Systems and Processes

Or, as I like to call them, tools to support good habits.  In both instances they should be useful and help people, not time consuming and a burden.

Many companies have systems and processes that have built up and developed over time.  They often reflect the culture of the company, but as with many things that grow over time, these systems and processes may have redundancies and duplication that make them more cumbersome than they have to be.

I firmly believe in ‘less is more’.  Systems and processes should be like any other tools, there to help the team do their work, and there should always be a benefit to the individual, team or company in following those processes.  It is easy to get buy in for a process which benefits the individual directly (e.g. an online expense system that will speed up the payment of employee expenses), but less so where the benefit is for another part of the company (ensuring each expense is categorised correctly so that individual items are allocated to the correct nominal account in the accounting system).  The key is to get the balance right, and try wherever possible to streamline processes so the team doesn’t get bogged down in ‘admin’.

Where there are duplication of tasks, consider whether they can be combined, are there processes that could complement or enhance efforts in another part of the company?  Looking at how various departments work together and separately can often lead to opportunities to collaborate.