This week I learned something incredibly important.

A process is INVALUABLE to the well being of a company, especially a startup.

Now before working at a startup, process and creating good processes wouldn’t have been listed in the top 20 things that interested me in the realm of business.

Now it approaches top 10.

Let me tell you why.

A good process takes into consideration the unique needs of a business.

A business is an organization of people.

Therefore, a good process is built from what works best for the people in your company fitting their unique needs.

Although a process in nature is meant to standardize things, it’s so important to tailor it to the needs and uniqueness of your business, your team.

Now, why is a process so important? If you or your team is doing something well but you haven’t documented the how – it’s not going to be repeated easily.

As you create a process you gain amazing insight on how everyone else is doing achieving x,y, and z, and then create a method to maximize for efficiency.

The textbook definition of a business process is a set of activities and tasks that, once completed, will accomplish an organizational goal.  The process must involve clearly defined inputs and a single output.

To track and scale your success I encourage you to evaluate the current course of action and create a method that takes that into account as well as fits the unique needs of your company and situation.

As you build out your process know that it’s ok to change and tailor it, at any moment, a process is only a benchmark – it’s meant to be built upon and improved.