A bit of advice

Just because it’s always been this way isn’t sufficient reason for continuing a bad practice.

Put another way: “But we’ve been doing it this way for thirty years!” “That may be so, but we may have been doing it wrong for all those years. Did you ever think of that?”

This is a bit of advice I feel I should write down, just because it seems so obvious to me now. I’m afraid that with age, it won’t be so obvious to me anymore. Maybe if it’s written here, on the timeless internet, I’ll be able to remember how simple it seemed when it doesn’t seem obvious any longer, in my senility.

So many problems can be avoided by simply looking at a problem from another perspective. How do you know if you have been doing it wrong for all these 30 years? Habits do something to the ones who develop them. They tend to cause a sort of tunnel vision. In some cases the habit-bearing people forget about the customers, sometimes they forget about department relationships, and even worse, they forget the vision of the company. In any process, idea, form or product, habits that have been formed over a long, long period of time, never changing or possibly getting progressively worse should be examined in detail with relation to objectives. Here are some evaluating suggestions:

1. Look at your idea, process or product from the point of view of the customer: how will someone feel filling out this form or going through this process? Is it easy for the customer (not to be confused with “is it easy for you?”) How will they describe it; in favorable terms?

This one can be difficult. If it’s too hard to get away from your idea, product, or process, get an outsider. Interview them and really listen to the whole answer, don’t just filter out the parts that don’t fit with your perception of the way things work.

2. Review the post-customer process – the interaction between people or departments to carry out the customer’s wishes.

This needs to be evaluated purely from an efficiency perspective. If there’s one overloaded staff member that’s part of this process, find a way to take them out, split the work or assign to a different person! You’ll save them the stress of an extra responsibility and make the process move more smoothly and quickly. I know it seems obvious, but many times it’s not even considered.

3. Think hard about the logic of your process – do all the steps make sense and are they all in the right order?

It seems that after a problem is thought through once or twice and a solution has been found, that process stays the same for as long as the idea lives. Sometimes that particular process isn’t the best process, just the first or quickest solution the creator arrived at. Make sure this is evaluated objectively.

4. Pare it down to the essentials.

Do you really need to ask for the home, work and cell number? Who uses that and why? You’ll save time for the customer, the people processing the task and yourself in assessing the effectiveness of customer response. You should be dealing with the important stuff. No need for fluff.

5. Ask questions.

The most important thing I have ever learned as a newbie is to always ask questions. Not questions about how to do the thing you’re a newbie at (that would be like asking ‘now where do I click?’). Instead ask why things are done the way they are. Why do the customers fill out this form? Where does it go after we give it to Jenny for processing? Many times, you’ll be able to see errors in logic, fluff or processing simply by asking a childish ‘why’ of every part of the process, idea or product.

Thanks for listening to my bit of advice! You don’t have to worry about taking it too seriously – I don’t have enough corporate experience for people to actually do the things I suggest. I’m not qualified to advise anyone. Still; I hope this nugget helps someone out there in the internet. I want to help, but I also want to remember it!