Why Your Business Needs a Playbook (Before It Breaks) - Episode 201

 There's a moment in every business, especially service businesses, when the gears start grinding. Things that used to run smoothly suddenly feel clunky. Your team's asking the same questions.

Clients are slipping through the cracks. And you find yourself re-explaining the same process three times in the same day. It's not because you stopped caring.

It's because you've outgrown your ability to wing it. When you build a business based on memory, intuition, and tribal knowledge, it works until it doesn't. Today, we're kicking off a new four-part series on service best practices that actually work.

This isn't theory. This isn't busy work. This is how real business owners remove the pressure, create consistency, and start building something scalable.

Welcome to the Budding Entrepreneur Podcast. Good day, and welcome to the Budding Entrepreneur Podcast. I'm your host, Randy Bridges.

In each episode, we dive into practical business strategies that you can put to work in your business right away. We also focus on inspiring stories from leaders who are shaking and making things happen in their industry. It's all about giving you the tools and insights to take you and your business to the next level.

So get comfortable, and let's jump right in. 

All right, all right. We are on episode 201, and today is May 30th, 2025.

Last week, we did a retrospective on the podcast back to the recurring themes and topics beginning back in 2020. Keep in mind, that kickoff was right smack in the middle of the pandemic, so it was an interesting time to begin podcasting. Nonetheless, I ran a daily podcast for something like eight months, doing it seven days a week come rain, shine, or whatever.

Now you and I are sitting down weekly to see where we can make the most difference for you and your business. Today, we're starting a new four-part series on the podcast. This series is built directly from my Service Best Practices course and book.

The combo is designed to help business owners across dozens of industries to build their own owner's manual, or playbook, if you will, for how their unique business should run best to achieve their goals. We're going to look at four points today. Number one, why most businesses wait way too long to document what they do.

What a playbook actually is, and hint, it's not a 100-page binder. Number three, how to spot the early warning signs that things are breaking. And number four, what you can do this week to start taking pressure off your team and yourself.

So let's dig into the quote of the week, and I go into that Service Best Practices course to pull something from me, and it's, if you don't document how you win, don't be surprised when your team starts losing. And the quote came out of an early draft of the course, and I still stand by it. Because here's the truth, if you're the only one who knows what right looks like, you'll always be the bottleneck.

Now with that quote in mind, let's jump into our main content. And we're going to be talking first about why your business needs a playbook. And ultimately, the reason is very simple.

Because without one, you're building your business on hope. And I know that might sound harsh, but it's true. When everything lives in your head, you are the system.

Which means your team can't scale, your clients can't rely on consistency, and you can't step out without stress. A playbook is your answer to this invisible chaos. It gives your team something to lean on when you're not in the room.

It gives you the freedom to delegate without second guessing. And it gives your clients the experience they came for. Every. Single. Time. 

This isn't about corporate bureaucracy.

It's about building a system in your business that works even when you're not the one pushing every button. You create a playbook, not because you're planning to leave. You are the owner, after all.

But you create one because you want the business to run better while you're still in it, and to give you the opportunity to escape the business when you need it most. And many times, people are not prepared for that. They just take a vacation or whatever, and they come back to a total mess.

Because the minute the cat's away, the mice will play, right? So, let's start off with the reasons why we wait too long to document things. Obviously, no one wants to document things when it's really busy. When you're growing fast or buried in fulfillment, writing things down feels like a luxury.

But most business owners wait too long because of three excuses that are disguised as reasons. Number one, I don't have time. Now, we all know you barely have time to do the work, but you've got to make the time to document the work at some point.

Number two, I'll just explain it when I hire someone. I hear that one a lot. And every new person that you hire, every new person coming in on their very first day, is going to get a different version of the instructions.

And that means inconsistency is going to spread quickly. And number three, it's working fine right now. Yes, because you are the one holding it all together.

The problem? As soon as your availability gets stretched, your business cracks. So, let's look at the hidden cost of winging it. Winging it looks efficient until it explodes.

What really happens when you don't document is you make ten micro decisions a day that no one else can make. You explain the same thing over and over, slightly differently each time. To make it even worse, your team is improvising, and you're the one cleaning it up.

And then the day comes when someone quits, or you finally take a vacation, and the whole thing wobbles. Every fire you're putting out, it's probably a sign that something wasn't written down. Now let's talk about what a playbook actually is.

This is what your documentation is really working as. A playbook. You wouldn't expect a professional team of some sort to go without a playbook.

In football, there's one playbook just for the whole team. There's one for offense. There's one for defense.

There's one for kicking, one for punting. Each one of these has different requirements on it, and I'm not saying you have to do that for your business. Let's bust a myth here.

A playbook isn't a policy manual. It's not a stuffy corporate SOP binder. It's your custom operating guide for how your business wins.

Think of it like this. Your business already runs on systems. You're just doing them in your head.

The playbook puts those systems into a repeatable format. It creates consistency without killing your personality or creativity. A good playbook usually includes core functions, like sales, fulfillment, admin, ops, etc.

A repeatable process for how those functions run. Decision guidelines, templates, checklists, the stuff that keeps your team aligned. Now, how do you know it's time to document? Well, here's some dead giveaways.

You dread onboarding new people because all the stuff you'll have to remember to say. Your team asks you questions they should already know. You get nervous about taking time off.

And you don't feel like you can really let go of anything just yet. These aren't personality flaws. They're signals that you're operating without clarity.

But there is good news. You don't need to write a 50 page playbook. You just need to start writing.

Here's what I want you to do today. Pick one thing that your business does every week. Write it down in steps as if you were going to hand it to someone else.

And it doesn't have to be perfect. Just get it out of your head. That's your first entry in your business playbook.

As a coach of mine often repeats, done is better than perfect. And he often adds, clarity beats chaos always. So let's do a quick recap.

Every business hits a point where memory and time break down. Winging it is expensive, even if it feels efficient in the moment. A playbook is how you make success repeatable, not just possible.

And you can start small, one task at a time. Next week, we're going to go from the why to the what. We'll cover how to map your business's core functions, and how to decide what to document next after you get that first one documented.

If you've ever thought, I don't even know where to start, episode 202 is your map. 

That's it for this episode. I hope you picked up some valuable insights, and maybe even sparked a few new ideas.

If you want to keep the conversation going, or maybe even explore partnerships, don't hesitate to reach out. And hey, don't forget to subscribe, leave a review, and share this with someone who needs to hear it. The steps you take today, could be the start of something big tomorrow.

For The Budding Entrepreneur, I wish you the best in your health, your wealth, your business, your family, everything about you. Take care, and we'll see you back here next week.