While it’s absolutely true that the most important business activity of your business is sales and marketing, it’s also vital to ensure the service exceeds the clients’ expectations.
A bad service means chronic retention, meaning you will struggle to get any kind of traction in your business (you’ll be adding new clients just to replace those you have lost).
Remember that the problem is mainly one of perception not reality. If clients perceive your business doesn’t know what it’s doing then that’s a problem, no matter what you think the reality is.
The good news is that the majority of IT support businesses offer a great service. There’s a certain pride that comes from owning and operating your own business.
But where many people fall down is ensuring that the business continues to operate a great service when the owner is away.
When analysing businesses, I often see that staff act differently when the boss isn’t there. I don’t mean extreme changes of behaviour; I mean the sharp attention to detail going out of the window. It probably happens in your business, even if it’s just to a minor degree.
It’s good to have talented staff who have the ability to use their initiative to keep the business running smoothly. But they need clear guidelines about what is expected of them; what they can and can’t do.
That’s why you need an operations manual. It’s simply your way of laying out how you want your business to be run and why.
An operations manual does not hold your business back in any way. On the contrary; it FREES your business from its over reliance on you and your decision making abilities.
A simple and clearly written operations manual is like a rule book. It lets your staff understand what is expected of them and the business. They will fill in the blanks, often surprising you along the way by solving problems before you even knew you had them.
Doesn’t that sound like an exciting business?
