How to Develop Systems and Processes

Kathy (host):

Hello there and welcome back to Help! My Business is Growing, a podcast where we explore how to grow and build a business that is healthy and sustainable. I’m your host, Kathy Svetina.

Kathy (host):

Systems and processes are essential in supporting a growing business. They improve the productivity that keeps your organization agile and efficient and allow your team to do what they do. So having SOPs, those standard operating procedures, ensures the highest quality of work, whatever the task might be. And SOPs are the oil in the well-oiled machine that is a successful business. As an entrepreneur, the systems and processes you have or don’t have in your business can make or break a company. So if these are such an important part of your business, you might be asking. How do you start building the systems and processes and develop them in your business so that they can grow with you as the business grows?

Kathy (host):

A quick reminder, all the episodes on this podcast, including this one, come with timestamps for topics that we discuss, and each one has its own blog posts too. You can find all the links in the detailed topics in this episode’s show notes.

Kathy (host):

So my guest today is Jordan Schanda King. She is a serial entrepreneur and expert in business optimization. Since starting her first business since 2013, she has published a book develop and led group programs in three industries, filed copyright of multiple products, and sold a business.

Kathy (host):

Now she runs a contract COO plus team agency specializing in full operation management for coaches and service providers with an all-female team of VAs copywriters, marketing, social media managers, and tech grows to help female founders scale without burning out so that they can build a sustainable business. After learning the hard way, how to run a business that she loves while also growing her family. Jordan is excited to share her expertise with other women in this entrepreneurial. Join us.

Kathy (host):

Welcome to the show, Jordan.

Jordan (guest):

Yeah, thank you. I’m excited to be here.

Kathy (host):

Thanks for being here. One of the things that I keep saying to the businesses that I work with is how important it is to have systems and processes in place because it becomes this anchor in all the chaos of growth. And I work with a lot of growing businesses. So before we dive into the specific of hows, let’s start with why have these systems and processes in the place and what happens when a business doesn’t have

Jordan (guest):

Totally. So when I think systems and processes, I sometimes think about that in terms of something that’s very simple that I think people can complicate in the online space. So I think a lot of times when people hear systems, they think a full dips do build or something like super complicated.

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Jordan (guest):

And for me, when I think of the word systems, I think of just a step-by-step process that is being followed, whether that’s manually or automated, or a mix of both. And I think that’s a really key thing to start with at the beginning, because often I have to tell people, a system does not have to be complicated. It can literally be something that’s in a Google Doc. So starting there I think is important. But then beyond that, the kind of why behind it is to save time, to make things more consistent in how things are done in your business, and then also to identify opportunities to optimize. Those are like the three core, like whys behind systems.

Kathy (host):

Yeah, and I would also add to that efficiency and it allows you to scale at a faster rate if you so need to, because as you are onboarding people, you don’t have to go and take time away from you or from other people as resources, time resources, to train them. You have that already in a document. And then you can just point them to the document, say, “Here is what we have, and if you have any questions, we can talk about it, obviously.” So it really allows you to bring in people more as the need arises versus trying to scramble, “Oh my God, we have all this business. Now how do we support it?”right?

Jordan (guest):

Yes. And I think in a perfect world, yes, we would have all of our SOPs before we scale or grow or bring people on to our team. But typically in real life, it doesn’t happen that way, unfortunately. I wish it did, but I always tell people, “That’s okay”, and I’m even going through this myself. I’m in the midst of it right now as I’m growing a team and bringing on employees and as much as you would like to wait until you’ve got the detailed SOP before you bring someone into the role. Sometimes you have to do those things in tandem and that’s okay.

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Kathy (host):

Yeah.

Jordan (guest):

Just as long as you know that you still have to do them.

Kathy (host):

And let’s talk about the SOPs. How does that look like when you’re creating them? Is there a specific steps that you should be taking? How does that look like? Is there a specific format that, that they should have? How should they look like so that they’re useful to other people?

