How Many Systems Is Enough?

I was talking on the phone to Jayne this week and she mentioned to me that she’d been reading and reviewing some of the system protocols we had in place at our practice all those years ago…

That’s the dental practice that I bought in 1987and I worked there full time until I left there in 2014. When I took over, there was only one employee who acted as a dental receptionist, and a dental assistant, and a steri-nurse, and as any other role or roles that were needed.

And from this one chair and two-person practice in 1987, this practice grew because of my unbridled enthusiasm over the years into a seven chair two-location dental office that was renowned for its excellence in customer service and care.

Jayne mentioned to me that the manual that she had uncovered and was reviewing had indeed been part of a seventy-six system “Bible” that the practice had lived, breathed, and died for over its time in operation.

The thing was, with this manual of operations, that if something needed to be documented, it was important that the process needing to be studied and taught and learned was simple and achievable.

And duplicatable.

It was also very important that the manual needed to be thorough, but not overwhelming.

In saying that, I mean that everything that we needed to know was in the manual, but also that everything in the manual was not needed to be done for the sake of doing.

Such as data-collection.

I know of dental practices where data is collected for the sole sake of collecting, but that data is never analysed or used for any purpose.

And often that data, if needed, is easily available and sourceable by simply searching a computer programme or software, rather than having to be manually gathered and presented.

The purpose of systems, and I mean documented systems, is that whenever a procedure or a process needs to be amended or constructed, or deconstructed, then we have easy access to what we are supposed to be doing at that point of time, before any changes or alterations are made.

It’s our recipe that we refer back to… our cookbook with all the recipes and ingredients.

Because without systems and without manuals, there would be no “Eleven Secret Herbs and Spices”.

There would be no “McDonalds Special Sauce”.

There would be no “Coca-Cola Original”.

Without systems, everything would all just be a guess.

And that’s a mess.

A red-hot mess.

How are your systems and protocols?

Are they documented?

Are they documented clearly?

Or are they just floating around inside one employee’s head?

I guess it’s the same thing for business plans?

And for goals?

Red-hot mess?

Or documented?

Guess what?

The businesses with written business plans and written goals, are the businesses with documented operations manuals and programmes.

And these are the successful businesses.

And the businesses with no written goals, with no systems and no manuals and no plans?

How much better could they really be doing?

They could be doing a shipload better…..

Why is it that some businesses just stumble along from one disaster to another, and other businesses map out a course of action that removes speed humps and avoids roadblocks?

Isn’t it just logical to do the preparation so as to avoid the disasters and disappointments?

The answer to the question “How many systems is enough?” is simply this:

The number of systems that you need is the number of systems that will keep your business on the straight line to success.

Without distraction.

Without detours.

And without roadblocks.

Is your business staying on the straight line to success?

I call it the green line.

The green line worked for me.

And the green line to success has worked for all of our clients who have followed our programme….

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The Ultimate Patient Experience is a simple to build complete Customer Service system in itself that I developed that allowed me to create an extraordinary dental office in an ordinary Sydney suburb. If you’d like to know more, ask me about my free special report.