Feel Like You're Being Followed? Policy & Procedure Documentation Can Feel Overwhelming.

By Amanda Menking
Internal Communications Specialist, PKG Communications

The thought of inviting a third party into your organization to document your policies and procedures may seem overwhelming and generally unappealing. After all, you know your business inside and out. You have things to do. You have deadlines. You don't want to spend your time explaining the details to someone else--someone who will leave after a several weeks without affecting the bottom line.

And yet you know you need to document a few things. Your employees are asking the same questions again and again. Your on-boarding process is informal at best. You're struggling to consistently apply standards for hiring, promoting and retaining employees. But, you're busy and you don't like to write.

Why it makes sense to let us follow you. PKG Communications partners with organizations to create concise and applicable internal documentation. Yes, we'll follow you. Yes, we'll ask questions. We may bring tape recorders, camcorders and digital cameras. We will always bring our laptops, our notebooks and our enthusiasm. (We really like what we do.)

If you have existing documentation, including job descriptions, policies, procedures, and processes, we will begin with what you have and build on it. If you don't have any documentation at all, we will work with you so that what you know inside and out is finally black and white.

Let's be honest. It will take some time and it will take you away from your daily tasks. But, it will also affect the bottom line--in a positive way. As you're explaining your procedures and processes, as you're reflecting on your business, you may realize that there are things you want to improve. We may ask questions that prompt change. And what better time to make changes than when you're ready to document and share your vision?

Joseph Joubert writes, "To teach is to learn twice." In much the same way a teacher better understands the material when she explains it to her students, business owners can benefit from sharing their vision and objectives with someone outside of their organization.

By introducing a consultant, you have the opportunity to re-examine assumptions and question the way we do things. You have the opportunity not only to learn twice but to learn better.