Jordan (guest):

Yeah, so this is another thing that, it’s so fluid and it depends so much on the exact SOP that you’re creating. I have a very strong opinion that when I talk about SOPs and when think people think about SOPs, sometimes their mind goes straight to like a manual. Like that type of format. Something that’s very detailed. It’s got every little minute step and it’s maybe got pictures to go with it, so you know exactly what button to click when. Yes, absolutely. That is an SOP, and there is a time and a place for an SOP like that, but I have very strong opinion that some SOPs just need to be a checklist or some SOPs just need to be a video or maybe a combination of a couple of these things, and it really goes back to understanding what is the purpose of the SOP?

Jordan (guest):

Because an SOP that you create to train someone how to do something for the very first time is going to look very different than a SOP that someone uses on an ongoing basis for like quality control. And it could be for the exact same task, but it has a different purpose.

Kathy (host):

Yeah, and this is interesting. Let’s talk about, are there different types of SOPs? Because you brought this quality control SOPs. What exactly is that and how does that look like? How is it different from an SOP that you would create from someone? Go here, click here, do this. How is that different?

Jordan (guest):

It’s different because it has to actually be usable in real time. So I’ll give a very specific example of one that we have been using in my business recently. So I launched a podcast and we have a weekly task SOP for the podcast. So this is things around like how we create graphics, how we notify the guest that their episode is ready and send them their assets for promotion, how we prepare those assets for promotion. All of these things that have to be done on a weekly basis. We create a blog post, we put the notes in everything in Buzzsprout, like there’s so much stuff, and we have a very detailed step-by-step operating procedure, standard operating procedure, SOP, for these tasks and there’s like sections. It’s here’s how you do all the things related to Buzzsprout. Here’s how you do all the things related to graphics, and they have all the information in there. It’s linked out to the different places where they need to maybe pull templates or access the correct page in Kajabi. And so that’s all there.

Jordan (guest):

And that’s great for when you first bring someone on to do the task for the very first time, or if the person who regularly does the task is out and someone else needs to do the task and they’re new, so that you have to have that level of detail, sometimes.

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Jordan (guest):

But once you know how to do that task, what you really need is for it to be a checklist. You don’t need to know that. Remember, this is the button that you click to do X, Y, and Z. You don’t need to do that level of detail in that type of SOP. The person just needs to go through and make sure they’re not missing anything.

Jordan (guest):

So that’s when you take this five-page, step-by-step, here’s how you do it, and you pair it back to when you do videos, check for these four things to make sure that this isn’t missing. And they check it off as they go in real-time. And that’s how you ensure quality. Because everything that could go wrong is in the checklist.

Kathy (host):

I really like that it becomes almost like a sanity check. Have I missed something that I’ve followed this I do a similar thing with our SOPs as well? The only thing is I don’t have that as a separate SOP, so to speak. It’s essentially, I see it as a part of the SOP, but it’s just an overview. So there’s an overview step, and then there’s the details behind it.

Jordan (guest):

Yep.

Kathy (host):

So once, once you know the details behind it, you don’t need to read it anymore.

Jordan (guest):

Exactly. And we do the same. We keep it all in one document and at the top is the checklist version, and then at the bottom is the fully detailed SOP so that it’s altogether there in one place.

Jordan (guest):

And we do the same thing with videos. So when I brought someone on to do this weekly task list, we had the full detail. SOP but I also recorded a loom of me going through and doing all of the things, and that’s linked in there as well. If a new person ever needs to watch the full process take place in real-time.

Kathy (host):

And one of the things that I’ve always, they’re tricky and when you are doing technical stuff like this, check here, do this. It’s fairly easy to do the SOPs, but I think one, the hardest part to do SOPs is in terms of stuff that takes someone’s either creativity or more of a personality.

Kathy (host):

So for example, if you have someone who does customer service, like how do you go and train them and do you have an SOP in terms of the type of responses that they give and how they should think about the responses that they’re giving them. Because you can have all these canned and templated things, but every single interaction might be different.

Kathy (host):

Is there a way that you could put an SOP together for something like this and for creative work? For example, if you have a graphic designer that they have a SOP of how you want it to look like, what needs to happen, but there has to be this creativity that needs to be embedded in their work. How do you manage that with the SOPs and can you even do?

