Creating Business Systems – Preparing Your Business So You Can Take A Holiday

In this issue……

Are you addicted to volume?

So many business owners focus on maintaining enough sales volume to stay busy.  They go for more sales instead of better or more profitable sales. They take what comes in the door and compete against too many cheap competitors who don’t make a profit.  They also don’t offer anything much different to their competitors, so they continue to sell at low prices to stay open for business or to keep busy. 

This results in lesser quality products, tougher customers, and working at loo low a margin to cover costs.  Profit driven business owners focus on seeking highly profitable customers, clients, projects, joint ventures, systems, methods and opportunities to sell their products and services.  These efforts give you the highest return on your time, energy, and resources. 

Rather than devoting all of your time to daily operations, focus at least 25% of your time on finding and keeping profitable customers, clients, projects, joint ventures, systems and looking for opportunities for better profit margins.

Creating Business Systems – Preparing Your Business So You Can Take A Holiday

If you find that you’re only ever taking short 2 or 3 day breaks here and there because you are worried that your business won’t cope while you’re away, then this article will shed some light on some key things you can do in the lead up to your holiday so that you can take a decent break to recharge your batteries and spend time with your family.

If you’ve decided that you need a week or two away, then the first thing that you must do in preparation for taking a holiday from your business is to write a list of all the things that you do on a daily, weekly, and fortnightly basis.  When you have your list of things that you do, separate it out into two columns and write down all the things that absolutely cannot be done by anybody else, and all the things that with some training and instruction, could be done by someone else.  Your next focus is to work on the things that could be done by someone else.  Next time you do that task, spend just a little longer doing it, and write down the steps in a checklist. 

Once you have the checklists done, choose a team member to perform those tasks and walk them through it first, and then get them to do it on their own and you then check it and provide constructive feedback.

For the things on your list that you deem can only be done by yourself, you need to work out if they can wait while you are away, or decide if they absolutely need to get done while you are away.  If they absolutely must be done while you are on your holiday, someone else in your team must do them.  If you’re going away for a week or two, I recommend that a month before you go, you should know who will be stepping in to “act” in your position and manage the business in your absence.  Its vitally important that one person is appointed to manage your business and oversee the day to day runnings in your absence, so staff and contractors know who is in charge and who they can go to if problems arise, and even if you are contactable, it should only be for emergencies.

Before you go away, you should have a handover session with the person who will be acting and give them clear guidelines as to what they are responsible for, and what decisions they should be making (and not making) in your absence.

You should also let your key customers know that you will be taking a well deserved break and give them the name of the person who will be managing the business in your absence. 

Key takeaway:  When you’re preparing to go away on holiday and leave your business for more than a few days, you need to make sure that your team have procedures and checklists to do the things that you would normally do and that must absolutely be done in your absence.  You should also appoint one person as the “caretaker” of your business so that staff and contractors know who is in charge.  Start planning at least 1 month before if you’re planning on going way for a week or two, make sure your key customers know you’ll be out of action and let them know they’ll be in good hands while you’re away..  

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