Tell me if this scenario looks familiar to you. The holidays roll around, predictably at the same time every year. One of your key employees takes their regularly-scheduled holiday vacation. The same week they are out, payroll needs to get pushed out. Or the internal software has an issue only they know how to fix. Or a government audit is due and they are the only one who knows how to fill out the forms (or even where the forms are found).
It’s a familiar story; a breakdown in the functional pipeline that affects everyone because of how specialized work is these days. Both for-profit and nonprofits frequently suffer because the ways in which things get done only live in the minds of the people doing them. There is no centralized documentation, no playbook to consult. The experts do the work (and do it well), but if something happens to them – vacation, sick time, parental leave, etc. – then everything falls apart. Both public and private organizations stand to lose money, risk burnout, and have major delays occur because of a single point of failure. It doesn’t have to be this way.
Creating and updating Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs) takes time and effort that leadership typically does not want to spend. “It’s not an issue,” or “It’s not urgent” are the two most common responses we see. This short-term view of the workflow always comes back around to bite you, because when the need for SOPs presents itself, there’s no more time to write them. Either the person with the knowledge is gone, or there truly is no time now to work on them. Many of you reading this have likely experienced something like this.
SOPs are time-intensive, take considerable effort, and the people who do the work often don’t think to include every step necessary in a given process. Thankfully, you don’t have to do it alone. Reach out today to learn about how you can easily get SOPs written up in a way that simplifies your workflow, can be updated easily, and make it so your business doesn’t rely on one person. You’ll gain peace of mind, secure in the knowledge that next time a crisis rolls around there’s documentation on exactly what to do.