Get A System, But What Actually Is A System?

“Get a system” is one of those pieces of advice that sounds obvious until you try to act on it. So let’s actually break down what a system is.

What A System Isn’t

A system is not some magical thing that does everything for you on its own. It’s far simpler than that, and far less glamorous.

A system is basically a series of “do this, then do this, then do that” steps. A checklist, for want of a better word. That’s genuinely all it is.

So when someone tells you, “you could put a system behind that and it’ll do it for you,” and your brain immediately goes to, what do I use, what program, what automation, stop. Don’t jump to the tools. Break it down first.

An Example: Scheduling Social Media

Say someone tells you to create a system for scheduling your social media. Your instinct might be to think about Meta, or whatever platform you use, and feel overwhelmed before you’ve even started.

Instead, break it down properly. Scheduling social media isn’t actually one system, it’s three.

Content creation. This might involve AI to help generate ideas, or historical content you can pull back and reuse, whether that’s stored somewhere only you know about, or somewhere your team can access too.

Asset creation. This covers the infographics, the images, the actual written blurb that goes alongside each post.

Scheduling. This is the final step, actually getting everything created into the platform and live.

Three systems hiding inside what looked like one task.

How To Actually Build The System

Let’s take the scheduling piece and break it down further. Start by asking yourself, what do I actually do?

If you’re not sure, or you simply don’t have time to sit down and write it out, here’s a genuinely useful trick. Screen record yourself doing the job.

Press record and talk yourself through it as you go. Where do I find the content? Where is it stored? If someone else were doing this instead of me, would they have access to it? When does the content get updated, and how would they know it’s been updated? Where does that communication happen?

Then carry on. Now I go into the platform. I click this. I add these hashtags or keywords. Where did those come from? Are they fixed, or do they change depending on the post? Where is that information stored, and how would someone else know to use it?

Once you’ve recorded the whole process, watch it back and turn it into a list. Every question you asked yourself along the way now has an answer. That content lives here, so whoever takes this on needs access to that Google Drive. Or, you need to build a spreadsheet that lays out what’s being scheduled and which hashtags go with what. Decide whether you fill that in, or whether that becomes part of their job too.

Start With The Easiest Win

So which system should you build first? Pick something simple, something you do repetitively, and systemise that one first.

Getting one small system built and delegated gives you the confidence to move on to the next one, and the one after that.

As you build each system, keep asking the same questions. Can I automate this? Should I delegate this? Do I actually need to be doing this at all? Is there a simpler way? An easier way? Tighten the system down until it’s as streamlined as it can possibly be.

Then test it. Send it out, see how it runs, come back to it, and tweak what isn’t working. If it’s running smoothly, leave it alone and move on to your next system.

That’s genuinely how you systemise a business. One piece at a time.

Things To Think About Along The Way

Know your strengths and weaknesses. If you’re not good at something, that’s usually one of the first things you should hand over. If content creation or writing copy isn’t your strength, use AI as a starting point, though it can be hit and miss, or invest in a copywriting course, a good book, or bring in an actual copywriter.

Get clear on who’s responsible, and what “done well” looks like. Whoever takes on a task needs to know exactly what’s expected of them, and you need a way of checking whether they’re hitting it.

Think about autonomy. Can your team members just get on with certain things without checking in every time? Or are there tasks that genuinely need to stay with you? Either way, decide it deliberately rather than by accident.

Make it realistically doable. If a task means someone signing into four different platforms with four tabs open, all while trying to welcome children through the door and take the register, it simply isn’t going to happen. Design the system around how the work actually gets done, not how it looks on paper.

Pick One Thing And Start

Choose one thing that’s causing you an issue, costing you time, or quietly draining you, and build a system around that first.

Systems give you power and control. And with that comes the confidence to stop being scared of delegating, because you’re not trying to hand over your whole business at once. You’re handing over one small, well built system, and then building your confidence from there.

If you’d like support building this out properly, The Den Business School has whole modules on systems and my Mastermind is built to help you do exactly this but hands on with my help. Click the links for more information.