System Change

It is 8:05 on a Wednesday morning; you have a midday deadline with a major new client. The phone rings. It is your PA, Audrey, her voice is nasally and before she has got past "Good Morning" you guess correctly that she has flu and will not be coming into work.
Putting down the phone you glance across the open plan, your eyes alight on Bertha.
Bertha is bright and competent and can fill the void left by Audrey for a day.
Informing her of her new role for the day you request that she bring you the "Big Project File", get you the brief Audrey was working on, handle all calls, and while she is at it get you a cup of coffee.
Happy with your decision you retire to your office to focus on your presentation.
Thirty minutes later there is a plaintive knock on the door.
It is a tear-faced Bertha she cannot find the file that you asked for, the document that Audrey was supposed to have typed up does not seem to be in the computer.
She keeps cutting people off when she tries to transfer them to your office from Audrey's fancy phone and she is not sure how you like your tea (or was it coffee).
Two weeks ago I touched on a written systems and checklists manual as a means of managing your business.
These help avoid situations like those above. They can cover everything from filing systems to detailing how the phone works to (for the really pedantic) how many sugars you like in your beverage.
The contents of your operations manual should govern how your business is run and the standard to which it should be done.
In a perfect system, it should not matter if you, Bertha or Audrey answers the phone the results should be the same.
A few years ago I was hired by a company to review their operations. The process was exhaustive, after covering everything from ordering supplies to vehicle maintenance they finally had a comprehensive manual of how the company should operate.
The Chief Operations Officer was excited and approved the work.
The checklists were so defined that even someone who had no education could follow them.
For example: 1. Turn on the light, 2. Pick up the clean rag counter, 3. Wipe the board-room table, 4. Put the used cloth inside the cleaning room on the second shelf, etc.
It may sound way too detailed, but you'll be surprised with how many people love a daily routine that is written down for them.
Six months later nothing had changed. It was not that the new systems were faulty, there was just no buy-in from the staff below the executive. There were a couple of reasons for this.
One was that systems form a great "how to", but need to be related back to the vision of the organisation, the "why to".
This should extend to a degree that you can sell the vision of your company and relate the systems that you are developing to your dream and values and the degree of success you will have.
"Toilets get cleaned hourly because we pride ourselves on excellence. Measurements are accurate to within a tenth of a millimetre because we are creating a reliable product that will last for generations."
With the company that I consulted for there was limited communication of the vision of the company to junior staff because they were building nothing but their own salary at the end of the month.
The other reason for failure is the attempt to change too much at once. This is a common error for a company that is trying to create an operations manual from scratch when they have not had one for years, or for the company that is trying to overhaul operations completely.
I faced this when I took over a long-standing, compact business. They had generally great systems that worked.
The only problem was that they were not written down.
If someone went on leave there was no way to follow up on his or her tasks, and new staff had no idea what to do.
I literally had to sit with each staff member and ask what he or she did, write it down and examine the process for possible improvement.
My advice is start in one area. There is probably no "right" area to begin, but pick one where there is little to change (preferably at little expense) and where the positive results will be quickly noticed.
Name badges for front office staff, watering the small front lawn twice a week, the way the phone is answered for an external call are all simple and relatively cost effective measures.
Document it, checklist it, explain the reason for the change, and follow up on compliance and results.
Then move on to the next area. It may be slower than you want but greater compliance translates into better results.
After all, results are what matter. One last tip, in some cases make sure your procedures are compliant with legal requirements. This is especially true in the process governing disciplinary cases.
Get advice where necessary and have a copy of the relevant laws on hand.