Dear Friends,
As we close the quarter for this year, I would like to share some learnings. We are facing challenges for execution and rapid scale up. This means, people are multi tasking, not always following processes, inducting new team members, roles are changing, people are travelling. Most of you know what I mean.
In order that the back end functions flawlessly, some time ago, we did the mission control course. By the way, the course is happening again on 9th and 10th July. Interested people can contact manan at 'manan@unleashed.in' to know more.
When it came to implementation, we did 2 key activities that I realized during my month long thinking time (vacation) in the US in May.
For each designation, define a list of daily, weekly and monthly activities. Seems simple? It is not. Takes a lot of time and patience. Let people tick mark this list for compliance. (especially the non engineering staff like admin, accounts, support, testing etc.) Review this ticked compliance list once a month. This ensure that nothing is left out. What we noticed is that most items were regularly routine for most people (at different time intervals).
For each item on the list create a video (yes a video!) with a screen recording of the exact process to be followed with the voice of the person who knows the process the best. This resolved the major problem of document creation, becomes interesting, people can follow easily, you can mix languages as you record. We already have recorded approx 15 gb of videos using this process across the company that has me talking about core values to our accountant doing a video on “how to do a reco in tally”. Now suddenly, the processes are well defined in HINGLISH language (as long as people understand). Suddenly, following the video manual became simple. Investments? Well, Freeware software like camstudio, debut video, camstasia etc. One paid of headphones and mic from Logitech for each employee (rs 600 or so). One 1 tb LAN hard disk (some 10k-15k or so approx). Worth the investment? You bet. Now the team sees these videos on their own desktop without moving to the meeting room. If they don’t understand something, they see it again and again and again, rewind and replay. This also insures us against employee turnover, transfers, promotions etc.
For the first time ever, people know what exactly they have to do on a regular basis and how to do it. A simple step. But extremely important if you want to free up your time from escalations and get productive and get to explosive growth in the business.
I hope this helps you all in getting geared up and participating in the India growth story.... All the best and may we all grow together.

