Frankman – a vision for delivering design and marketing that succeeds…
How an accountability structure helps address the priority.
Or when important / non-urgent issues, become urgent!
We all have different skills and strengths – normally based on what we like doing most.
Put simply, the level of desire creates the level of result.
In a sole trader business, the proprietor does best by focusing on what he’s really good at (normally doing the work), and may need to outsource other things (like marketing or bookkeeping) to specialists who love doing these things.
In a partnership or a business with more than one director, you’re starting to build a team. And different players are best if their favourite positions.
You don’t try and focus on the defensive weaknesses your best striker has.
Or force your goalkeeper to play ‘up front’.
Mark and Maggie at Frankman were attracted to the design and marketing industry because they love coming up with ideas and being creative.
They didn’t choose their profession because they loved designing flow chart processes for building web sites.
They could get by without efficient processes to start with, but as their experience and business grew, they could no longer avoid having an effective flow process, from initial enquiry to after-sales.
And the longer they kicked this can down the road, the more urgent this important area of the business became.
Their business will grow to eventually create a bigger team around them, but in the meantime, it’s taking a real discipline to put in place clear and efficient processes.
This is where there’s value in an accountability structure.
Reporting in on a regular basis what you have done, where you are, and what’s next, around what you say is most important right now.
And depending on how disciplined you are, this could be a chart on the wall, updated say weekly.
Or having someone hold us to account around doing what we say is most important, and by when.
You could even report into a lamp post 8am every Monday morning on what you’ve done and what you’re promising next if you’re that disciplined! (Most of us aren’t).
What’s keeping Mark and Maggie moving forward, whilst being creative elsewhere, is the structure of a plan for the bigger picture, a declaration of what’s most important now, and putting the stake down each week to promise what they will do next to accomplish it.
When we finish education or leave home to work for ourselves, we lose anyone to be accountable to, other than ourselves.
And unless you are unusually well-disciplined, important stuff like planning, finances and well-being can be neglected until they become urgent, because of the consequences of the neglect.
It’s a simple, but not easy process to implement.
Get clear what’s most important to you, your values, and what you love to do – your start point.
Create the ultimate destination, as clear as possible, what you want to accomplish.
And then make sure you have a structure to fulfil on the important actions in the gap – whether it’s a wall chart, a lamp post, or better, a business coach.
