Small Business Risk Identification MethodologyInvolve Employees in Risk Assessment ProjectsWhat have our employees to tell us? We need to find out! ... because our businesses could be in real danger and we didn't even know it... Some time ago my wife visited a fashion store and overheard a discussion between a customer and store assistant. The discussion went like this: Customer: May I return this item if it doesn't fit my daughter? Assistant: No, Ma'm, it is not company policy. Customer: Then I won't buy it. Assistant: I am very sorry Ma'm. Customer: You should tell your manager that customers will stop buying here... Assistant: We did. We told them that the customers are unhappy. But they don't want to listen to us! As business owners we cannot afford to ignore our employees! And we especially cannot ignore them when they have the courage to tell us what is wrong or not working in our businesses! Of course we should discern whether the ideas and logic of our employees are valid and correct, but we cannot dismiss their input out of hand! Yes, I know, sometimes employees only seem to complain. Yet, many times, their feedback is an indication of areas where things are really not going well. These are areas which could have a negative impact on our finances and, eventually, profits. Usually, and unfortunately, these indications come in "coded" format from employees. Why? Because many small and medium businesses do NOT have, as I call it, a profit protection communication culture to facilitate (and ENCOURAGE) useful feedback from bottom to top! Employees are too afraid to tell whatever is bothering them in a straightforward way. The lack of a positive feedback and communication culture is usually due to the fact that these owners and managers have NOT made a conscious decision to implement and enforce profit protection planning (i.e. a risk management policy and culture) in the company. (At Business-Around-the-Globe we teach small business owners exactly how to do this.) Such channels would automatically involve the participation of ALL employees, as well as the establishment of reporting channels! Particularly, employees would then have the chance to give feedback on what they perceive (or have noticed) as current and potential risks (dangers/threats) in- and outside their departments as well as in- and outside the company as an entity. We should not ignore our personnel (even the lowest person in the ranks!) and our professional advisors. The clerk entering transactions every day into your financial application, the cashier receiving money from customers, the managers heading different departments in your business, your advisors who are each a specialist in his/her own right, each of them KNOW the small details and weak points of the specific areas they are responsible for. Actually, you can learn much from your employees WITHOUT having to hire risk management consultants to identify and counteract problem (profit erosion) areas in your business! To tell the truth, consultants would make time to listen to your employees (as they are under pressure to produce results). They will then come back to you with a nice report boasting their logo, giving the "results of the investigation", results which they actually discovered only from talking to your employees. And you could have done the same! For example, to name just a few generic, common areas for profit loss:
Why is it easier for business owners to hire consultants than to trust their employees? Personally, I think it is because risk management specialists keep the know-how to themselves (it is after all their bread and butter) and as a result business owners are always dependent on them, thinking that they cannot gain feedback themselves. In other words, business owners easily accept the insinuation (namely that they cannot do it themselves) as truth. As a result, employees are also not trained to recognize events, actions, decisions and situations which eat away the profits of business owners and how to handle or report it. In fact it seems employees are conditioned to only divulge this type of information to consultants who have the knowledge to "extract the vital info from employees so that we as consultants can look good in the eyes of the client so that they can hire us again and pay us an arm and a few legs." [Note: I do not say we should never use consultants. We DO NEED specialist consultants to assist us in more complicated areas. For example, if you have identified problems in your computer systems (say for instance your financial systems) you would probably have to hire a specialist with the qualifications, skills and experience to fix the systems!] Are you sick and tired of consultants not knowing your business? You know your business better than anybody else (including us)... To assist you in your efforts to strategically counteract your business risks and grow your business, we have decided to extend the duration of our special offer. YOU are the ideal person to implement and apply the solution and techniques presented in our business survival manual, Survival Kit for Small and Medium Businesses - Profit from your Business Risks! Our goal is to add new techniques to your business survival kit and instruct you in using these in the future - without any help from a consultant! You will be saved a lot of money by applying the techniques yourself rather than having to hire a consultant to assist you! For more information about the benefits of implementing small business risk management methodologies in your company, please visit: http://www.business-around-the-globe.com
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