183: Preparing for an OPs Resource in Your Design Firm
Michele 00:00
Hello, my name is Michele, and you're listening to Profit is a Choice. On the podcast today with me, again is Kelcee Sparks. She is the Director of Operations and Success for scarlet thread consulting. You might remember that Kelcee and I did Episode 168 together on how to hire an operations person for your design firm. In that episode, if you haven't listened you may want to go check it out, we discussed operations, building trust, working within your zone of genius and process, and we really focused on what an operations person did and why you might need one. Today, we're going to go a little bit deeper. We're going to really focus on the details of being ready, creating the first steps to move in the direction of hiring an operations person. We're going to talk 30-60-90 day plans. We're also going to talk about creating a hybrid, so that sometimes the person may be in the office, and sometimes they may be working remotely. So I hope that you gather a lot from this and are able to put it into practice.
Michele 01:12
Every day, empowered entrepreneurs are taking ownership of their company financial health, and enjoying the rewards of reduced stress and more creativity. With my background, as a financial software developer, owner of multiple businesses in the interior design, industry, educator, and speaker, I coach women in the interior design industry, to increase their profits, regain ownership of their bottom line, and to have fun again in their business. Welcome to Profit is a Choice.
Michele 01:46
Hey, Kelcee, welcome to the podcast.
Kelcee Sparks 01:48
Thanks for having me.
Michele 01:50
Oh, I'm so glad to talk to you again. Given that we talk to each other about every day, it's so fun to actually turn on the record and do it that way. So you and I not only work together, but we also help set up my coaching clients with operations support, that is part of what I offer in Scarlet Thread Consulting, is dedicated hours of remote operation support. And so we do this all the time with our clients. And so we decided that today, we would go into a little more detail for the listeners that aren't involved in the Inner Circle coaching program, so that if they need to do this, they can, you know, effectively do some of it on their own. And in Episode 168, when we talked about kind of how to build trust and making sure we were hiring people that weren't trying to take our business, all of that what an operations person was, we we spoke about it I think, a lot in a remote way. And so before I move into what we should do, let's, talk a little bit about a hybrid situation, perhaps, or why one might be better than the other being a remote ops person versus in house flesh and blood showing up at the job every day. And when we should use one or the other, or maybe combining the two, even the same person might might work. So share a little bit I know you get asked about that a ton. And so this would be a great opportunity to talk about that before we then jump into kind of the even the more detail.
Kelcee Sparks 03:30
Yeah, so when business owners come to me a lot of the time, they have some reservations around the fact that this person's not going to be in the office with them because they love having that right hand person with them every day. But what I also know about in office operations people is that they often get pulled in a million different directions, and don't get to do that true operations of the business. And that doesn't hurt them necessarily, but the business overall, because a lot of those tasks are really important. So it's difficult when they don't have time to do them. That is one of the benefits of being able to have an on site and off site operations person, whether it's the same person or without someone different. A lot of the times I've seen interior designers and other business owners who will bring it on site person on to do the more day to day tasks to do the hands on tasks that the business owner needs in the office, while the off site operations person handles more of the back in higher level operations tasks that may be in their zone of genius. I've worked with several interior designers in Michele's program recently who have done just that. They've used our off site operations people for that higher level, strategic and big vision view type work where they're helping them to pull those visions down and create processes and systems to make them a reality while having an on site person who is supporting them daily. Today in the office to make sure that projects and all of the to do daily to dues creative from the meetings with the off site person are getting done.
Michele 05:08
Yeah, I, I love that. And I think it is great. I mean, I know even in my own business, there are times that I need somebody locally to do things. Now, my benefit is that even though you are not local to me, you are within a couple of hours. And so there are times that I bring you in into my office space to do the things that we need to do, especially around events or some of those things. You know, the other thing that you and I've been doing recently, too, that I think sometimes people don't necessarily think about certainly after you've built trust with your operations person, and you've you've really gotten to a place where you can work together is things that I need done physically, I just have them shipped to you. So instead of shipping them to my local office, I look at you as a satellite office, and I'm able to ship the work there and have you manually do what we need to have done. And so there's more than one way to think about it. It's not business the way that it used to be right, where people were either in the office, or you felt limited day outside of asking an operations, but can you go to the mailbox for me, like there is a lot that can be done, virtually. And I will say this, even the designers that I'm currently working with that are trying to hire and Kelcee, I'm sure you've probably seen this too, that are trying to hire that on site operations person, even in their local town slash community. Those on site people aren't wanting to work in the office every single day they are wanting or needing some level of flexibility, either because of you know, schools being in and out, you know, pandemic requirements, or just they've got so used to working from home, they don't want to go back. I know even in my husband's office, that's what we're seeing all over the place, is people wanting kind of that hybrid approach. And so whether it's the same person working in a hybrid manner, or two different people, each working independently, but together, the job is being done in a hybrid way. Both are, I think, practical these days, for sure. And I think you also mentioned a really good point, even the designers that that we support together sometimes will encourage them to work from home for a day or for a half a day, if there are things they really need to get done, so that they're not constantly being interrupted. And when you hire this person who is a true integrator who was like your, you know, your right hand person there, if you're not being pulled, they're going to be pulled, they're going to be pulled into everything all over the place, they're not going to be able to sit down and kind of have tunnel vision. And so sometimes having either an additional resource that can work remotely that can do that, or allowing your boots on the ground in the office person time to be able to do that, I think could really benefit the company to have some very dedicated and focused time to accomplish the task before them.
