Due to a pinched nerve in my neck, I have been forbidden to ride my bike until the issue is fixed. Being an active person and living near the Charlotte greenway, I needed to find another activity to enjoy the outdoors and exercise. And walking was just not cutting it.
So I went into my closet and dug out my rollerblades. I received them as a Christmas gift in high school and have moved them with me ever since. I'm not going to say how many years it's been, but they don't make the replacement parts anymore.
I packed up the rollerblades in a backpack and walked to a seating area on the greenway. My neighborhood is relatively flat, but there is a very steep hill to get down to the greenway, so I knew better than to skate from my house. I strapped myself into the rollerblades and set off on my adventure.
I was quite shaky at first, not having done this for many years. But I know how to ski and ice skate, so I was able to figure it out. While gaining confidence with each stroke, I realized I didn't remember how to stop. I was pretty sure snowplowing like I was skiing would not end well. The same with trying to hockey-stop like I was on ice. I decided to stop by running into an immovable object (Newton's 3rd law).
I approached another seating area and decided to use a bench to stop my forward progress. It was a great idea and bracing my arms against the seat stopped me quickly. Unfortunately, my feet were on wheels and kept going until my shins hit the same bench seat. That was a painful way to come to a stop. I sat down, had some water, and reflected on how to improve my experience.
I decided to keep going and the next time I wanted to stop, I stopped skating and let gravity and friction do the work. That worked well, except that it’s hard to judge how long that will take and I ended up slowly walking back to the next bench. When it was time to turn around, I stopped skating and decided to use the railing on a bridge to help me stop. That worked and I tentatively turned around to head back home. When it was time to stop and remove the rollerblades, I chose to use a tall trash can, which I could hit with both my feet and my hands (avoiding more bruises on my shins).
What did I learn from all of this? Just because I’ve done something before doesn’t mean I can just do it again without reviewing the instructions. So I read the instructions before heading out on my next rollerblading adventure. I was still a bit wobbly when braking, but I re-learned the proper procedure and as a back-up, made sure to seek out tall trash cans instead of low benches.
Your employees (new and old) would benefit from defined processes. They can quickly get up to speed with the best way to do things. They can easily return to tasks they haven’t done in a while. And you can be confident that things will be done correctly every time. Whether you're navigating on rollerblades or navigating the complexities of a project, the value of process documentation becomes abundantly clear when faced with the unexpected.
Whether you're hiring new employees or simply want to ensure your business runs smoothly, you should document your operations. Reach out to Beck Insights to keep your business rolling: https://beckinsights.com/get-started
