The Back Office

What is the Back Office?

“You need a website!” or so the common wisdom goes. I spent a massive amount of time on my Connexions Coaching website, but I constantly found myself grabbing a piece of scrap paper to make some note about something I needed to do.  Then one day, I realized that my website was focused outward, on the people I want to attract, but I was doing nothing for the person I was spending the most time with: ME!.

I realized that the front office (my public website) needed to be pretty, clean, no spelling errors, etc. But when you go through the door that says “Employees Only”, the rules change. In the Back Office, what is important is flexibility and simplicity. I need to be able t add new processes or tools quickly and easily, but I don’t need to spend an time on styling or making things pretty.

So I stat down (metaphorically) and thought about what I needed my from my back office. I realized quickly that I needed some way of managing the issues that come up. Yes, I could use a task manager or some external website, but I wanted whatever I do to be easily modified.  So I created an Issues list

I noticed that I had information about the businesses I deal with in many places, and lots of the issues I need to address are related to one of my “Vendors”. So  I created a Vendors list, and made it easy to associate each issue with a vendor.

Then I realized that One of my vendors is me, so I added my own business as a vendor and added lots of issues I need to take care of, like writing this page.

The principle emerged is that my business is in constantly morphing mode, and my back office needs to be constantly morphing.