Kelcee Sparks 08:14
Completely. And I think what I see the most, especially for designers is if they accept the person that's in the office with them, even if it's for 30 hours a week, that person pulls them away, they help them get away and and maintain their focus on those things that are are important. And not get sucked into design 40, 50, 60 hours a week, not get stuck there, the client needs 40, 50, 60 hours a week, that person helps them get focused on the business case, the operations, that higher level stuff that is important. And I think that that's where your clients see the biggest benefit from our operations support that we provide them in the program is because they do have to stop and focus on the bigger picture.
Michele 09:05
Right? It makes it a little bit easier because they feel like they're a team to be able to get that done. Okay, question for you. Then as we move forward with this conversation, let's go into a little more detail when we talk about readiness to bring the ops person in, and how to set it up for success from the very beginning. Like we really want these people successful. And this is pretty much what we do in our program. One of the first things that that I talked to them about is strategy, where is the business going? And so when we bring on a new person that we're going to support for the year, I go in and have a very detailed our conversation on where do you want to go? What do you want to accomplish? Who do you want to be when you grow up in your business? And then you come in, you know, shortly behind me within a week or two and you go through a deep dive operations What's working? What's not working? Where do you need help? What systems and processes do you currently have defined? What are you using? And so I think one of the first places to start, either right after you bring somebody in or even before you bring somebody in, is having clarity on what is it that you either have in place that's working or not working? What do you not have in place that you know that you need? What is it that you just don't know, sometimes I know, even there are times, even in still in my business after 20 plus years, where I'm like, I know I need something, I'm just not even sure what it is that I need, but being able to articulate that. And so tell us a little bit about how you go through the deep dive with our clients. And so that those that are listening can maybe do their own personal deep dive from an operation standpoint.
Kelcee Sparks 10:50
So there's five main areas that we focus on and the deep dive. From an operations perspective, the first one is your client experience, what does your client experience look like? So I put myself in the place of their client, and I have them walk me through exactly what I would experience with a six month design project with them, and ask them more deep questions than clients. Probably what how do I get these emails? How do you send out how to know let's 10? Send them those types of things? When do you send them? Why are you sending them? But we go through the whole entire client experience. The next thing we talk about is people management, if they have a team or if they have contractors, how are they managing them? How are they making sure that they are keeping track of what their employees are doing with their contractor they're doing if they're doing what they need them to do if they're staying on schedule? Do they have this kind of goes into the next one? Which is project management system? Do they have that in place? How is it set up? Do they have templates, those to go a little bit hand in hand and go straight from people to project management? The next piece is we talked about their vision. So what what is their vision? What do they want their business? So we're biting? Where's that right now, I asked them to give me five things that they think are holding them back from getting from where they are right now to where they want to be, because then that helps lead me into number five, where we talk about how we can pull their vision down into a daily actions into daily, weekly monthly action steps so that you can get to that bigger vision goal in the time that you'd like to get there. So that was really quick and dirty. But that's exactly how we walked through their operations, deep dive to cover each piece of the operations of their business.
