For 15 years Business Design Corporation was a consulting company delivering business development programs like The E-Myth Mastery Program. Our Master Certified E-Myth Consultants worked with entrepreneurs to help them ‘systemize’ their operations – our goal was to help them create and implement their Standard Operating Processes.
However, what we discovered was that while our clients were getting valuable ‘theory’ they were NOT putting it into practice.
To address this need we started writing our client’s processes for them. After several months we would provide them a beautiful 3 ring binder with all of their processes neatly printed out and organized behind tabs for each position together with a DVD with all of the procedures electronically organized in file folders.
This would have a profound effect on our client’s ability to grow. Armed with these consistent instructions on how to do what needs to be done, new employees could be hired and trained and a consistent and reliable result generated.
All was well and good until a step in a process changed or a new procedure needed to be written and the 3 ring binders became out of date. Or they went to look for a process on their network and they couldn’t find it or someone had done a “save as” four times and no one knew what the most current version was.
Employees found it difficult to find a processes and, if they found it, it was almost always out dated. Without processes to follow, employees went back to winging it and the company fell back to being dependent upon it’s people instead of depending on the people following the processes that they knew worked.
As a result, we developed and released The TouchStone Business SystemTM to provide small businesses with a method for consistently creating, organizing and easily implementing their operating processes.
Since the year 2000, TouchStone has revolutionized business process development and management with technologies specially designed for small businesses. We have a community of industry leaders, business owners, coaches, and consultants all using the TouchStone system to accelerated small business growth and profitability.
Behind the scenes
Our E-Myth ExperienceWhat we know about E-Myth and what we’ve done with it.
The question is not whether a business needs to create systems. To create a business that can thrive beyond dependence on the owners and key employees, systems must be created. This is a critical point made in Michael Gerber’s book The E-Myth Revisited – Why Most Small Businesses Don’t Work and What To Do About it. The real question is how? How do you get the systems written, organized and implemented in your business.
Support from Industry Experts:Business Design Corporation was a team of Master Certified E-Myth consultants. We have been systematizing businesses for more than 17 years. We have systematized thousands of businesses ranging from 2 or 3 employees to hundreds of employees. Our systems design and writing consultants have been trained and certified in the Touchstone Business SystemTM to be able to deliver to you and/or your clients the highest level of actionable business development advice – information that you can implement immediately.
Our E-Myth Experience Business Design Corp’s founders and members have had a combined total of 34 years experience delivering the E-Myth Mastery Program. Our experience delivering these programs exposed the profound need for a simple tool to assist business owners in the creation, organization and implementation of systems – something better than a word processing application and papers crammed in three ring binders that no one ever uses.
To address this need, the TouchStone Business System was born with the specific purpose of taking businesses far beyond just the theory of systems building derived from the E-Myth Mastery Program. TouchStone makes it easy to build your systems and then to view, use, update, manage and disseminate them all on-line, wherever you have access to the internet. Your reward is a business that runs smoothly and profitably as expected.
Small Business to the Core
We don’t just believe in small business—we live it.Michael MillsMichael is one of the Managing Directors of Business Design Corporation, a business development company for small and mid size businesses.
Business Design Corporation develops and implements technologies that businesses use to become great companies – companies that can grow by capitalizing on and leveraging systems and processes that produce consistent & reliable results.
– What is a GREAT company?
– How do you create a GREAT company – one that SERVES its people?
– How do you move from the chaos that so often characterizes growth, into order, and implement and leverage processes to create consistency and reliability?
These are the questions that Michael will address when working with a business. His purpose is to use the technologies that Business Design Corporation has developed to make a difference in the lives of those who run and work in businesses – to transform lives by helping to achieve true business and personal freedom.
Michael Mills Bio
Michael is an internationally known business & personal development coach and speaker. His focus is on developing and implementing cutting edge success technologies that deliver strategic vision and personal success to business owners paving the way for true business and personal freedom. His purpose is to transform the lives of business owners by building high performance companies that produce consistent & reliable results.
