The first step in creating systems in your business is investing in capture tools to start building your online training university for the people you will ultimately hire. Do this as soon as possible, before you even think you need to hire someone. I use Zoom for this. They have a free version if you keep your recordings under 45 minutes.
Recording my screen with Zoom allows you to capture screenshots and a voice recording to create a module for each task. This documents your processes and sets up procedures so that when you are ready to hire someone, you can quickly train them and get them up and running.
Get off Email
Email is probably the biggest time suck that you are going to encounter every week as a business owner. When you get to the point that you can afford $10 an hour, hire a virtual assistant and have them call you up twice a day and read you your email. You will tell them how to respond. This is great to do while you are driving to an appointment.
After about two weeks of doing this, you will have email entirely off your plate. Your VA can screen your email, reply to basic questions, and handle all the little things before they even get you on the phone. This practice saves me about 15 hours a week.
Train Your Employees
Once you hire a resource and hand them a module, you still need to train them. If you don’t onboard your help properly, it will come back to you with lots of questions, misunderstandings, and mistakes, and you will eventually revert to doing it yourself. Don’t let this happen.
You are hiring someone to do it right and better than you were doing it. You want your employees to succeed. Before you give them that module, you need to ensure they have the skill set to succeed with their given tasks. Then, you want to sit down and explain everything to them and have them watch the module.
When they are done watching the module, ask them if they have any questions, understand what is expected of them, and know what success in their job looks like. Ensure they are clear on those three things before turning them loose.
While you train your employees, ensure they understand that you want them to learn. It is okay for them to make mistakes because you want them to learn why they happened and how to avoid them. Also, permit them to improve the process to make it better than what you were doing.
Then, give them some time to figure it out. At this point, they own the task, which does not return to you. Let them go and make mistakes and figure it out. Don’t ever take this task back. Let them stumble, fall, and make mistakes, but give them 100% ownership of that task. Now, it is off your plate, and you are free to go and do more of what you want to do.
Test your Systems
As your business grows, you are going to want to test where your business is at. Make sure you have the right systems in place. As you outsource, delegate, and automate, you will get your business to the point where it can run by itself. The ultimate goal here is to be able to disappear for four straight weeks, and things will continue business as usual.
That is how you want to structure your business, and it all starts with you capturing everything you do so you can create training modules and set up your employees for success. Let me know if you have any questions about the importance of building training modules as you start your business.