Michele 12:34
What's so cool about those five areas is they align and mimic the five areas that I go through with them when we're looking at strategy. And so that follows the angle with intent methodology that I have, which is tell me about your foundational pieces, your mission, your vision, your why are they clear? Do we know who you are and what you do and who you serve? Then we look at intent, right? So we're looking at Do you have a strategy? How are you putting these things into practice? Where are we going with that? Do you have team meetings that how are you being intentional about what you're doing? And then we move into people process and profits? And so we start looking at team? How do you manage your team? Do you have the right butts in the right seats doing the right job? Do you have the right people? Do you have the right clients? You have the right vendors? Like what does that look like? Then we move into process? What are the processes that you use? I again asked about project management, I asked financial management, what systems are you using? You know, what, what do you need there from strategy? And then we move into money. And so we start looking at are you making what you need to make personally? Does the business make what it needs to make? Are you able to pay your people well? Do you provide benefits? Are you doing retirement? What are you doing for bonus plans? Are you doing profit? First, how were you managing your funds. So by going through the aim with intent piece, and then layering it with the operations piece, which is following a very intentional pathway, what we're doing together between the two is remembering, here's the strategy of the business, here's operationally how it needs to be put in place. And here's financially what it takes to make that happen. And Kelcee, that's even why this year we're doing and our coaching calls, we're doing three a month, one focused on strategy, one focused on operations, and one focused on financials. So that we are taking these three major parts of a business a thriving, successful, scalable business, and we're iterating and we are strengthening. We're taking the muscles in these areas, and we are working them every single month because it's so important that we don't just look at strategy and then forget the fact that operationally we have to do something on the day to day to make the strategy happen. It doesn't just happen and to do all of that cost money. So we have to be able to look at the financial impact. To be able to do that, right, and they all go together. So I love that let's, I'm going to review your five again. So there's the client experience, team management, project management, vision, clarity, and then vision to action is kind of where we are with that. And out of that, you develop a plan for our clients that that says, Okay, here's kind of where we need to start. So let's say that somebody doesn't have an me and a you. For those that are looking for a me and a, you, you know, hit us up, you can go to Scarlet Thread Consulting, and fill out the Inner Circle, work with me form and we'd be happy to talk to you. For those that are trying to implement this on their own. They could ask themselves the same types of questions in the same categories, and then take that information. And how do you start looking at what's most important? You know, what, where do we start? First, I think the tendency that we all have, and I see it all the time with people that are calling me is they may already have done some of this work to have a list of what they think needs to be done or areas of impact that they want to address. And we want to do it on we want to do it on now. But the truth of the matter is, can't do it on can't do it all now. And so how do you take this and kind of chew it up and boil it down and put it into an actionable plan?
Kelcee Sparks 16:22
So anytime we go into one of your clients, businesses with an operations person we start with, what do you want to get done over the next year? What are your big goals. And as operations people our expertise is breaking those big goals down and realistically setting expectations for you and for us, that we have the number of hours we know we're going to work we know how many what your big goals are. So then we're going to break that down based on what's important. For us always, if somebody is uncomfortable with their client experience, we want to start there because we don't want no matter what we don't want the clients to know that maybe it's not quite together, we make sure that they're getting experience,
Michele 17:07
it's kind of like it makes me think of the the picture of the little duck on the pond. And from the top, the little duck looks like all like ah la la la. And under the water. It's like pedaling like crazy. So that's kind of what we allow our clients to do is we let them pedal like crazy behind the scenes on the backend. But that client experience looks just easy peasy lemon squeezy, as my kids would say, right across the top of the water backwards.
Kelcee Sparks 17:33
So that's always our first focus. And that's our first 30 Day goal, if that's something that needs to be improved, because like Michele said, we want the clients to feel like this whole experience is easy and Simon and are getting what they want at the end that the next part we're going to look at is your processes. So if you come and you say I feel like my processes are not are not serving us, we are not organized, we don't know where we are, we don't know what's happening. Next, we're going to jump into action there, because that's the next piece that can then reflect to your clients. So for us, what we're doing is we're walking through and we're looking at any areas that the client that the designer feels uncomfortable with in their business, and we're starting with the one that affects the client most. And we're working our way backwards after that. So that's not saying that all of your everything's not important. I truly believe that all of it's important. And when it's working right, your life's way easier. But again, you're in this business to support your clients. And we want to make sure that they're getting a good experience. So that's how we usually take it from an operations perspective to make sure that your business just to prioritize what your business needs.
Michele 18:44
You know, what's so interesting about this, too, is you're right, we do want to all to work well. But we also are supporting, you know, majority of our clients are at 750,000 500,000, a million in revenues and up. And so when they've got these really large businesses like you know, we've got a couple that are at, you know, that three to $5 million range, and we're working with them, they've got entire firms like entire processes behind them that are needing to be tweaked. They didn't build all that overnight, and they're not going to shift it and change it overnight. So we have to go in and help them make these changes and shifts and mindsets and all of it in a way that also keeps harmony with what's already happening in the company. And so it is really important. We can't just throw it all up in the air and hope it comes down. Okay. And so having that graduated approach, you know, I'm also a big fan of the book, the 12 Week Year, and that is the approach that I teach within the Scarlet Thread Consulting way. And that's really about saying we're going to have one really big massive goal every quarter. Instead of a list of 58 goals in front of us. It doesn't mean we're not going to have the sub goals and the task and all the small pieces. But we might have one really large thing that we're putting our focus on for a quarter. And the 12 Week Year helps us get that done. So that even when we're creating 30-60-90 day plans, you know, that 90 day plan is a 12 week year, that is what we need to get done. So when we're looking at, here's a year out, we're only really talking four huge goals, or four really big goals for the year. And again, they all spider out, you know, have tentacles and have all these other pieces and parts before example, a website would be one really big goal, it might be that we are changing our client experience. We've been working on some of that internally for my business, just reviewing the email series reviewing how it feels reviewing what they get up leveling some of the documentation, things that we're constantly doing, as we we move, these are months in the making. They're not because we're again, going back to being intentional with that. And so I love that you are looking at what are their big goals and then taking it. So what that also means is some of these things can take more than a year to implement to get it all buttoned up and tied up together.