Jordan (guest):

Yeah, I think you can in certain aspects, but not in others. And so I’ll touch on the graphic piece first because that I think is a little bit easier to speak to because a lot of times what’s most helpful to do with graphic work is more have like templates or guidelines. And I think an SOP can come into play around things that are cut and dry.

Jordan (guest):

So like for me, I am very particular about my graphics and so I have certain things that I could put in an SOP that would say, if you’re using this color background, only use white text on top. That’s like very objective information that people can make sure that they implement into their creative process or then check when they’re finished and ask themselves these questions like, is this going to meet the standards of what Jordan wants in her graphics? So I think there’s an element of that, that you can have SOPs for.

Jordan (guest):

But it depends on how you’re working with the person. So is it something where you just want them to use the templates or do they have full creative freedom and then you just want them to check to that it meets like your guidelines? That’s what I would suggest on that side of things.

Jordan (guest):

On the other side around more like the customer-facing support that you mentioned. That I feel like falls more in the realm of like principles-based decision-making. So that is more in how you train people and encourage them to make decisions based on principles, not based on if X happens, do Y like very specific. This is exactly what you need to do.

Jordan (guest):

I do think templates can be helpful for people in roles like that. If you have a standard way that you want people to respond to, maybe the same question that gets asked all the time. So like for instance, in what I do, we have a standard for what happens if someone goes over hours or if they don’t use all of their hours. Because we do all monthly retainers based on packages of hours and the answer is always the same.

Jordan (guest):

And so that type of stuff you can easily give people information to act on that is set. For things that are not as clear cut, I think it’s not something that you can really have in a standard operating procedure. It comes back to that more principles-based decision making, so making sure that people understand the why behind the decision that you would make. If there’s some kind of issue and we mess up something on a client’s account, what would be the appropriate response in that situation? If we know that making our clients happy and taking responsibility for making mistakes is the principle, then they can see what the next action needs to be, and maybe we need to comp them some hours, and then they don’t have to ask me every single time. Tim Ferris talks about this in his book, the Four-Hour Work Week, if you’ve read that.

Kathy (host):

It’s been my to-be-read pile for a long time.

Jordan (guest):

Oh, that’s so good.

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Kathy (host):

But I, I do like that. So in terms of the principles that the business has, do you have that document somewhere as well, or is this more of a conversation that you have with someone on an ongoing basis, like how does that look like?

Jordan (guest):

So it’s not something that we had documented early on in the business and so for anyone listening who’s I don’t have any of this documented, I don’t know. I don’t even know what my values or my principles are, that’s okay.

Jordan (guest):

I think as you have difficult conversations or situations where decisions need to be made based on your principles or your values, that’s the time to really think through them. And that’s the opportunity to do it because again, I think it’s hard to put that stuff in place until you’re actually in a situation that calls for you to think through it. So that’s what we’ve had to do over the years as we’ve had situations arise and we have to make these decisions. We’ve, we’re documenting our values and that’s come, that’s become much more clear to me, as the CEO, as this is my job. I have to be the one that’s setting the guiding values and principles for our work and how we operate with our clients and how we operate internally. And it just presents itself as, “Ooh, this happened and I didn’t really like how that happened. What would I have liked that to look like instead?” So for us, it’s things like high-quality work, it’s open communication, and transparency, those types of things are the values that we make decisions based on.

Kathy (host):

Yeah, it’s more of an evolving type of thing versus this is how we are from day one. And you feel that in the business too, as the business grows and what might have been a value originally might have evolved into something different over the years as well.

Kathy (host):

And I feel like the same thing also goes, going back to the SOPs, is it’s not a one-and-done type of thing. You might have something document and you realize that it just might not really work for you.

Kathy (host):

Like when I, and I’m going to be transparent here. When I originally started doing this podcast, if you are a regular listener to this, you know that I do introductions after we actually have the interview with the guest. And I realize that for me, it takes a lot of time to go back and listen to the interview again and figure out this, how am I going to go and write the introduction? So I was a complete blocker in the process. It was absolutely awful in the workflow. It just messed up my whole workflow up.

