Simple People Systems That Help Small Teams Hit Big Goals - Toroti Akogun

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[00:00:01]: Hey there. Good to have you here. Welcome to the June Jumpstart Summit. I am Toroti Akogun. I'm an HR consultant and people system strategist. I help founders and small business owners set up people systems and structures that help them scale their businesses sustainably. And I help teams learn to automate their people processes with the right systems and tech so everybody can do their best work all the time. Okay, today I'll be speaking about simple people systems that help small teams hit big goals.  Tooru  

[00:00:32]: So let's dive right in. Now we're going to do a quick check. I would love for you to answer these three questions. I know that you are listening to this because you are ready for a restart, you're ready for a refresh, you're ready to hit your goals in the next half of the year. And, you know, I'm glad to be able to help you do that. I really and strongly hope that this presentation, this session, is enough to get you started right towards aligning your goals with your team. Okay, so, yes, my first question is this. What Was your number one business goal for the last 90 days? I want you to think about it.  

[00:01:08]: What Was your number one business goal for the last 90 days? The first one, the topmost, the foremost one. Now, the second question is, did your team know it clearly in their own words? Okay. Did your team know this number one business goal? Are they aware of it? If you ask them, would they be able to repeat it in their own words? And the third question is, did each person know exactly what to focus on each week to help achieve that goal? Okay, think about it. Did everyone know exactly what to focus on each week to help achieve that goal? Now, if you hesitated at any point with answering any of these three questions, then this presentation is for you. I want you to listen in. Get your notepads, get your pens, and get ready to learn. Okay? Now, this statement might sound familiar to you. You probably have said one or more of this at some point in time.  

[00:02:01]: Again, you said, everyone is doing so much, but we're not really hitting our goals. Okay, everybody's busy, but then we are not able to hit the goals that we have set for ourselves. Or you said, oh, I feel like I'm the only one thinking about the big picture. Nobody else can see it. I'm the one who has to drive it all the time. Or, you know, you said, I'm constantly following up. Why can't people just do their jobs? Okay, I've said this myself. I've heard a number of people say This a number of times.  

[00:02:29]: And then the last is, I can't have the tough conversations. I hate confrontations. Now, if you're an introvert like me, this is probably something that you have said in recent times. I know it's difficult to have those tough conversations. You don't really like confrontations. But then if the statement sound familiar, if these statements are things that you have said over and over again, then it shows that there is something that isn't working that needs to be fixed. Now these are the real issues. The first is that roles and goals are not clearly aligned.  

[00:03:02]: What this means is that the roles that you have in your business are not aligned with the goals that you have for your business. Right? So if you bring in people to do the work that you know they have the expertise in, there is no clear alignment of what they are doing with the goals that you have set for the business. The second issue is that there's a gap in feedback and communication overall. Communication probably happens when there's a crisis or it happens last minute or you know, something is changing and someone on the team doesn't know until they have done something. And then someone has to correct them and say, oh, something has changed. And also that shows that there's a gap in feedback and communication overall. And then another issue is that systems and frameworks that can support team members with meeting their goals are missing. Do team members have the support that they need to hit the goals that the business has? These are the real issues and it's time for us to fix this.

[00:03:56]: So let's fix this. You don't need more people or tools. You don't need complex structures. You need lightweight systems that help your team do the right work at the right time and without constant supervision. Having to micromanage your team is the number one cause of burnout. Burnout. Okay? So you don't want to get burnt out. You want to still be able to achieve the goals that you have set for your business.  Tooru Tiakogu [00:04:20]: And so you don't need to just keep adding more people to your team. You don't need to build complicated, complex structures like a full blown organization. Right? You need lightweight systems, simple systems that would help everyone do the right work at the right time. Okay, so what are these systems? Now we're going to be talking about three people systems that would help you drive results in your business. What are systems generally? These are things that are cut across every system. Okay. Systems are repeatable. A system is a process that can be followed the same way every time to get consistent results.  

[00:04:55]: So whatever it is that you're setting up in your business, it has to be repeatable. You don't have to keep spinning the wheels all the time. You don't have to keep doing something new. Okay? You need to have systems that are repeatable such that if anyone comes into your business today, they are able to just plug into the system and continue. So you need something that is repeatable. Also, systems are clear. You need something that makes it clear who is doing what, you know when what is to be done, and you know how success is measured. Okay? So systems make that clear who is responsible for what, who is accountable for what, when reporting should happen and how success is measured.  

