Developing business auto pilot process involves development of an effective business structure that allows you the operate with your minimum involvement in routine operational work.

Identify Key Drivers of Business
This first and foremost thing you need to understand to make your business run on auto-pilot mode are the key driving factors of the business. Although some of them are common, such as sales, they are an unique set and spread across your organization. For example, in a continuous process manufacturing PPC (Production Planning and Control) will be the key driver while in machinery or discreet manufacturing PPC (Project Planning and Control) along with Purchase are Key Drivers of business.

Arrest Bottlenecks and Standardize
Once the key drivers have been identified, one needs to focus on eliminating the leakages and bottlenecks in the process. It is not only pushing out through the bottleneck once but to search and eliminate the root cause. For example, if your project timelines are struggling due to delayed purchase payments, the root cause of liquidity constraint needs to be addressed. Once done, the efficient ideal processes should be defined and followed.

Reporting and Supervision
Next step is to seek relevant daily, weekly, monthly and quarterly reports from your different department heads or functional area managers. These reports enables owner to get a snapshot of operations and decide where and when to intervene. Hence, once owner involvement is reduced to situational intervention and planning, they can focus on crucial matters of business growth rather than routine operations.

Competent Team and Accountability
This is a key component of running your business on auto-pilot. And to ensure such an organization, one has to develop the right organization structure along with hierarchy positions in alignment with KRAs (Key Result Areas) while ensuring that these positions are standard to facilitate quicker replacement and reduce dependency. Moreover, one needs to clearly define roles, responsibilities
as well as authority needs to be clearly defined, while the sense of accountability and ownership of performance needs to be fostered.

Continuous Improvement (Kaizen)
Auto pilot does not stop here, as a hands-off approach can lead to a fiasco. Along with reporting, owners need to establish a seamless review and communication system to ensure smooth flow of information across all levels of hierarchy for feedback and improvement decisions.

Leverage Technology
‘Customized’ Software solutions are key tools necessary to run business on auto pilot!
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