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Recently I shared some ideas and strategic questions to ask yourself about Sales & Marketing, Finance & Cashflow and Strategic Growth, which are in this group below. Today I am offering some ideas on questions to ask yourself on how you can scale your operations…
SCALING & OPERATIONS
1) Does your current process rely too much on you — what does that cost you? Not just in time, but in terms of lost opportunittes to market, sell and network.
2) What’s one task you do frequently that someone else could be trained to do in the next 30 days? Could you automate any other systems?
3) How clearly defined are your SOPs — and how would a new hire experience your business in their first week? Could you write a job description for your first hire? (Hint: make a list of all the tasks you do frequently, from Q2 above, and that’s more or less the job description of your first hire!)
4) What technology or automation have you resisted, and why?
5) What are the current operating conditions that now is, or is not, the right time for you to hire?
6) If you stepped away from the business for 2 weeks what would fall apart first? Repeat that thought for 1 Month, 6months.
7) What skill, piece of tech, tool or other process or operation could you invest in to help lighten the load and speed up operations? What is your plan and timescale to acquire this?
Just a few thoughts on how or what might work to build and grow your business. Your aim is not to create the perfect jail cell for yourself. The business should serve your needs but should also allow you to take time out to regroup, rethink, analyse and widen your circle of influence.
Hope these are useful and if you have any further questions just ask!
Gareth Turner and Rob Fryer7 Comments-
I like no’ 3 Stu – making a job description out of all those tasks you’ve been cursing at over the past few months.
I have also resisted investing in a good CRM until recently, thinking that my diy processes are OK for managing customers and leads and also the confusion of which one to choose. But now it’s been put in place for me with someone keeping one eye on it I can’t believe I held out so long.
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@robfryer-brandstorm Totally understand the resistance “it’s working for me now”… what CRM did you plump for?
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@stu Go High Level
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These are such powerful prompts—thank you for sharing them. I love the idea of identifying just one task I could train someone else to do in the next 30 days—that feels actionable and not overwhelming. Thanks Stu.
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I would say number 4 – i have told people many times, but dream is to automate as much of my job as i can.
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@garethturner make yourself redundant!
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@stu Well thats where you have to be sensible – firstly i make sure that i build it so i am the only one who knopws how it works, and secondaly and most importantly – ALWAYS install a kill switch ahaha
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