Kelcee Sparks 21:20
So one of your clients I know had been working, she told me on our last meeting that she shared with you because it was her third year. And when we were looking at her operations, deep dive for this third year, she was she was excited because some of the things that she started with were no longer there. But then she was a little bit discouraged. Because she she said to me, I've been doing this for four years. And there's still some of these issues. And and we talked about it how those big issues weren't there, when she started those big issues became issues because she fixed and she changed. And she shifted some of the things that were problems when she first started working with the shelf. So it's all about perspective, there's always it's a business, and we're always going to be something that can be better. But it's having those people who can not only help you identify it, because sometimes as a business owner, you're so in the middle of it, it's difficult to see, but also holding you accountable to making the shift because it's easy to know that you have problems and put them on the back burner because they don't feel to them. But then once they they are shifted once they're better, what's the process of improved? The whole business works differently, and you feel better? So having those operations people on the back end to can support you in that is, in my opinion, super, super important.
Michele 22:37
Yeah, I know, I've had to even work on my own mindset around that, because sometimes it's like, I've already done that, why am I not done? Without thinking? Okay, I did it. But now my business doesn't look like it did them. So now it's time to do it. Again. It's kind of like when we update the website, I can't even tell you how many websites I've had now after 20 something years, but you're constantly tweaking it as you go. And then every couple of years, it's like, oh, we need an overhaul of the whole thing again. So the operations is very much that same thing. Let's talk for a minute about how you then take and we create a 30-60-90 day plan. What are some of the items, Kelcee, that you would, that you consistently see, because I want to say this, when you hire somebody into your company, it takes 90 days for them to even understand, in some ways, what's happening in that company, and the communication flows and information flow and where things are and to really kind of get a grasp of a full thing. And what's really hard these days in our companies is because projects and processes are starting and then going for eight months, nine months, a year and a half, two years. They don't even see the beginning and the end of a process within a 90 day period. So it's a there's a constant learning, and that first engagement of relationship. And so how do you take that into account when we create 30-60-90 day plans? And how can those listening create their own 30-60-90 day plans.
Kelcee Sparks 24:10
So my favorite place to start if either with SOPs or client experience, because those in both of those areas, your new person is going to get to know your business, they're going to get to know either either the back end or the front end of your business, which is exactly what they need to learn. So I always take what they tell me their vague goals are obviously it's a consideration, and then figure out do we need to start on the front end of the business with the client experience? And if not, we're starting with SOPs, we want at minimum the first 30 days for somebody to review all of your SOPs if they're coming in as your operations person, because that's going to help them understand what you have and be able to identify things that you still need. If it's the front end, that needs work first and obviously the best doesn't matter as much, we're going to start with your client experience, we're gonna use that as your 30 day goal. And we're going to have a plan in 30 days as what needs to be done to improve it. And then after that moving forward, the plan would be to implement those changes.
Michele 25:15
What do you do Kelcee, if I've seen two things, and I've actually even been, I've had times in my business where I could have been either of these one, I had no SOPs. So it was all in my head, because it's the first time that I'm really starting with an operations person or bringing in that extra person. And so I would either probably have answered at that time, not fully grasping, that I didn't have any processes. Or I may have said, Oh, I've got process, but it's all in my head. And so I've been there and done that. And then the other one was I had processes, but they were scattered. I had some on my hard drive. I had some that were in Google, I had some that were in Dropbox, so they were not in a very well organized, laid out, go here to get it. And I know that you don't just work with clients that have everything buttoned up, and it's super ready. So there's there's a mixture in there. I would, I would guess I know one of the things that when I worked started with Paige who is the manager and director of the podcast, one of the things we did for all of that was I had SOPs, we had them all in Dropbox, she went through review them all did exactly what you're saying. But then she also helped me see where there were holes or what might be missing in that process that we could add. When you came in and started working with me. I said, here's everything that we have. But here's the other pieces and parts and you've been writing those SOPs with me as we've moved through and strengthened and changed. I know you and I have some of our SOPs in Dropbox. But we have a ton of our SOPs and Asana. Like we're running them through Asana projects. And so how do you then within those first, let's say three months, for the people that were placing, how did they go about analyzing not only are there SOPs, you know, and you don't always know which ones are missing at the very beginning, if you don't know the entire process, but they would we also expect them to start pulling some things together so that we kind of have one place to house it. I know we have created even in my Asana, and we do this with our clients, we create a project that's kind of a hub. And in the hub, it what it does is it goes through and says here's everything that you have. And here's where you can find it. So it provides all the links, it's like a table of contents for us. Is that something that they could expect to at least get started within the first 90 days.