[00:05:35]: And then another thing about systems is that they are visible and so you can see what is happening and what's not happening and who is responsible for what without having to, you know, bring up all the documents and you know, the history and all of that. You can see everything at a glance. So these are things that will help you know that you have this system in place. So now let's go into the three people systems that drive results. The first one we'll speak about is goal alignment system. The second is a goal tracking system, and the third is a continuous feedback. So the first is the goal alignment system. Now, if you remember, I said at the start that one of the many issues that businesses have is that roles and goals are not aligned.  

[00:06:17]: So you have people, you bring in people into your business and they don't necessarily know what they are doing to contribute to the goal of the business. They are doing work, they are getting work done, but it doesn't necessarily translate to success for the business or the business achieving its goals. And I'll give you an example. You might have hired a virtual assistant to help you with all the operational tasks that you need to get done. Now the VA comes in, the VA gets started, you know, with doing all of the things, handling all your operational work and all of that, okay? So that, you know, the VA's work doesn't necessarily tie to the goals that you have set for the business. So the VA could be working really hard, could be very busy, but their work might not be driving the kind of results that you want in your business. And so what happens in a case like this is that the team works hard, but they work in different directions. Someone focuses on social media, another person focuses on fixing the website, and someone else focuses on just putting out posts, building systems or building templates and all of that.  

[00:07:26]: But no one is driving actual sales. No one is Helping you meet the goals that you have set for your business. This is what happens when goals and roles are not aligned. And so what you need to do to create a system around this is this. First, pick one clear business goal for the next 90 days. So this is June. In the next. Between now and August or September, just pick one clear goal.  

[00:07:54]: Okay? Now from that goal, define two to three focus areas and success metrics. Okay? So if your goal is to sign five new monthly retainer clients by 30th of September, define two to three focus areas for that. Okay? For that goal, is it going to be sales? Is it going to be lead generation? Okay, what, whatever it is, is it going to be product development? Whatever it's going to be, okay, Define two to three focus areas and then define the success metrics. So if it is lead generation, how many leads do you want to generate within the time? How many leads do you need to generate to be able to get five new monthly retainer clients? Okay, so you need to define that. What is the definition of success for you? Okay? And then you share this with your team. And the team goes through it goes through the goal and the focus areas. And, you know, they are able to define what they need to do to be able to help the business hit its goals. They're able to review their processes and their tasks and, you know, all their responsibilities and say, okay, in order to help this business hit this goal, this is what I need to do.  

[00:09:06]: These are the things I need to do. So the team is able to define their tasks from the goal that you have set for the business. An example with the VA is the VA's task might be to follow up with every lead that you have engaged within 48 to 72 hours. Or it might be to automate the process of, you know, reaching out to the leads and then getting them to set up a meeting with you, maybe to automate that process. But what they are doing, they are able to see that it ties directly to the goals of the business. Okay? So set that in place. Create that system. So every quarter or every year, right? Or every half year, however frequently you want to do that, you would have this process in place.  

[00:09:48]: So you set your business goals. Not too many, but realistic goals, specific goals. So you set the goals for your business and then you define focus areas for these goals and success metrics, and then you share this with your team. And your team defines what they would need to do in order to help to achieve that goal. In order to get to that definition of success that you already defined. Alright, so that is the goal alignment system. Whenever you have a new hire, let them run through this process as well. So yes, the person who probably occupied the role before might have defined their own task to help the business hit its goals.  

[00:10:27]: But it's good that whenever someone comes into the business, they go through this exercise as well, so that they're able to understand the goal and see what role they have to play in getting to that goal. And that way everybody works as one towards the same purpose, towards achieving the same goal, right? So there is some integration. And you know, when everybody's working as one, there's a higher chance that you'll be able to hit that goal faster. So yes, that's the goal alignment system. The second is the goal tracking system. Now, many times we track activity and not impact or we don't track at all. An example of tracking activity is your social media manager. Probably tracks the number of posts they have put out, right? Maybe they post on your Instagram page every single day or three times a day.  

[00:11:15]: They're able to write out those metrics and then write the. Maybe the number of views, track the number of views, track the engagement and you know, all of those things. They are tracking that. Okay, so you are impressed with your marketing assistant or your social media manager for posting daily on Instagram, but then you are not checking to see if what they are doing is actually driving traffic or sales to your business. You are not checking to see if it is helping you meet your goals. And so the tracking that they are doing is just tracking activity and not impact. So what happens then is that your team is busy, but they are not as productive towards business goals. Now how you can turn that around is that when you are outlining the metrics you want to track, ensure that you are tracking it in a way that shows progress towards your goal.  