For more than 17 years, Michael has helped people discover their goals and achieve their vision. He has been an entrepreneur all his life, with successful careers in the Industrial Tools & Fasteners Industry, Software Development & Distribution as well as Professional Sports & Entertainment Ticket Distribution and Sales & Management Consulting.
He has consulted with many world renowned organizations including the San Francisco Giants Baseball Franchise and Los Angeles’ Center Theater Group.
In 1997, after selling his software company of 12 years, Michael enrolled in an Advanced Senior E-Myth Consultancy Certification, completing the program from Michael Gerber’s E-Myth Academy 4 years later. In the subsequent years, he delivered The E-Myth Mastery Program to hundreds of business owners successfully applying business development techniques.
As one of the Managing Directors of Business Design Corporation, Michael continues to teach proven life and business development systems to business owners and senior managers in most English speaking countries around the globe. He and his wife, Katrina, live in Sonoma, California.
Shannon Brodie Bio
Shannon is the other Managing Director of Business Design Corporation. From 1994 to 1998 Shannon worked as a Senior Consultant, then as Manager of Consulting Services at E-Myth World Wide. With more than 13 years of experience with The E-Myth Mastery Program and in business consulting, Shannon has worked with hundreds of small business owners to systemize and develop their businesses.
Projects have included; management development, sales development & training, customer service, financial evaluation & controlling, work flow analysis, process mapping & organizational development and much more. She has been accountable for client relationships, program development and business development with a wide variety of companies.
In addition to this direct client experience, Shannon was part of the consulting team that contributed to the development and implementation of the E-Myth Mastery Program. While at E-Myth World Wide, Shannon managed, coached and trained E-myth coaches as well as countless Certified E-Myth Consultants.
From start-up organizations to large corporations she has mentored and made lasting impressions through her work. She has had customer-facing responsibilities related to sales, account management and delivery of consulting services for large publicly held companies, like Allied Domecq, Allstate Insurance and Commworld.
Serving as adjunct facility at Sonoma State University Shannon taught Small Business Analysis in The Business and Economics Department. During which time her students won the Small Business Institutes’ Project of the Year award. The Project of the Year competition was developed to recognize outstanding student work in small business consulting.
Shannon is one of the founding partners of Business Design Corporation and now serves as the companies Vice President of Program Development and Client Services. In this capacity she is accountable for the company’s delivery of world-class client services and for the development and execution of the on-line software tools. She is the primary inventor and developer of Business Design Corp’s new on-line business development tool, TouchStone, which has revolutionized the way businesses document, disseminate and manage their systems and procedures.
Join the movement
For process documentation and management, TouchStone provides what file folders, word documents, networks, drop box, wikies and google docs can’t.
Process documentation assistance and support are mission-critical to your success. Whether it’s one-on-one consulting, live training, or access to best practices, small businesses know that TouchStone is more than software. It’s a way to connect to experts that can show you how to make it simple and easy.
How Do You Write a Business Process Document?
When writing a business process document, you first have to identify the processes and name it. What is the goal of each process and how will your organization achieve these goals?
You’ll have to define the scope of the process by distinguishing what’s included and what’s not. From there, you can explain the boundaries of the process as well as where it begins and ends. Such boundaries also include what causes the process to start and when it’s done.
Moreover, you have to establish the expected output from the process. In conjunction with the output, you also have to clarify the resources required to carry out the process, which is called process inputs. You should also describe and list the people who are involved.
Once you have this skeletal information, you can now expand in a step-by-step sequence. To make the process easier to understand, you can create a flowchart to complement your documentation. Most business process documentation software has this function.
How Can We Improve the Documentation Process?
The documentation process will be easier and quicker to improve if you use a procedure documentation software. Through this tool, you can update your process documentation and everyone in your team will have direct access. Such software also allows you to identify access points as needed.
A process document isn’t a set-it-and-forget-it tool. You should always update the content to stay in line with your operation’s goals and objectives. Consultation with managers and supervisors will also keep your documentation process more efficient.
You should always document improvement opportunities as well as changes in priorities, operation size, positions, and baseline metrics.