Kelcee Sparks 27:47
Absolutely. So for the second scenario, where they're they have processes, but they're scattered, the first thing we would always ask them to do is pull them all together, it doesn't matter if they're organized, it just put them all in one place. Because that operations person is going to be really good at helping you understand what like what processes are related how you can organize them. And truthfully, if your operations person or project manager or someone, your right hand person is the one that's organizing them, then you're always going to be able to find them. So that's the operations persons a good person to start getting them organized. Until they're organized, it's hard to find holes, we're not even going to look for holes until we start organizing them. So first step organized. Second step, look for holes, if you have no FLPs, what I always tell people, what I would do, what I always have our operations people do is sit down for an hour sit down as often as you can and just start pulling them out of the owners head because they're not doing a whole lot of good up there for everyone else. And as you're starting to scale, everyone else is going to need them way more than the owner is because she's gonna need to start delegating he or she that work to the team. So what the other staff that operations people are very good at is being able to pull out the necessary steps and get them on paper. It's really, really hard actually to sit down and write your own SOPs for processes you've been doing for a really long time. So it's almost helpful to have somebody else sit down with you and say, I feel like you probably do two steps and between the two, you just told me what are those so that everyone understands when they read them how to do the process themselves.
Michele 29:33
You know? Well, my my degree is in information systems and so I can write processes. I don't necessarily love it. I don't know that I'd love it. But I also you know, I used to be a coder and software. So you learn that you can't miss anything. But sometimes we can also those that think like I do, we can over SOP over engineer it. You know if I'm having to tell you'd click enter every single time, that's a bit much. And so there's a fine line or a happy medium, let's say, between over engineering and under engineering. And what we're really trying to do is capture what's happening so that somebody else can pick it up and get the same results that you would get if you did it. And so having that other person is really instrumental and making sure that you're capturing the information at the right level. You know, one other thing, Kelcee, that you still like, even, even in our Monday meeting this week, one of the things that you asked me to do, and you asked me this, would say maybe at least two or three times a year. And I think that our operations people at I'm pretty sure they ask after they've kind of gotten their feet under him and see what's going on. But you always say to me, Michele, write down a list of everything that you're doing for the next couple of weeks. And then let's talk about it and see what you don't need to be doing anymore. Because the truth of the matter is, I've handed off a time, I mean, I hand it off so much to you, I've handed off to Paige, I've handed off to Tina, you know, I've handed off to Kate, I've handed off to Jill like I've got a team of, of men and women around me that I've handed off work to. But we know what happens when we are busy business owners, every one of us are you included, we tend to then take on something else to fill in that empty space. And just because I take on something else, or now I think I have capacity to do this new thing. Again, it doesn't mean I need to be doing all of that new thing. But my mind isn't immediately sometimes going to how can I start that new thing? And who can whose plate can I go put that on. And I know I'm the type of manager slash leader who feels like nothing is below me. And so I'll be over here sitting in the floor doing something and you're like, Michele, stop. Give me that stop. Michele, give me that. And so I know that that is something that is important. So that that could be a really great thing. For those listening is to just write down every single thing that you do, we've talked about it in other podcasts, write down everything you do. Write down what you would love to hand off, if you could write down what you don't want to give up star what you absolutely want to hold on to. But then if you were to share that list with your ops person, even though they may be working within a 30-60-90 day plan that you've created, they are going to be able to look at that list and see what else they could implement as they go or where the next steps might be. It really gives them a lot of information and how to best help and support you, don't you? I mean, I guess that's why you keep asking me. Alright, Michele, I feel like we need to do this exercise again. Yeah, I feel like your schedule is getting too tight, write everything down.
Kelcee Sparks 32:49
I think is really important. And I think what I think there's two things, I think business owners often say, I can do this way faster than I can teach someone else to do it. And that is 100% true. But if you take the time to teach someone else to do it, now, you don't have to take time to do it again later.
Michele 33:10
Alright, let's talk about that real quick. That's about doing what's significant, versus urgent and important. And we talked about that even with training our children with let's say, bathroom habits or training them to brush their teeth. Yet, it's faster for us to go in there and put on their pajamas and do their bedtime rituals and brush their teeth. But I'm not going to college with my kid to do that. So it is it does matter that I teach it to them so that I can get it off my plate. But you are absolutely right. Because every time I'd leave something on my list that I probably could hand off. It's because I think I think two things I think, I don't want to bother you. I don't want to bug you. I can do it faster, not in a braggadocious way. But more in a it's so small, why don't I just do it and get it over with instead of handing it off. Or I find that it is different when you work and delegate whether it's internally, in a boots on the ground, sitting at the desk beside you or virtual, you have to do things more in advance. You can't be as last minute. And I think that just finding that shift. And I need this. And if I need it tomorrow, it's a little late to ask you. So it makes me have to start being intentional to think in advance of what's going to happen. And I'm sure that you've worked with other people who are semi crazy like me in that way. So
Kelcee Sparks 34:29
It's so common. I do it in my business. You do it in your business. Everyone I've ever worked with does it and it's it's easy to think and I'm lucky to have a husband who has looked at me before and said why are you doing that? You should not be doing that. Just stop and then we have the same conversation right over and over again. easier for me to just get it down. I'm sure you and your husband do it too. I've heard your guys's conversations. It's no it's easy to set. That's step number one. Step number two is what If someone just asked you, What can I do for you, without them having a list of what they're doing, it's hard for them to think about it, it is going to pass off way more stuff. If you write a list and look at your list that if you try to think about it yourself,
Michele 35:14
You know, the way that I sometimes answer that for you is I look at my tasks list because I keep all my tasks in Asana, I stopped doing the paper note taking and all of that, just because it made it so much easier. And I kept trying to transfer like things that I was doing from day to day to day to day. And so I just moved it out into Asana. So not just project management, but for task management. So when you ask me that, the easier part for me to do is I look at two things, either look at my email, and say, what is it that I'm having to address an email that I could really hand off to you or to someone else? Or I look at my Asana task list and say, What can I hand off? I've gotten better about it, because the more you do it, the more you start to think that way. But even the other day, I had a couple of things on my list. And just you asking me again made me stop and go, Okay, let me look at it again. Because again, it's easy to fall into bad habits of just putting things on the list. And, and then you, you know, worked entire week and didn't get done some of the other big things, but don't if you didn't get 52 small tasks done, but that you want to go in and, you know, check off to see the unicorn fly in Asana. But that's not really the way Yeah, should be delegated. Right?