Kathy (host):

So then I figure out that this, SOP is really not going to work for me anymore. And then we revise it. Now, I actually have someone else do that and I read it and she writes it for me versus me going back and writing it. So this was a pretty good example of how something you think might work well, it actually can you realize once you start doing, it’s “Oh my god, this is really not working for me.”

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Jordan (guest):

Yeah, and I think this too is where values and priorities, and principles come into play, because I have found the exact same thing to be true for us, but I’ve made a different decision because maybe I’m a control freak. I don’t know. Like we can talk about the why behind it, but for me, I enjoy haven’t wanted to let go of the listening to the entire episode before it’s released, piece of things.

Jordan (guest):

And so what we’ve decided is that even though it does create a little bit of a block because it takes extra time for me to be the person that has to listen to the episode. I think that I feel more confident in the show notes. I feel more confident in how I’m promoting it. I feel more confident in it actually being published, and it always sparks ideas for me to create content too.

Jordan (guest):

So it has this multifunction purpose behind it. . And so even though it takes more time and it’s not necessarily the most efficient way to do things, we’ve decided to keep doing it that way. Because if I’m going to listen to the entire episode anyway, I might as well be the one who’s finalizing the show notes.

Jordan (guest):

So I do it in a similar way as you in that my editor creates the bones of the show notes first, so that I’ve got bullet points there that he’s listed out, but then I still listen to everything and I customize it based on what I heard and make sure that there’s not anything that I want to tweak before it’s actually released.

Jordan (guest):

So I just want to mention that because I think that sometimes people can get caught in this trap in thinking that the right. SOP or the right way to do things is the most efficient way, and that’s not necessarily true. Efficiency is important, but effectiveness is also important. And so understanding those principles behind why you’re doing it that way come into play here too, for your own SOPs and your own way of showing up in the process.

Kathy (host):

Yeah, I really like that too. And this is a great example of how one person does it. It’s completely different than the other business. Does it?

Jordan (guest):

Yeah.

Kathy (host):

And you have your own reasons why you do certain things. For me, it was, I care about the quality of the podcast, but I just do not have the time nor the resources, my own resources, to dedicate this much time into it. Because I have other things. So that’s why I opted, I said, this is good enough. I trust my team to do it, and I’m just going to let that piece go.

Jordan (guest):

Yep. Exactly.

Kathy (host):

So let’s talk about how to actually create these SOPs. What is the best way to do it? Do you put it in a Google Doc? Do you put it in project management system like ClickUp or Asana or whatever you use? We personally, in my business, we use ClickUp. So ClickUp is like the central hub for everything. We have all the SOPs in there, we have all the workflows. Everything is in there because it’s easier for us. But I’m interested in what do you use in your business and what do your client use.

Jordan (guest):

Yeah, so I’d say there’s three main platforms that we use specifically internally and for our clients. The first is Google Drive. So Google Doc is almost always the starting point for a lot of these things, even if it ends up being a template or something elsewhere. Google Doc we use for documentation in an archive of everything.

Jordan (guest):

The second is Loom for videos. So we do Looms for almost everything because a lot of people just need to see it happening in real-time and see where the buttons to click are located or hear the narration of the why behind the SOP as they’re seeing it take place.

Jordan (guest):

So Google drive loom and then ClickUp. So we do use ClickUp both internally for our company and project management, and then also for the project management for all of our clients.

Jordan (guest):

So again, the first step is figuring out the why for the SOP, because the format that it’s going to be in is going to depend on who’s using it and what they’re using it for. But it’s usually going to end up being in one of those three places or in multiple places. So like the one I just explained, there’s a Google Doc for that entire weekly podcast SOP, there is also an accompanying loom that I mentioned showing you all the step and then portions of those steps are in ClickUp as a recurring task for the person who’s actually doing them. So that one in particular lives in all the places, but other SOPs, other projects, other tasks, may only live in one of those places.

Kathy (host):

And who creates these? Is it the business owner? Is it the outsource team? Is it the person who’s doing it? Who would be the best person to create these?

