Improve My Business

When you find an error in your process or system, you should do an analysis of the reason you made that error.  Many times, you may find out that the reason that an error was made is that you don’t have a process - or that the process wasn’t followed (but that’ll be another post…)

So, if you don’t have a process - design one!

HOW do you design a process?  Easy peasy - map the process out.  How do you map a process?  Write down the steps that need to be done in order, try following those steps, then refine it until you’ve got it where  you want it.

Here’s an example:  we rent our Texas beach house out on VRBO and HomeAway. During this time of year, we get a LOT of requests for summer rentals.  The big risk is to rent the place twice for the same night(s) - double booking, so we want to make sure that we have a process in place.  Sure enough, we didn’t have our process in place, and ended up with a double booking this year; luckily, we caught it within an hour of accepting the second booking, so only had to apologize profusely and refund the deposit.  [It would've been MUCH worse if both families had shown up at the beach place expecting to stay for a week!]

So the problem remained - we had double booked.  How to revise our current process?

1. we stopped letting all folks take and make reservations - I am now the linchpin for the reservation process, and although others can check the account and answer queries, I’m the only one who accepts a deposit.
2. We track every reservation and deposit on a spreadsheet - and the process has to be followed in order.  So, a reservation has to be logged in and the calendar dates have to be blocked out before we deposit the money, as an example - to ensure that money isn’t accepted prior to verifying that the calendar is available.  The spreadsheet is sorted by date, so this should ensure that we don’t double-book.
3. Our double check for this is to make a copy of the check or credit card deposit, and to file those by dates  in a paper backup file.  [That's how we found out that we had double booked - the calendar hadn't been updated, but we had a deposit for that week already.]
4. Then, and only then, do we let our guests know that they have secured the reservation and continue the process.

We are hopeful that these tweaks will work for us, but are vigilant to identify possible ‘loopholes’ in the process, and plug them up. This is the essence of effective corrective action - monitoring to ensure that the process design is robust enough to prevent recurrence of the problem.

Have you had a problem, or made an error, and put a process in place to ‘fix’ it?  Post it here or contact me at marymcd@mcdcg.com - I’d love to hear about it!

Technorati Tags: beach home, process design, process improvement, process map

Now, after two posts on the importance of taking “time outs” for thinking and re-charging the mental batteries, it’s time to discuss the dirty habit that lies just on the other side of productive time off-task and task avoidance. Yes, I’m talking about procrastination.

According to Dr. Piers Steel, an expert in the study of procrastination, at least 95% of people procrastinate and for 15-20% of us it is a consistent problem. (http://www.procrastinus.com/)

There are many theories on the causes of procrastination, and much debate over the validity of these theories. There are even more people and companies with websites and programs offering advice on how to overcome procrastination. In fact, I was overwhelmed (and intrigued) at all the info out there. You can count on hearing more on this topic in future posts. In the meantime, I ask you, “Why (or what) do you procrastinate?“

To get the ball rolling, I’ll admit to procrastinating on getting my car serviced.

At first there was just the engine light, which was explained to me as a secondary sensor being out, and that it was not crucial to be fixed immediately. Next the brake light came on, of which I was told the brake pads need to be replaced soon, but I could get by until my next payday. The third warning was the add coolant light – which I would never ignore, although I have been able to postpone repair by periodically adding water. The final straw for me was when the display read “SERVICE!” with an accompanying high pitched beep. So now, the car is screaming at me for attention. And just yesterday, I noticed the A/C not blowing as cold as usual. Finally, I’ve made the appointment to bring my car in. The main reason I didn’t do it before was simply the inconvenience of having to arrange for alternate transportation. I am sure I’ll pay for this when it’s time to pay the service bill!

Technorati Tags: efficiency, problem solving, Procrastination

Do you feel guilty for taking time to think?

Thinking is important; really important…so why are we embarrassed when we are caught thinking? Thinking is not the same as daydreaming. Deep, productive thought cannot always be accomplished while multi-tasking. Just because you are not typing on your keyboard doesn’t mean that nothing is being done.

I think we are harder on ourselves then we realize when it comes to taking time to think. In fact, we actually stop ourselves from thinking when that little voice in our head says, “You need to get busy!” We’re so used to jumping when we hear our inner voice that we don’t even challenge that thought. Try answering that thought with: ‘Hey, I am busy, I am thinking and you (voice) are interrupting!”

When you let your thoughts be interrupted by the notion that you need to get busy, the outcome is potentially dangerous. Here are some reasons why:

• Incomplete thoughts lead to unforeseen problems
• You can lose your ability to complete a thought before acting (getting trigger happy)
• You will be stumped when someone asks you if you’ve “thought this through”
• You can miss the obvious better solution
• You depend on others input so much that you’re really just copying their thoughts – losing your originality
• It becomes your habit to rely on crutches to help you with your thoughts (Google, spell check)

So, I’m suggesting you take some time to think, fight the urge to look busy and see how your quality of work improves.

Technorati Tags: preparation, quality, working smarter

I find that seeing lots of different ideas on one page is really helpful when trying to come up with a creative solution.

The easiest of these is via brainstorming, where ideas are captured and (purposely) placed randomly on a piece of paper.  (Randomness is key - if we listed them in order, the mind automatically gives more weight to the top idea).  Once these ideas are captured, you can sort them via affinity diagrams, fishbone/cause-and-effect diagrams, or mindmaps.

I’ve talked about affinity diagrams and cause and effect diagrams in previous posts, so let’s talk a bit more about mindmaps.  Mindmaps are graphical representations of not only the ideas, but their relationships.  For example, if doing a mindmap about a vacation, I may have something that looks like this:

For folks who are visual learners, mindmaps are a great tool.  There are several free programs out there; I like Freemind and MindMeister.

What have you used a mindmap for, and how has it worked for you?

Technorati Tags: cause-and-effect diagram, de-clutter, fishbone diagram, FreeMind, mind map, mindmap, MindMeister

Happy first day of Spring!

You know what that means…time for Spring Cleaning. When was the last time you thought about cleaning up around your office? I’m not just talking about straightening your desk and your top drawer; I mean really getting into the dark and dingy crevices that are never seen. Deep in your email box maybe, messages from 2003? What about those old programs and trials you downloaded and used once? Do you have 6 draft versions of the same document? Clean out your cache? Really, it’s better to do it now then when your computer freezes up and you get so frustrated you just delete it all!

Start with your desktop, do you really need all those shortcuts? I’m sure with a bit of thought you can create a file management system that will really make sense to you. A clean computer desktop is just as important as a clean desk-desk top.

Trust me, you’ll feel so much better!

Technorati Tags: de-clutter, organization, organizing