Kelcee Sparks 36:29
Exactly. I will I'll call you and tell you, I'm going to check it or even let you check it. I feel just let me do it. That's how most operations people feel are not bothered. We just want to help you. So if you still want that unicorn to fly across your screen,
Michele 36:44
let me have it.
Kelcee Sparks 36:45
Yeah, I'll let you probably do it. If you just let me do the work. That's awesome.
Michele 36:50
The other thing let's talk about is how do you do? So we've talked about really being ready for that ops person we've talked about in the last podcast that 168, how to build trust and how to do those things, we absolutely need some type of job description as much as we can put down there. I mean, the job description doesn't have to go as far as listing every SOP you want to handle. But you can just say, Write, organize, help us keep up with SOP. So having that using that to turn it into 30-60-90 day plans, going through the deep dive that you would ask right? So even if you're the one that's the owner, leading that deep dive and asking those questions with the ops person, they're with you super helpful. And then creating the plan of what are we going to tackle first. And I also, I'm a huge proponent of starting with the client experience, because we want the client happy. That is what's feeding the business, get the client happy, keep them happy, see what those needs are, and put them into practice and then work on the processes that are supporting the team and the company to be able to do that. And we both know that these things are all intertwined. So it's never segregated to just one piece or another. There's always tentacles that flow between them being very realistic, and what can be accomplished in the timeframe we talked about that? How often do you believe that? Or what is the contact and the communication like that we usually set up with our ops support and our clients and how do you usually suggest that they keep those communication lines open and the you know, flexibility, but also accountability in that.
Kelcee Sparks 38:39
So for your clients who have like a smaller number of hours a month, I don't love for them to have to take a lot of those hours in meetings. So I suggest 15-30 minutes a week, check in make sure everybody's on the same page. And then every Friday, they what they do is they send a status report and I say this is what I've gotten done. This is what I plan on getting done. This is what I need from you to help me move forward. So every Friday, your client, your designer would get that email from an operations person. For those people who have more hours of operation support in a month. I think weekly meetings are extremely important. And I've even worked with a couple of your designers who have more hours and they want 15 minute check ins every morning. Let's start the day with this. Let's get on the same page and let's you know, let's move in the right direction. Make sure that we know what they're doing. So I'm thinking
Michele 39:35
and that's no different than if they were a full time employee. I mean, you know, you could either do one big meeting and uh, you and I we do a big Monday meeting first thing Monday morning we do a minimum of an hour. Go through everything. We talk about projects that we're working on long term, we talk about any client issues or client support. We talk about what's coming, we're planning, we talked about here's what you're doing Here's what I'm doing. And here's where we think we'll be by Friday. And we go into a sauna. And we have made sure everything is in a sauna, and we put names and dates and assign projects, and everything's there. So then we both work. And then a lot of times, we'll touch base again by Wednesday, Thursday, if not by phone. I mean, we are doing that on and off throughout the week. But then we do it again, in the middle of the week, just to say, 15-20 minutes, hey, can we chat about this or that. But I want to say one other thing that I think has made our communication work so well that we really, really, really ask those that we work with and support, be it a, you know, the designer and the art support that we provide, is finding one place that is the master keeper of information. And I know when you when I started, the master keeper was part in email and part and Asana. And so my, my personal clients are on there either on Asana, click up Basecamp. Hive, we may have some on Trello. But those are the I would say the top five that that our clients are currently on. And so what we suggest is to pick that and let that be their main form of keeping up with information and communication. Because things that come in through text, or things that come in through email can easily get lost or misplaced if they're not there. So we've even gone into those and turn them into tasks within those project manager internal project management systems. I know it's the same for those that are using AV and may domain studio and you know, all of the other project management client facing keep everything in one place. Because if not, you can't remember where you saw things. So that's even one of the big things in the first 30-60-90 days is determining where are where is the keeper of the information just like the SOPs, but the day to day communication.