Jordan (guest):

Yeah, so it depends. I find, at least with our clients, that the business owner is often the person who has at least pieces of the information that need to be pulled out of their brain and go into the SOP and so that’s why it’s hard. I think people want to be able to outsource this completely, and you just can’t. Usually. Unless somebody else is totally owning the task, like for instance, maybe like hours tracking is something that I’m not involved in whatsoever for how we track hours for our clients, and maybe someone on my team is fully managing that process. They’re fully managing the creation of the SOP and then they’re overseeing it.

Kathy (host):

Okay.

Jordan (guest):

So potentially the business owner could be taken out of that. But at least in the context of when clients come to us, they’re either a one-person show, and so there isn’t anyone else doing the to us, so we need to pull the information out of them. Or if it’s something brand new that’s being created, they maybe want to have input. And so a lot of times it ends up needing to be a facilitated process with the person who’s creating the SOP and the business owner or the subject matter expert, whoever’s doing the actual task.

Jordan (guest):

So this happens with onboarding a lot. We’ll have a client who’s “I want to improve my onboarding, or I want an SOP for my onboarding process.” Great. We can’t create that in a vacuum. We’ve got a template SOP that you can absolutely use, but we’re going to have to get on at least a 30-minute call for us to walk you through the pieces that we think probably need to happen because they’re standard. And then you need to tell us, “Oh, I actually do that like this, or I like to send my gift at this time.” And then it gets fully customized to what you want to happen. And then once that’s done and we have the information from your brain, then we can fully systematize it and put it into an SOP that it can be managed by someone else completely or automated.

Kathy (host):

Yeah, and again, it’s an evolving thing as well, because. And I see that there’s an extra benefit to this because you can see what are some of the pieces that might actually be a road blocker leader in the future, or maybe right now, even. So for example, if you have two people that need to prove something, what if those two people are not in the office? What do you do then? Do you need to have a backup up person? It almost. It’s not just putting the SOPs together so the business runs more smoothly, but also to do a little bit of an audit of how your business runs.

Jordan (guest):

Yes, a thousand percent. This is actually one of my favorite things about SOPs that I think gets overlooked a lot because people are so focused on “Oh, I have to have this like process for doing things”, and they just throw it together and then they never go back and look at it critically and identify those opportunities to improve. Can something be automated? Like you said, that’s a time blocker. Can it be simplified? Do all of these steps even need to be in there?

Jordan (guest):

So again, going back to the why behind the SOP, the why of who picks out your client gifts. Does it have to be you? Really questioning, critically questioning all of the pieces of the SOP? And do they have to be that way? Does anything need to be added? Does anything need to be taken away?

Jordan (guest):

That optimization piece, once you’ve got the process documented, I think. The real beauty of SOPs personally, but I’m like a total nerd. I know.

Kathy (host):

I can definitely relate to that. I absolutely love my SOPs and the workflows and I could not run my business without it. That’s why I’m such a, I really get on my soapbox even with my clients. It’s like we have to start doing this is because as the business grows is you’re going to give more people is you’re going to have more chaos, this is really like this anco in the middle of the sea. You can also think about it, as you have a business, there’s this you’re floating on a raft somewhere in the middle of the sea and it gets really windy and you’re trashed around. But these processes and systems are really what are going to give you that stability because I cannot imagine not having a business without them. I’m a huge fan of SOPs. As you can tell. Right?

Kathy (host):

So let’s talk about how often should you go back and revisit them. Obviously, these are an ongoing documents that ideally you should be using them, that you can see whether they’re working or not, but how often should you be really taking an audit of all the SOPs that you have? And figuring out maybe I need to change something or maybe we need to create another one. Like how does that process look like?

Jordan (guest):

Yeah, so I think this goes back to the piece about making sure that these are in the format, that they’re actually usable. Because if they are and they’re being used, you don’t really have to ever think about going back to audit them or to fix them or to make sure that they’re still accurate because you’re using them in real-time.

Jordan (guest):

So another great example, this same podcast, SOP that I was talking about earlier. I had a call with one of my team members today. I was like, “Oh, we should just integrate this into the process because you’re already, we were talking about scheduling the promo email and creating the social media post, and I was like it doesn’t make sense for somebody else to do that if you’re already putting together the promo assets. You could just easily copy and paste that and schedule that and Kajabi for me while you’re there.” And SOPerfect opportunity to, in real time, we made a note in the, SOP add step by step process for doing this, and this.

