Every business does something. Your business may be service-oriented or product-oriented, but unless you've discovered the goal of alchemists and slackers alike—to get paid for doing nothing—you perform some kind of activities for your business.
Now, what if you couldn't do those things, even for a short time? What if you were hospitalized or needed to go out of town, and needed to hire someone to keep the baseline stuff running in your absence? Hell, what if your business was so successful you needed to hire someone to help you keep the baseline stuff running? Could you explain your business's processes and outcomes to another person?
If those questions make your hands go clammy or make you want to change the subject, that's a good indication that your business could benefit from a great tool with an uninspiring name: the Procedures Manual.
A procedures manual is basically a how-to guide for your business that covers the basic operational processes. For instance, if you're a web designer, your procedures manual wouldn't cover how to design or program anything, but it would cover how to send out invoices and reminders and how often to check your clients' web sites for functionality. If you run a nail salon, your procedures manual would cover opening and closing the shop and keeping all the supplies stocked, but it wouldn't cover the secrets to a perfect French manicure.
If you ever want or need to expand your business beyond you and you alone, a procedures manual can help you train new people and give your new hires a resource to check when they need reminding of how to do something. It can also provide empirical examples of how something should look or what wording should be used.
Creating a procedures manual is not a short, one-sitting project. It's a pretty important item, so take your time with it. Here are some tips for how to develop your manual:
1. Observe what you do for at least a week. Most business procedures don't occur on a daily basis; they're more like weekly or monthly items. So give yourself a chance to remember all the stuff you do and how you do it.
2. Keep a notebook nearby and write down what you're doing, how you're doing it, what your desired outcome is and how it relates to other aspects of your business.
3. Take pictures, make printouts. You can use hundreds of words to describe what a completed invoice should look like, or you can print out a correct generic invoice and write a few notes on it. Most people learn better with pictures in addition to words, so having visuals will help with training.
4. If your manual is longer than 10 pages, use a table of contents and an index. Microsoft Word has both those functions, so you can automatically generate these useful guides to your manual.
5. Once you've finished your manual, don't just put it on a shelf. Review it every time you do your procedures yourself for a while, and make sure that's how they're actually done. Whenever a procedure changes (you get a new vendor for supplies, for instance), make note of the change in your manual and print out a new page. After all, an out-of-date procedures manual is just a 3-ring paperweight.
It's a bit of an investment of time and energy to create a procedures manual that works for your business. Fortunately, you'll get that back and more if you ever ask another person to work for your business, too.
What do you think? Have you encountered good procedures manuals, bad procedures manuals or no manuals at all in your previous work? Let me know in the comments!
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