which marketing channels need to be updated, with what type of content and how often.
How to Document your Processes
Now that we know what we need to document let’s look at how you can put those process documents together.
1. Explain what and why
Start by giving a clear overview of the process, what it achieves and why it is important. This helps the user understand what they are doing and why. Often people are more inclined to complete a task correctly if they understand why they are doing it.
2. Break the process down into clear steps
Remember that the clearer you can make the process, the easier it will be for someone to follow. Don’t assume that anything will be done automatically; write down the tiny and larger details. When creating steps, try not to group too many parts of the process in one step.
3. Show the process
Visual aids are helpful, so incorporate pictures or video into your process document to make things more apparent. This could be a video of you completing the task or screenshots of the steps taken.
Top tip: We recommend including both if you can.
4. Get someone to check the process
When you are used to doing things yourself, it can be hard to document the process. Because the job is second nature, you might forget to consider essential steps or not make things clear enough. So, it’s a good idea to get someone else to have a go following your instructions. They’ll be able to highlight any parts that need to be adjusted or clarified.
What you will consider implicit needs to be made explicit!
5. Keep the process document where you can find it
A process document is only helpful if it can be located! These days it is easiest to keep electronic versions of your process documents. This makes it easier to update them if required and distribute them to anyone completing the task, even if they are outside your company, like a VA.
Get Expert Help with your Process Documents and the Tasks they Explain
With an experienced team of virtual assistants, Admin Army can help you with all the tasks we’ve documented above.
And more than that, we can also help you tidy up those process documents.
Process documents are a super vital business resource, but they can feel like a chore to create.
Luckily, our troops are ready and waiting to help you get your standard operating procedures in order and take on all the time-consuming tasks. We’ll ensure everything runs smoothly in the background, leaving you to concentrate on building your business.
Get in touch to see how we can help.