Kelcee Sparks 42:00
I heard files I hear, I've heard it from every single client I've ever worked with, whether it be a coach, a designer, or any other type of business, do you mean I have to copy my emails into my product management system? That's what they asked me every single time? And the answer is yes. And it's not because I want your life to be harder, because I want you to waste your time doing it. It's because you have everything in one place, you are saving time, it's taking you 10 seconds to copy that email in there, where it's gonna take you five minutes to find it later. And your emails go for it. So or risk it not getting done at all, Michele and I, when we first started, I missed some things because I never would know if I was looking at my email or my text message or, you know, my Asana. And as soon as we put it all in one place, that's not that's not even the conversation, we have to have more. And so the 10 seconds it takes to put it in there, it's worth not having to miss it or look for it later.
Michele 42:59
And sometimes you and I both do this, I might send you an email. Because you may not know if you're actually in Asana at that moment, and I'll send you an email or a text and I'll say, hey, Kelcee, I've added this, I put it into Asana and assigned it to you, you know, take a look at it. So if it's something that I really need to have your eyes on quickly, that you might not miss because it hadn't been there when you started and allocated the day and what you were going to do, and you do the same Hey, Michele, I've done this I've updated in Asana, it's probably going to come through at your next break when you're not with the client, check that out. And so just again, we still use text and email, we have to it's part of the way that we work. But the keeper of the information, I'll say this, it would be the equivalent of having QuickBooks, but having some of your stuff done and you know, Stripe and never having it connected, or having something that you're keeping up with in Excel and not having it connected. And then not being able to reconcile your books because you never connected all the things that you still have to use bank accounts, you still have to use payment processors, but we have to connect them in to the keeper of the financial data, which would be your QuickBooks, and this is the same thing that's going to make you successful here. You know, one of the things that I want to touch on before we kind of in the conversation of how to really make this work is I think that we did we talked about it, but I really want to dig in for a minute on the idea of we have to, we have to have a mindset that the way we've done business can shift and might shift and most likely will shift. Even if we were doing it ourselves for the next five years, we would shift it. And so sometimes it is especially if this is the first time you've brought somebody in to help you. It is very easy to look at this business as this is what I've done and this is what I've created, and why are you coming in and telling me to do something differently? And so, I know I've struggled with that, you know at the very beginning and then even Sometimes now, there'll be a process that I'm just like, my heart is in and somebody will say, yeah, that we might need to tweak that. And I have to catch myself and go, Wait a minute, this. Yeah, I might have helped create that. But is it really the best now? And what do we do about that? So having that mindset, if you hire the right people, having the mindset that they're there to make things better. And that that means that there needs to be a shift, or another way to do it and not hold on to the processes so tightly. You know, unless it's something that you know, you absolutely know, because you've done it, you've tried it, whatever. But having an open mind that there's more than one way to do it, and that there could be a better, more efficient way. I know you have to work through that sometimes.
Kelcee Sparks 45:45
And I think that what I love about working with you is you set the expectation for me early, that if I'm coming to you with a problem or something that you that I think needs to be fixed, I am also coming to you with a solution. And that may not be the solution we use. But I'm at least like showing you another way to do it. And I don't feel as bad about coming to you with things that I think could be better when I'm also coming to you with it could work like this, or let's talk about it, it could work another way. But I think that there's holes here, here and here and explaining it and not just say, Michele, this is a problem we need to fix it has been super helpful for us.
Michele 46:29
So you remember I did that I'll have to look up, I'll put it in the I'll put it in the show notes about the the dump versus delegate, where we talked about like, if I'm giving you work, I want to delegate it, which means give you all the information, expectations, all that kind of stuff. And so this is almost the reverse dump. So if you were to just come to me and say, Hey, there's problem with that, that doesn't work. That doesn't work. It feels very pokey. Like you're poking like poke the bear, right? And it feels like you're then dumping it back on me the owner to solve, which the whole reason I hired you or that our people are hiring ops people is to help solve those problems to get it off their plate. And so if the operations person cannot think straight, I think that is one of the really big differences in ops person is they should have some ability to think strategically, maybe not about the entire business, but at least strategically about a process or about a workflow or something. Because if they don't, then it can very much be a here's a problem without a solution. And you know, I just that that's not what we're looking, that's not the position that we're talking about. In this podcast, we're talking about an operations person who has an ability to think strategically and intentionally, because then you're not doing the reverse dump back in my lap, are back in the lap of the person. What I think that also does, though, Kelcee, and I know I think this was really important to you when you are going in to support my company. And what I was looking for, is I wanted somebody who had opinions, and I wanted somebody who was thinking, and I say, I say that to be kind, but it's easy to get, there are some people that just want to be told what to do. And I get that that's fine. They can be those people. But I need somebody who who could push back in a good healthy way to stress an idea to say, but what if we did this? But what if we did that? Let's take it to the next logical conclusion, what is the most efficient way to do this, I feel like you're doing four steps, maybe we could do that in three, I need that type of thinker. And when you hire the right ops person, that's the type of thinker that you're looking for.
