More about Systems

Have you ever found yourself complaining over and over again about something in your workplace? “I’m always losing people’s phone numbers” or “They never send visitors to the right place”.

Whenever something keeps going wrong it is a system malfunction of some sort. The key words to watch out for are “always” and “never”. The trouble is that we seldom take the time to put the system right, so the system keeps going wrong. But don’t forget that spending time on your systems is time well spent.

Sorting out a system is not only a matter of putting things right when they go wrong. Sometimes thinking up a superior system can completely transform your business. New businesses tend to set out with their major constraint being the amount of business they can get. But once the business starts to become successful the major constraint changes to the amount of business they can handle. It is vital at this stage that they put systems into place which are capable of responding to the increased amount of business.

I was greatly able to expand my own coaching business by looking at my systems for booking appointments with my coaching clients, payment and invoicing. Getting this right enabled me to take on twice as many coaching clients as before. In the same way before launching my “The New Time Management” seminars I worked out every aspect of booking, payment, issuing instructions, preparation, and follow-up. I made sure I got it right first time so that I could run a large number of seminars with minimum effort.

In both these cases it was the new system that resulted in my business and therefore my income expanding. The time I spent getting the systems right resulted in my earning over double what I was earning before.

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