Building a successful business is all about keeping things simple. Although we think we can do many things at once, we can’t. And filling your mind with unrealistic tasks will only confuse you, forcing you to make rash decisions, lose focus, and produce shoddy results.
Therefore, it is crucial for a business owner to focus on key areas, areas that focus on business growth and market dominance. However, this does not mean that you overlook other areas of the business, but your attention and time should always be on some crucial and practical activities, which are ultimately the building blocks of your business.
That being said, knowing what to focus on and how to simplify your tasks can be a dilemma. But here’s a simple five-step streamlining guide to help you be more productive:
1. Clear the brush
One of the easiest ways to start simplifying is to get rid of the unnecessary rules, low-value activities, and time-wasters that are common in most businesses. For example, start by finding out how many people need to review and approve expense reports, or how many reports need to be reviewed before they’re submitted. By reducing some simple and repetitive tasks, you will have more time to focus on crucial tasks.
2. Take an outside-in perspective
The need to offer more value to your customers should guide the simplification of your business. To achieve this, proactively clarify what your customers really need and what you can do to meet their needs.
3. Prioritize
To simplify the activities and tasks of your business, you must establish what is really important and what is not. Also, you need to continually reassess priority as new things come up.
4. Always try to take the shortest path
Once you establish you’re working on the right things, eliminate extra steps in core processes. Eliminate all extraneous loops, redundancies, and unnecessary opportunities to make your processes as efficient as possible.
5. Reduce levels and increase sections
One cause of complexity is the tendency to add layers of management resulting in managers often supervising one or two people. This makes managers feel the need to add value by questioning everything their subordinates do and this results in more work and lower employee morale. To get rid of this form of complexity, stop micromanaging. Examine the company structure, remove unnecessary levels and increase spans of control.
Keep it simple by choosing the three most important things to focus on if you want to build a successful business. Remember, just because everything is simplified doesn’t mean it’s easy to do. Not even remotely. It takes a lot of work and your mind will work non-stop as you try to bring your business to perfection.