Jordan (guest):

So that’s how they will evolve and change. You just have to make sure that you’re updating them when you’re coming up with those new ideas and not just assigning a new task to somebody and expecting them to do it because they know how to do it, but making sure that’s actually reflected in the SOP. So again, making sure that they’re in a format that people are actually using in real time.

Kathy (host):

Yeah, I keep getting flashbacks of my corporate life at the 20 years ago when we didn’t really have any of these ClickUp and Asanas and all that stuff. We had these binders, huge binders in our closets that were full of these procedures that were actually outdated, and you look this up and you’re like, we haven’t even using this system for years and years. Why do we still have this? Right?

Jordan (guest):

Yeah. That’s what you don’t want. You don’t want to create a manual that nobody ever looks at. You want these to be living functional documents that people are in all the time.

Kathy (host):

I absolutely agree. Jordan, this has been absolutely the life flight, and I love Geeky gal about SOPs with you. But let’s talk about if someone doesn’t have any SOPs, whatsoever in their business and they know that they need to start creating this and but they’re super overwhelmed with, they have no idea where to start, what is the next actionable step that they can take in the next week to get them closer to having these SOPs in their business?

Jordan (guest):

The easiest thing that you can do because you want to make this easy. You don’t want to build this up into this huge task that you’re going to avoid. The easiest thing to do is just document in real-time the next time you do the task. So whatever it is, make a list of SOPs you think you need to create, pick one, and document that in real-time when you do it. So either record your screen as you’re doing it. Sometimes you need to get on a call with someone.

Jordan (guest):

So I think most people, I think work better either talking it out or being asked questions by someone else. So pick whichever one’s going to make sense for the SOP you want to create and either record a loom, a screen share of you doing the task in real-time, or have someone get on a call with you and ask you questions and you explain the SOP to them.

Jordan (guest):

Those are the two best ways to get started. That’s not going to be overwhelming, and then you can transcribe that into some type of checklist or have them turn it into a checklist. There’s all kinds of crazy things you can do with it after you’ve done it, but the first step is just documenting.

Kathy (host):

I love that. And that’s something that I also did very recently too, is I recorded myself on a Loom video doing the steps that I needed the SOPs for, and then I had my assistant turn that into an actual document.

Jordan (guest):

Exactly. I love that way of doing it because it’s almost like this added layer of accountability that you put into it. And so to go back to the thing I mentioned at the very, very beginning. I think a lot of people avoid bringing team members on when they know they need help, but they’re like terrified that they don’t have things ready to bring someone into a role. And they wait and they wait until it’s just they wait too long. And so don’t use not having SOPs as an excuse not to bring people on, instead look at that as an opportunity to go ahead and get things documented. Yes, it’s going to take you more time with that person in the training process, but at the end of it, you’re going to finally have all those SOPs that you need.

Kathy (host):

Yeah, I definitely agree with that. Jordan, where can people find you?

Jordan (guest):

They can find me on my website. It’s probably the easiest place to find me. Easyscaling.com, and then my Instagram is linked on there. Jordan Schanda King, that’s where I hang out, is on Instagram if anyone wants to chat.

Kathy (host):

Great, and we’re going to put all of those in the show notes too. So if you are interested, you should just click on there and it will take you right to Jordan’s website. Thank you so much for being on the show, Jordan. I absolutely love this conversation.

Jordan (guest):

Thank you. This is so much fun.

Kathy (host):

Thanks so much for joining us and I hope that today’s episode has inspired you to craft your own SOP or revisit those that you already have in place with a fresh set of eyes. Also, if you love this episode, you can find all the timestamps, show notes, blog posts, and links on the website, newcastlefinance.us/podcast.

Kathy (host):

And before I go, as always, I do have a favor to ask. If you are listening to this on Apple podcast, you could please go to the show, tap the number of stars that you think this show deserves, because this helps other people find it and benefit from it as well. Thanks so much. Until next time.