Documenting Your Home Business

Des Walsh, of b5’s Business and Blogging blog (www.businessandblogging.com ) , brought up an interesting idea, when he commented on one of my posts. He mentioned documenting what you do in your home business…possibly eventually writing a manual. Des was talking about this in reference to possibly selling your business or the process (that “exit” he mentioned in another comment).

One thing I find with people who have really interesting businesses that actually could be documented as a saleable business process, so to speak, is that they balk at documenting what they do, not realizing that for someone new to the business what the established business owner does is pure mystery.

You also could write this documentation of your business process as a way to generate income from selling a book or teaching classes. I know of some business people who teach classes on their businesses or the business process at continuing education or adult education classes. Sometimes they are invited as guest speakers at college business classes.

Such a documentation, in the form of a manual, would be helpful if you decide to sell your business. I can see how this would have been helpful to me, when I took over a quilted vest business from a friend. We sat down and I took notes as she gave me hints on her business process. However, a manual would have been of interest, too.

If you shudder at the idea of writing this yourself, Des suggests having someone video everything you do as you talk about it…for instance from how you set up your desk, organize your files, process mailouts, purchase supplies, invoice customers, produce your product or conduct your service. (Or you could tape it yourself.)

As Des says, these are all the things some of us have spend years learning the hard way.

He has one tip for making the video: even though you like to work in your jammies, it would be a good idea to dress up a bit. After the video, cassette, or CD is made, you could contract a writer to watch it and produce a manual.

As you read this, you may get other innovative ideas for documenting your home business.