More is possible –without spending a penny

Written by Simon Taylor from Tesseract Management Consulting Limited

Fact: size doesn’t matter, it’s what you do with it. Slightly provocative, got your attention, but true.

And if I said the C word, I’d get your attention, right?

Shall I try it?

Okay, I’m going to try it. Don’t get angry with me. Here goes…

‘Compliance’.

Ah, see, now you’re angry. I’ve tricked you into becoming bored. I can see it in your eyes; your lids are drooping; you’re wondering if you should shove the pen on your desk through one just to feel alive again.

Here’s the thing: if it’s boring, it’s because you’re doing it wrong. (Yes, still compliance, not that other thing you think I might be talking about.) And size really doesn’t matter. Honestly. I know there’s someone pecking your head – an auditor, the finance director, Brian (it’s always a Brian) – but truly, you could have the biggest compliance system in the world and it could be utterly, stonkingly useless if it just exists for the sake of existing.

And most of all – it’s an untapped goldmine. It’s an engine that can transform your business, if only you plug it in.

There’s three main reasons that compliance might feel like a tickbox exercise, a thing for the audit, a waste of time (and, in which case, probably is).

First, because it duplicates real life. If you have ISO certifications and schedule a so-called management review just in time for the auditor coming so you can triumphantly brandish the minutes in their face, then you can knock it on the head. You know the weekly/biweekly/monthly management/board/directors’ meeting you already have? That’s your management review.

I’d confidently bet that you are discussing these things all the time. Because if you aren’t talking about how effectively your business is running more often than a week before the annual audit, you wouldn’t have a business for very long.

You don’t need to call it a management review for it to qualify. You don’t need to use the dry technical terms of the standard on your agenda, either. But chances are, you did indeed discuss your clients, staff, shareholders. And the cost of living crisis, the effects of the latest political drama afflicting whichever Prime Minister is in power by the time this goes to print. Bingo – that’s ‘Context of the Organisation’ and ‘Needs and Expectations of Interested Parties’ ticked off. And so on.

If, by chance, there’s a part of the standard you didn’t cover – you probably should add it somewhere. Call it something in plain English, but don’t neglect it. Not “for the audit”, but because it’s all quite important stuff. You don’t need to discuss every item in every meeting either; have some items on every agenda, and others can rotate so that meetings don’t last the whole day.

The second reason is that the purpose might not be clear. If you’re doing something “for compliance reasons” and don’t really see the point of it, then it’s all but certainly not fulfilling its purpose. Never should something be done for the sake of it. Take the humble PAT test: nobody would dispute the sanity of having your plugs checked periodically to ensure you don’t electrocute Belinda in the procurement department (however tempting Belinda may make that prospect, from time to time). As with Belinda, so with life. Everything you do in compliance is looking for that electric shock.

Take every compliance process you have, and interrogate it with one question: ‘So what?’. Demand an answer.

Third, and this is a biggie: it’s not fit for purpose.

Compliance should be time-saving engine, not a time-draining vampire. It shouldn’t run separately to your business, or even in parallel to your business. It should run your business.

Your processes, your procedure documentation, your policies, your quality checks, your risks, your KPIs – all of it should form one cohesive powerhouse that does the hard work for you.

You, as a business leader, should receive the management information that you need to make decisions, prevent disasters, and power your business onwards towards the objectives you –and everybody else – are striving for. It should be the mushroom to your Super Mario.

And that’s not unachievable. The constraining factors are usually lack of confidence in your freedom to change “compliance stuff” from the templates Brian got from the auditor or Google; lack of understanding of how everything should fit together; or lack of time to rewire the system because you’ve a bulging inbox and pile of work. You’re not alone. Not even close.

But that’s what Tesseract helps with. We have a deep understanding of how everything is intended to fit together. Instead of ramming the wrong bits of the jigsaw together to produce a gargoyle, let us rearrange the pieces to make something better. Not just replacing your templates with ours, or giving Brian a biscuit while we give you a list of things to do instead. But actually crafting a system that works for you, for your business and in your context. You will have unique advantages, challenges and requirements and working with Tesseract means you get something that factors all of that in.

Our solutions are always:

• Relevant to your business, meaning you can actually use it.

• Elegant in application: maximum benefit, minimum fuss.

• Worthwhile: expect a return on your time investment with real-life results for your business.

We’ll start with an informal chat and get to understand you, then work with you through our respected client portal which keeps everything together. Our vision for you will be a Wallace-and-Gromit breakfast machine that delivers what you need, how you need it, when you need it. And save you from Brian banging on while you’re drowning in forms you’d cheerfully set on fire as Belinda’s over there getting repeatedly blown up.

Hop to our website – www.tesseract.consulting or drop us a note at ask@tesseract.consulting.

More is possible.