Can your agency employees make decisions without you? Are you frustrated that you keep putting out fires or re-explaining yourself over and over? Documenting processes isn't the glamorous part of being an agency owner. However, it’s a necessary part of growing your and the first step to exiting daily operations. Today’s guest runs an advisory agency where they help customers achieve profitability by documenting processes. He’ll talk about the biggest mistake agency owners typically make when it comes to documenting processes and how you can tackle this daunting task.

Chris Gwinn is the founder of Great Lakes Advisory, an agency that helps digital agencies implement EOS by creating more consistency, productivity, and profitability by documenting their processes and developing KPIs. They also offer customized training to ensure all processes are up to standard.

In this episode, we’ll discuss:

3 ways to identify your agency's core processes.
How to start documenting agency SOPs.
The biggest mistake people make when documenting processes.

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Sponsors and Resources

E2M Solutions: Today's episode of the Smart Agency Masterclass is sponsored by E2M Solutions, a web design, and development agency that has provided white-label services for the past 10 years to agencies all over the world. Check out e2msolutions.com/smartagency and get 10% off for the first three months of service.

The Benefits of Having Clearly Defined Processes

In 2015, Chris’ dad was struggling with his business; constantly putting out fires and dealing with personnel issues. He asked Chris to take an objective look at their operations and financials. As he started to dissect operations and interview employees, he quickly found out they had NO did not have any documented processes or training, and didn't measure any KPIs. “It was essentially throwing them in a room and see if they’d figure it out on their own." There was no way to verify whether or not anyone was following processes.

His first instinct was to clearly define all the processes and organization. They needed clarity with step-by-step processes that lead to a specific result. It was also important to tie those results to specific KPIs so they could measure outcomes and build training around it. He felt that this plan would help all employees be better prepared to fulfill their tasks.

Dissecting the company’s financials and operations to build a process playbook helped him see how processes impact an organization. Employees feel the organization is investing in their professional development. The team becomes less reliant on their managers. At the same time, managers have better visibility into the operations and filled less of a technician role. Finally, having processes in place help the owner step away from daily operations and reduce hours working in the business.

3 Steps for Prioritizing Your Agency's Core Processes

If you’re not a detailed, process person, the thought of developing and implementing processes might give you some anxiety. However, you don’t necessarily have to put all the processes in place at once. According to Chris, the idea that you have to document absolutely every part of the operations is wrong. Instead of trying to document every single process, he advises focusing on the highest-impact items.

A good way to prioritize your core processes is to separate them according to these categories:

Impact. What are the 20% of processes that represent 80% of your agency’s activities and results? For most agencies, this is the sales process and client onboarding. Be sure to standardize these core processes.
Priority by headcount. How many people are performing certain processes? If it’s 50 people, then that would be a priority over a process only one person is performing.
Frequency. If it’s an ad-hoc process performed quarterly or annually, it ranks lower on the priority list than processes performed weekly or daily.

How to Start Documenting Agency SOPs

If you ask a salesperson to document what they do, they might not know where to start. Once you have a list of priorities and break it down by the different departments, identify the subject matter expert. Who owns that particular process? It is usually the head of that department.

Basically, identify the process owners, the name of the process, how frequently it is performed, and how long it takes to perform. From there, you can share additional information, applications, or resources and outline the simple steps.

The idea is to create a resource that one person can follow from beginning to end without having to reach out to another person or another department. The goal of an SOP is to always achieve the same result or outcome by following the same steps.

Biggest Mistake People Make When Documenting Processes

Overall, the biggest mistake Chris sees when it comes to documenting processes is thinking it has to be perfect from the start. In those cases, people spend way too much time trying to perfect their SOPs rather than making them available.

Documenting your processes is an evolving process. The agency processes when you have 5 employees won’t necessarily be the same as when there is a team of 50. Set clear expectations of how the processes are likely to change and create areas of accountability for the people responsible for documenting their core processes.

Finally, set a cadence of reviewing those processes every year or every six months to ensure they’re all up to date.

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