Kelcee Sparks 48:47
So from my perspective, it's important for the ops people that the business owner, the designer, the firm owner, that whoever it is, whatever kind of business that you open up that space for us to do that, because I've walked into businesses before an operation role where that was not, I was told it was welcomed, it was not actually welcomed. It was not a welcomed behavior. And I had a hard time, you know that sometimes I tell Michele face and I have sat in my chair for 15 minutes and thought I'm never really hard. I'm gonna read really baby. You know, like, I don't know what she's gonna say she's never taken any of my feedback negatively. And I that makes me every day, want to give her feedback, if I have it off so much making it up. But if I have it, it makes it easy to give it and building that relationship, in my opinion should be the business owners 3060 90 day.
Michele 49:42
Well, I'd love it. Yes, yes. And that I think that was the thing. That was the thing I told you when I went through the interview process, that you made the comment I want to be part of helping, you know, create that strategy or I want to be able to give input to the company owner that I am supporting, if I see something, and all I could think of is why would I hire somebody to do a job and then tie their hands and gag them, and not let them tell me, I mean, they're the ones doing that job, it's kind of like, remember that show Undercover Boss, and the boss would right go down and you'd be like cooking fries and the local joint. And somebody would say, you know why we have a problem with this, we overcooked the fries, or whatever. But they are learning from the person doing the work. And I wanted to hire people that are great at what they do, but that have feedback about what they do, again, understanding my company values where we're going our vision, but we're working, because now I look at it as the people on the team with me, they're working to help us all get there together, not just me, but all of us get there together. And you say that to me all the time, Michele, we're going to do this, we're going to be this we're going. And that is exciting for me. And so I really want that for those that are listening, is when you hire that person, get, think about consider hiring someone who's there to make your company better. And, and create an open environment for them to be able to be strategic. And to give you that feedback. It's not always easy. But I've I've never ever, ever taken anything that you gave to me as feedback in a bad way. Because we had built that trust. And I knew that you were saying it, not not out of like, for example, laziness, I don't really want to do that you're telling me these things, because you think they're going to make everything better. So that's where that trust factor comes into play. And that 30-60-90 days is where you're going to have to build it. Because conversely, we have seen ops people that have come through that we've talked to that said, I don't want to give feedback. I don't want to be strategic, I just want to be transactional. And those are not the ops people that that we continue to work with, because the business owners that we support want more than that. So Kelcee, as we wrap this up, is there anything else that we can think of detail wise, that would make it super successful in the first quarter, to onboard either from the owners perspective, or the ops perspective?
Kelcee Sparks 52:28
So I think the biggest thing is just having that platform for communication, that being the first thing, if you can communicate, it doesn't matter where you start, or what you're working on, everything is going to be smoother, it's going to work better. And then there's always the picking the right person like Michele, so I'm talking about making sure you know who you want before you bring them on. I think as as business owners, that's the most important part is knowing what you want. And once you have them in there using them to their strengths.
Michele 53:00
Yeah, I agree. I think the communication is huge. Also, knowing what what makes them happy, how they like to receive information and feedback. All of that is super important. You know, some people like to receive feedback and written so that they can digest it, some people want to be talked to they want to hear it. And so just really knowing yourself and not being afraid to say this is what I need, or this is how I like to get information on both sides of the relationship is super important. Well, Kelcee, thank you so much for coming on, and having more of a detailed conversation about this and really helping set the stage for how how our listeners can can do the same thing that we're doing. And again, you know, just a reminder, if anybody out there has a thriving business and you want some people to help you do it, Kelcee and I are here to help you move forward.
Kelcee Sparks 53:56
Thank you for having me. It was fun.
Michele 53:57
You're welcome. You're welcome. Well, thanks for being here. And I'll talk to you soon.
Michele 54:03
Thank you, Kelcee, for joining me on the podcast. I do hope that as you all grow and scale your firm that you consider hiring an operations support resource, it has greatly changed my own business. And when you begin to work together, consider the things that Kelcee mentioned the client experience, team and project management, vision, clarity, and turning your vision into action. Here is scarlet thread consulting, we work diligently to support successful business owners like you to continue to grow with ease by supporting their strategy, operations and financials. I would love to speak with you if you want this for your firm. You can go to scarletthreadconsulting.com and send me an email from the work with me page. Choose to be wildly profitable in 2022 Because profit doesn't happen by accident. Profit is a Choice is proud to be part of the DesignNetwork.org where you can discover more design media reaching creative listeners thanks for listening and stay creative and business minded.