Common Scalability Mistakes SMBs Make
The majority of small to medium-sized businesses, also known as SMBs, are being pushed for time and resources. This pressure may trigger the organizations to rush through process implementations, new hire training, and technology updates. Thus, it’s no surprise that this could result in clumsy executions and a business foundation that does not support sustainable scaling.
Sustainable scaling enables a business to scale up or down when essential. It considers the people, processes, and technologies being utilized. This concept is critical to your business’ future since it gets the company to deal with any unexpected modifications. However, before you can even approach sustainable scalability, you need to be aware of some common mistakes in this area.
Look out for these mistakes
A starting step you can take towards scaling your business sustainably is knowing which mistakes you need to avoid. Thus, ensure you keep a lookout for:
A lack of official documentation
This documentation involves processes, technology, and expertise. You’ve seen it happen – one of your best employees moves on to another job, taking years of undocumented knowledge to their new company. This puts stress on your remaining team, occasionally catalyzing others to resign. With this idea in your mind, it’s obvious how crucial proper documentation is for every organization.
Other severe impacts of poor documentation involve:
- Poor business decisions may result in revenue loss
- Time wasted on searching for information
- Insufficient communication within the company which causes organizational stress, amongst other things
- Inaccurate information centering on your clients’ preferences and employees’ performances
- Poor human resource management and customer service
- Unsuitable billing that may trigger fraud charges
Disjointed systems
For many reasons, disjointed systems cause your company to be unproductive and can even cost you money. Having a disconnection can cause unnecessary data duplication, resulting in dirty data stacking up on your network.
Since there is no free flow of data between systems, procedures could become slower. Disconnected systems can also limit real-time data. This issue will damage your ability to comprehend what is going on within the organization and determine the analytical data’s validity and the trend reporting you can utilize to make significant decisions.
So, disconnected systems can cause unneeded expenses due to redundant and delayed data. Therefore, the aim of your company should be to construct a wholly integrated system which data can efficiently flow through.
Obsolete onboarding and ongoing training
Many businesses don’t have a proper employee or customer onboarding and training processes. This issue can lead to employee and customer defection, negatively impacting your company’s bottom line.
Other consequences of having inadequate onboarding and training involve a reduction in employee and customer morale, confidence, and engagement, a lack of trust in the business, and falling short of meeting financial targets.
Unexpected vulnerabilities
A cyberattack that is unexpected is never good news for any business. This attack could have been caused by an unknown software vulnerability, a security flaw in which a patch was released that you missed, or a bug exploited by hackers.
Unexpected weaknesses in a system can be destructive to your sensitive data and information. When these situations come about, you need to be proactive instead of reactive. This approach will help you avoid or minimize the damage.
Outdated Technologies
Technologies that aren’t supported by up-to-date systems might have disastrous consequences – consequences that can have a substantial financial effect on your company.
It’s worth remembering that outdated technologies can reduce productivity levels, expose your network to unwanted hackers, and turn away valuable employees if they are tired of operating with outdated systems which make their work more difficult.
Daily operations and business finances may suffer the consequences because of the money needed to maintain outdated components and the increased chance of failure.
Partner for success
To prevent these mistakes and reach long-term scalability instead, you and your team must understand the best procedures and tools required to approach the situation. You’ll also need much more time and effort than you may currently have available in your busy day-to-day schedule. For this reason, you may wank to collaborate with a managed service provider (MSP). Working with an MSP can relieve you of a substantial burden whilst offering you the needed expertise and guidance to aid you in navigating the business world.
So, why look any further than our team of experts? With years of experience and knowledge helping us along, we may be the perfect fit to help you grow. Don’t hesitate to contact us for a no-obligation consultation.
Furthermore, if you want to discover more, click here to download the infographic “The Relationship Between Business Sustainability and Success”.