When you have a business, doesn’t matter if you are a solopreneur or you own a small company, you need to have the right systems in place to keep your growing business functioning. Choosing the right system involves many aspects; your needs, time and money available, technology preferences, ability to customize, among others. So how do you decide which system is right for you?
Start with your SOP (Standard Operating Procedure)
The first thing to keep in mind is that you need to understand what you are trying to achieve. There are many important things to consider when choosing a system for your business, but the central piece in the decision process is your needs. You need to determine what aspects of your business you’ll be tackling; customer service, accounting, bookkeeping, emails, task and team management, productivity, automation or another unique aspect of your company. Your SOPs are a great guide to help you have a clear picture of the way your business works.
Once you have this picture you’ll have a better idea of what is it that you need this system to do. From there you can ask some questions:
- What are the most inefficient processes in your business and what is going to be improved with the new system?
- What operational processes and workflows are lacking and need to be added?
- Who in the company is going to run the system? How many users does it need to support?
- Is there any other software you want to integrate?
When you understand your needs, you will have a better idea of what your workflow looks like, and then you can visualize what you want the system to look like. The ideal system for you is going to help achieve the desired workflow, fix the problems you located, organize the business and make it easier to scale up, introduce new team members and boost productivity.
Know what features and functionality you need
The first step was to clearly state your SOPs and understand what you’re trying to achieve. Next, you need to refer to your SOP for your workflow so you can determine what features and functionality you are looking for in a system. Your business has a unique way to function, has its processes, customer base, and growth dynamics. That being said, committing to a set of standard, basic or inflexible functions is just not wise.
Therefore, you need to construct a clear idea of what you are looking for. You need to understand all the features and functions that you expect your new system to have, and which of those you prioritize and which will be a cool extra but aren’t necessarily a requirement.
If you have other people working on your business you also need to understand the needs of the team. Aside from your own needs and the business’ goals, your system should be a good fit for your team. It is important to hear the team’s opinions and feedback, especially from those who will be directly operating in this system. You also need to take into consideration the number of people who will be using the system and, if you have plans to scale up, how many more people will it need to support in the future.
Considering all these factors you can come up with a wish list for features. Then start looking for a system that meets your needs. When implementing a new system you have no previous expectations or experiences. So you’ll be relying on your research and the analysis of your business, SOPs, workflow and wish list. If, on the other hand, you are replacing a current system you will also want to take into consideration why are you replacing it. What would you like to be different and what would you like to keep similar to the current system? How smooth will the migration process be?
Make sure the system integrates with other systems and software that you already have in place
The goal when getting a new system is not to have yet another item in a collection of different work systems. The idea is to streamline your business operations. That’s why you need to ensure that whatever system you get can integrate with other applications you already have. What will this system need to integrate with that you already have in place? You need to list all apps and software you have and make sure you’ll be able to integrate them into the system you choose.
You will also need to compare the integration cost and time required to get the new system working in your current environment. Ideally, the implementation, transferring of data and adaptation to processes are smooth and efficient. Getting a system is supposed to help you organize and grow your business not turn into a giant headache. That’s why choosing the system that is the best fit for your business as it is, is so important.
Keep in mind that getting carried away by all these awesome features (that you just don’t need and is probably not going to use) that a system has to offer, might end up creating a bunch of problems if you have to change your whole business to fit the system instead of the system fitting into your business.
Sometimes, a new system can be used to substitute the need for a lot of small ones you previously had. That can optimize workflow and boost efficiency once you have everything in the same place. However, if that’s the case, you need to, again, pay a lot of attention to the migration processes and protect your previous data, make sure it is preserved and re-organized. Having your business well documented is important, and you definitely want to make sure you don’t lose any information!
Free trials and advice
Free trials can be helpful, they allow you to get a good feel of how everything works and see the system’s strengths and weaknesses. Pay attention to ease of use, key functionality and the ability to expand. This can help you decide between systems and not end up “buying a book by its cover”. However, be careful not to waste a lot of time “playing” with system choices. If you know what you are looking for and do your research; testing should be more or less straight forward.
Getting advice is also an important option when choosing the right system. You will want to speak with people who actually use this software, both on the implementation side and the user side. You can ask for a live demo session. A salesperson will walk you through the software and show you how to use it. Then, you can ask specific questions related to your business. That way you get a feeling of what the software was designed for and also what the support is like. You also want to know what people who have used it think about it. Google the name of the system, watch review videos on YouTube, read reviews and check out the forums.
This process to choose and get a system working might be very time consuming and a little overwhelming. The best way to save time is to ask an expert who has already implemented something like this for their clients. They will be able to guide you to the right decision quickly with very little work on your part.
Planning the implementation
After going through the whole decision-making process and purchasing your new system, you will need a plan to get this new system up and running. If you are replacing a current system your plan will need to include how you are going to migrate data and users. When that is taken into consideration during the selection process, you probably have an idea of how that is going to work, which makes everything easier.
If this is a new system, you will probably need to create or update SOPs for your team. You need to make sure all team members are comfortable with the new system. Understand there will be an adaptation period. You should plan the implementation keeping in mind some things might look good on paper but don’t work so well when put into practice. Have check-in points in your plan and be open and flexible so that you and your team get the most out of your new system.
Your plan needs to take into account the impact that it will have on your team, your clients, and yourself. You want to keep everyone posted on what will change and how those changes will impact their work. Your new system is there to make your business better. However, a lack of communication can cause confusion that can lead to unnecessary damage to your relationships. Be sure to analyze all impacts the system will have on your team, your clients and yourself.
If you have a team, consider implementing the system in phases. Depending on your team’s dynamics it might not be the greatest idea to have a huge change in your business overnight. It might take a while for everyone to adapt and a very sudden change could disturb your team’s productivity. Talk to team members and come up with a solution that works for everyone. That might be a gradual transition into the new system.
If you need help choosing, planning and implementing a new system into your business get in contact!
