Most of what you do is what you have already done before.

In other words, there is a very high probability that the things you and your team are doing today are essentially the same things you’ve done before as a business.

That means they are activities that can and should be systemized.  But why bother?  Is it a good idea, a great thought or a “must”?

Value

Systemized businesses sell for higher prices – they are more valuable – because they aren’t heavily dependent on the owner’s knowledge and skills to be profitable.  That’s a worthwhile reason alone and not just financially speaking…

Time

An owner whose business can run independently has the luxury of not only a predictable cash flow, but the gift of flexibility – the freedom to choose how to spend their time, whether on the business or away from it.  Want to go to your kid’s game this afternoon?  It’s your choice.

Manageability

Systemized businesses are also much easier to run.  When you have clear visibility into the various functions – sales, marketing, operations, administration, people, etc. – decisions are faster and better.  When you have reliable information at your fingertips, evidence, not guesswork, drives your thinking and decision-making.

Engagement, Recruiting and Retention

Team members are more engaged when they know precisely what’s expected of them and it’s easier to train new employees when everything is based on repeatable processes.  Each role is easier to perform and it’s therefore easier to recruit new players and to keep them.

Improvement

Aside from increasing engagement, involving employees in process development, a culture develops that values continuous improvement.  When everyone enjoys the benefits of systemization and they help bring it about, they become interested in making things better and a virtuous cycle of process improvement thinking develops.

Consistency

Systems produce higher quality results with less effort consistently.  Consistency brings about higher customer satisfaction – there’s fewer mistakes that cause them to think about trying out your competition.  That comes from everyone following the same proven way that you have developed over time.

Predictable Cash Flow

The predictability inherent in the outputs of repeatable processes extends to cash flows.  You can see farther into the future with greater confidence, especially when your marketing and sales systems are dialed in.

Risk

Getting the knowledge out of the heads and onto paper makes you less vulnerable to the loss of a key employee.  And it prevents “mutation” of best practices that might otherwise degrade from the “tribal method” of training from one person to another over time.

Customer Satisfaction

When your strategy for customer satisfaction is built on systems as opposed to the variability of the personalities of employees who may come and go, customer experiences are reliably better.  That is not meant to say that the human touch is reduced.  On the contrary, strong systems allow the team to increase their focus on the emotional connections with your customers because they have more time to invest in these higher value behaviors.

Competitive Advantage

Operational excellence, product leadership or customer intimacy – whichever approach forms the basis of your strategy – becomes stronger and sets you further apart from everyone else.

In the end, it’s just more enjoyable to create an environment where everyone is aligned and engaged.  That alone is worthwhile.