EP 6: The System That Works... Until Someone's Gone
How to Build Systems That Don't Rely on Memory
Systems that don't rely on memory are the difference between a business that keeps running and one that falls apart the moment the wrong person is out of office. I learned that the hard way after a missed cancellation email nearly cost us a client and confused one of my cleaning techs on a busy Monday morning. This episode is about the system that quietly failed us, the tool that fixed it, and the five areas of your business where the same thing is probably happening right now.
What Actually Happened With the Missed Cancellation Email?
My cleaning tech, Anna, showed up to her first job of the day, went inside, and found the homeowner had family over and clearly wasn't expecting a cleaning. The homeowner was upset and told her to leave, insisting she'd already canceled. When we looked into it, she had. She'd emailed us the day before, but the one person who normally checked that inbox was out of the office, and nobody else went looking.
Why Wasn't This an Employee Problem?
It would have been easy to get after my team about what happened. But at the end of the day, we're all human and we all make mistakes. The real problem was that our system made it far too easy for something to get missed in the first place.
Before you blame your team or one person on it, take a look at the process itself. A good system should still work when somebody is sick, on vacation, or just not there that day.
What Made Our Old Email System Unreliable?
At the time, everyone in the office had their own individual inbox and login. When someone was out, we'd assign a coworker to physically go check that person's computer for new emails. It worked, until it didn't. It was easy for something to get missed, or for someone to simply forget to check.
What Actually Fixed It?
Not long after that, I visited another cleaning company in Fort Collins, Colorado, and the owner told me about a shared inbox and team communication tool called Missive.
Instead of email living with one person, multiple people can work out of the same inbox, assign conversations to each other, and leave internal notes so nothing gets missed just because someone's gone.
I implemented it as soon as I got back, and it's made a huge difference, especially now that our team works remotely. Nobody has to walk over to someone else's desk or remember to check an inbox. The system itself is what keeps things moving.
What Are the Five Areas Every Business Already Has Systems In?
In my book, Beyond the Office, coming out this fall, I break business systems into five main areas:
- Sales
- Customer service and delivery
- Operations
- Hiring and training
- Finances
Every business already has systems in all five, whether they're written down or not. The question isn't whether you have a system, it's whether it's actually a good one.
How Do You Find the Weak System in Your Business?
You don't have to fix everything at once.
Pick one of the five areas and ask yourself which process depends the most on somebody remembering what to do.
Walk through it step by step. Where could something get missed? Where are you relying on someone's memory? How does the whole thing stop if that one person is on vacation?
Then ask how you can make the system easier, simpler, more automatic, and more visible to the rest of your team.
If you're stuck, write out exactly how the process works today and paste it into ChatGPT, then ask what the weak points are and how to make it more reliable if someone's out. It'll surface things you weren't even thinking about.
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