Resolved Question

I need an organisation tool that is simple to help a small informal business work cohesively... any ideas?

I work in a family business, I'm on the road with 4 other technicians, my father manages from the office and we have three office girls who job share the admin and phone. So in essence we have three levels of management and we do not work well together... What can we do to help us make ideas come into reality when I'm never around, the office workers are different everyday and the boss always gets called out. I can't make anything happen... Help!!!

Best Answer - Chosen by Voters

Hi,
For start, an informal business will not work well and the first thing to do is formalise everything from a structural point of view. This structure needs to clearly define all the roles and responsibilities required.

From that you can then consider all the tasks that need doing, divide them up and make people responsible for the different tasks. You will probably find there's a either a lot of overlapping between all the different people involved with tasks being duplicated or some tasks not being doing at all which may mean you need fewer people there to do it.
It sounds like you definitely need at least one person based in the office full time for a start to keep track of everything that's happening and tie it all together. Maybe you should do that yourself and get another technician to go out on the road instead of you as it sounds like you have a clear idea of what you are looking to achieve.

100% 1 Vote

There are currently no comments for this question.

Other Answers (2)

• Sack one technician (or don't of you think you can get more business) and have your dad on the road too because he doesn't seem to be a manager really.
  
  Get rid of the three girls and employ one full time person who will hold it all together (or, if you want it -offer to do it yourself). This person should not just be an assistant but a real office manager who will run it properly, provide support to the guys on the road and who will chase up late payers. You need a 'rottweiler' type who is polite and nice and who makes easch customer feel 'special' if you know what I mean but someone who people don't mess with (time wasters and late payers).

  0% 0 Votes
• Who has the overall view and responsibility for the company? It must be either yourself or your father. That's the person who needs to remain constant and holding everything together.
  
  Process management is a way of keeping everything in place. This is where you work out what all the tasks are in the business, how they're done and where responsibility passes from one person to another. You set it down in a manual so that anyone can refer to it and know what needs to happen. It's particularly helpful when you have different staff working on different days or when new staff arrive.
  
  I'd also recommend having everyone together for half a day a month so that you all gather as a team and you or your father let everyone know what you've acheived in that month, what you want to achieve in the next month and how you're all going to do it. With processes in place, everyone then knows how they make it happen.
  
  You're not a big organisation so it should be possible to pull everyone together.
  
  Good luck!

  Source(s):

  0% 0 Votes