[00:12:07]: Track it in a way that shows progress towards your goal. For example, if you have someone who is posting daily on Instagram, what they are tracking should not just be the engagement rate, the number of likes, the number of shares, you know, and all of that. That should not be the only thing that they are tracking. But what can they track that shows progress towards your goal of getting five new retainers? Maybe the number of inquiries that come in. So this month from all of the posts, we got five new inquiries that already shows you progress towards your goal. They can continually track this. Every number of inquiries that come in, the number of qualified leads that you get from your lead magnets, from your freebies, from your Collaborations, what's the percentage of qualified leads that we got this week? They are tracking progress towards the goal and then automate progress updates weekly. Now you can do this on Airtable.  

 [00:13:05]: You can set a reminder to go out to every person who is supposed to provide an update, right? Something that reminds them to update their progress each week. And so that just ensures that at every time you are able to see what is happening, you're able to see how close you are to achieving the goals or how far you are from achieving it. So that's a simple system that you can set a goal tracking system and then the third one is the continuous feedback system. Now many business owners don't like confrontation or leave communication to a last minute thing, right? You should not leave feedback and team communications to emergencies, okay? Don't wait for something good to go bad before you then communicate with your team. An example of this is when the team only talks when there's fire, when there's a slight change in strategy that only a few persons in the team know of. Now what is wrong is that there are no regular check ins and so problems fester, they are not able to solve problems. As soon as they come up, those problems fester or some goals get missed quietly and you don't realize it until you are very far off the mark. So the result of this is misalignment, a lot of people dropping balls, you have a lot of missed deadlines and you feel like you have to chase everyone to provide updates.  

[00:14:27]: Now the goal tracking system helps you to track progress, but then a continuous feedback system helps you to ensure that progress is being tracked, that problems that come up are being addressed, feedback from clients or leads is being addressed promptly and you are able to just better support your team. You're able to better support them to achieve the goals of the business. Remember, you are the leader of that business, you are the leader of the team. So you have to be able to support your team. Now how you can build a system around this is this. Just go to your calendar now and set a time, a 20 minute time to check in with your team every week or bi weekly or however frequently you want it. Okay? Set a check in with them 20 minutes to review goal progress and then have a framework to guide conversations. Now if you look at the example I put here, the example is every Monday we each share one win, one challenge and one thing we need feedback on.  

[00:15:29]: Now everybody's coming to that meeting aware of what they want to share. It's not prolonged unnecessarily, but it is effective because everybody knows what they want to share, they're able to prepare towards it. So there's a framework to guide the conversations at that meeting. And then when you have action points from the meeting, you can review it regularly. And then a bonus to help you even implement this better is after the meeting, get the transcript, put it in ChatGPT and you know, ask ChatGPT to help you identify patterns. Okay, so maybe you, you put the transcript of like 3 to 4 meetings and have ChatGPT help you identify patterns, patterns in the kind of feedback that you give. And so once it can identify those patterns, that can then help your team members prepare better for subsequent conversations. So they know what you're looking out for, they know what kind of questions you would want answered and they can prepare adequately for it ahead of the next meeting.  

[00:16:25]: So that makes you a more effective leader of your business and that would help you achieve your goals even faster. Trying to lead without systems or copying comprehensive corporate processes will hurt your business results. So here are some simple steps you can take today from this presentation. Number one is set one clear priority goal for the next 30 to 90 days. Just pick one. Just pick one and set it for the next 30 to 90 days. And then next define two to three focus areas for the goals. Then let your team take ownership of the focus area, assign it to them and then let them define what tasks they need to do to help you achieve the goals.  Tooru Tiakogu

[00:17:09]: Now choose one metric for each role that tracks progress towards the goal. Okay, just one metric. Just start with this first choose one metric that tracks progress for each role and then track it. Use Airtable, use Google Sheets, whatever works for you, but make sure you are tracking it. And then block 20 minutes in your calendar for a weekly check in. These are steps you can take today to get started with building effective people systems in your business that will help you achieve your goal. Now if you want a head start, grab the Goals Cascading workbook. It is your step by step guide to getting your team's efforts and results aligned with your business goals.  

[00:17:52]: And then also let's connect Charity on Instagram, on LinkedIn and you can check out my website, www.primarksl.com. thank you for listening and enjoy the rest of the summit.