Systems and Procedures

Many businesses fall into the trap of failing to deliver effectively because they are inconsistent in some element of their business. When any process involves more than a couple of steps, most people “train” the person to perform the task and then monitor performance (although some do not even monitor performance).

They could improve performance substantially, for a very small change, by documenting the steps in a work instruction or procedure.

• These are not enormous sterile documents created in a language that only the author understands.
• They are simple check lists or step by step instructions that the person performing the task, once trained properly, can use to make sure that nothing gets missed and nothing is inconsistent.

Better still, display them so that everybody can easily refer to them and follow the steps.