Could your business be like a bad “I Love Lucy” episode? | Systems and Processes In Your Business

Beautiful picture, huh?

That was where I was “snowed in” for three days back in 2011.

Heber, AZ 1/1/11

I left Phoenix on Wednesday morning to go for a quick ride up to Heber, AZ with some friends and family. They were going to stay till Friday, and I was going to come home on Thursday.

Well, mother nature had other plans and I was stuck there for three days later than I had planned. 

This incident got me thinking about you all… can your business survive if you were removed?

Can it survive and go on as “normal” if you were taken out of the mix for a couple of days during a holiday without a hitch? Or God-forbid there was an emergency?

My pet sitting company did, and it only survived because I had systems and processes in place. I was able to enjoy a worry free “impromptu” vacation while my staff was on the ground during New Years weekend.

(Side note – reading this back in 2018 and realizing this was only a test for what happened in 2014 is almost comical)

Playing in the snow

Systems and processes are so important in every business.

Think about the conveyor belts. You can throw things onto it (system) and the belt keeps moving (process) and the people that are adding things to the product (replicating the system over and over again) keep doing their job.

Without systems and processes – it could be the demise of your business. When bad things happen, or you need to step out, many of your clients aren’t going to care what is going on with you and they are going to expect that the professional company their hired and paid, has processes in place to keep it running smoothly.

They hired a professional company for peace of mind and it is every business owner’s responsibility to follow through on that.

Can your business keep running?

What about if one of your staff went MIA? (that has happened to me before.)

What about if YOU went MIA? Is there always someone who knows that you are “alive” or would there be days that go by and no one would notice?

Admittedly, nothing can ever be perfect….but we can all strive for excellence, right?

In my case, the State of Arizona closed the roads going home, and I had 20 clients out of town. That would have been a lot of damage control to be doing without a solid back up plan. I was very thankful for my trusted staff, who were already scheduled for 100% of the visits.

I just sat back drove some ATV’s, sat by the fire, cooked, enjoyed friends and family, and learned what “cabin fever” was.

I was able to check messages, make calls, maybe work about a total of 30 minutes a day and managed to book lots of business each day for the weeks ahead. No one even knew I was gone unless I told them. This worked on 30 minutes a day because the already established systems were efficient and didn’t require a lot of extra work or steps.

If you were removed from your business… would it still run?

Or would it look like a funny I Love Lucy episode? (*The belt going faster is like the HOLIDAY RUSH!) Let me know your thoughts by leaving a comment below!