By Bond Collective Staff
If you want your business to succeed, you absolutely must focus on three key variables: people, process, and product. The three Ps, as they’re often called, provide the highest return for your efforts because they act as the cornerstone for everything your business does.
It’s critical, then, that you understand how to manage your people, your process, and your product for maximum yield.
In this article, we’ll introduce you to the three Ps, provide insight into how you can manage them better, and show you what role work environment plays in this concept.
What Are The 3 Ps?
People
Even if you’re going it on your own as a solopreneur or a digital nomad, people are an integral part of your business.
Of course, “people” refers to your workforce — be they on-site employees or remote freelancers. But it also refers to all of the other relationships you need to keep your business running smoothly, including:
Customers
Vendors
Suppliers
Advisers
Partners
There’s a reason people come first in the people, process, product trilogy — without these stakeholders, your business would flounder. It benefits you to put significant time, effort, and, yes, money, into cultivating these relationships.
Your business depends on it.
Process
Process, as a large-scale concept, is the actions your business takes to perform a specific function. Businesses of all sizes have myriad processes, including:
Delivering a service
Creating a product
Making a sales presentation
Responding to emergencies
Answering the phone
Providing information to customers
Keeping track of supplies on hand
Even brainstorming and problem-solving benefit when you take the time to implement a process — an action plan, if you will — that everyone can follow.
Having a process in place essentially answers the question, “How do we do X, and when do we do Y, and why do we do Z?” so that your business can run effectively without you.
Product
Your product is what your business has to offer. It could be a tangible “thing” that you can hold in your hand. Or it could be a service that is only visible by its results.
Your product — including your brand and your image — is the most visible part of your business and, as such, deserves the lion’s share of your focus. But not to the detriment of people and process.
In fact, it’s imperative to view people, process, and product as a system in which each separate part depends on the part before it.
People reinforce the process. Process reinforces the product. Product reinforces the people. On and on this goes in a spiral that — if managed correctly — moves in an upward direction and leads to sales and success.
How To Manage People, Process, Product
People — Stress Quality And Diversity
Managing the first “P” in the people, process, product chain begins with assembling the best team. For most businesses, that involves two critical factors:
Quality over quantity
Diversity over homogeneity
No amount of unskilled team members can accomplish the same work as one quality employee.
Focus on hiring the right people with the right skills for the job at hand. Don’t settle for less in the hopes that hiring more team members will make up for it in the end. That’s a recipe for disaster.
Similarly, a diverse workforce is always more productive than a homogenous one. Diversity provides a whole host of benefits, including:
Better employee performance
More skill
More experience
A larger talent pool
Creative innovation
Access to a broader client base
Learning experiences
Faster problem solving
More informed decision making
These benefits are extremely important for your business because they keep you competitive in an increasingly global — and diverse — world.
Process — Plan For Change
All businesses start small. But, with the right management, growth happens quickly. This growth brings with it an array of new issues that your business might not be prepared to handle.
You can prevent stagnation and give your business the highest chance for success by planning for change while your business is small. Small processes are much more amenable to change.
That’s not to say that you should restrict growth. Instead, perfect your processes early on and build in strategies for growth before that time comes.
When you’re able to scale your processes up or down at a moment’s notice, you give your business more of a chance to respond to changes in the market and more of a chance to stay profitable longer.
Product — Identify The Proper Market
At the early stages of your business, it’s vital to identify the proper market for your product or service. As your business continues to grow in size and scope, it’s equally vital to constantly reexamine your market to ensure that your people and processes are focused on the right goals.
As you do this, don’t forget to evaluate limitations — of your product and your market — as well as ways to care for your existing customer base while expanding into new areas.
The New Paradigm For Process And Product
Before the advent of the internet revolution, the three Ps — people, process, product — were all tangible objects that you could literally put your hands on.
Processes involved small- or large-scale pieces of equipment linked together into assembly lines, inventory management, and other essential functions. Those pieces of equipment handled product that you distributed to your clients and customers via various shipping methods.
All of this required a lot of space.
As we approach the first quarter of the 21st century, businesses are slowly but surely migrating two-thirds of the three Ps online. Process now involves algorithms instead of machinery. Product now often involves bytes and electricity rather than rubber and steel.
A paradigm shift of this magnitude means that businesses no longer need massive amounts of physical space to build something truly unique.
Thanks to that reduction in scale, properly managing the three Ps has never been easier.
The Importance Of Work Environment For Success
Even though process and product have evolved as more and more entrepreneurs and startups move online and into digital offerings, one thing remains the same: people.
People need inspiration to do their best work. They need the best tools at hand. They need comfort, flexibility, and community. Without these variables, their performance — and, ultimately, your business and your success — suffer.
How can you provide all of these essentials without locking yourself into a long-term lease — that won’t grow and evolve with your business — and without burning through all of your hard-earned capital?
By basing your people, process, and product in a coworking space like Bond Collective.
Bond Collective offers thoughtfully curated boutique work environments that provide an unmatched experience for you and your team.
Inspiration doesn’t come easy. When it does finally arrive, you want to prolong its presence as much as possible. Bond Collective decorates, arranges, and operates each one of its many locations with inspiration in mind.
Bright colors, natural light, stimulating textures, and plenty of space for your body and your mind to move around — these are the unique ways in which Bond Collective brings inspiration into the work environment.
Inspiration, though, is only one piece of the equation. The right tools is another. That’s why we offer:
Fast, reliable WiFi and Ethernet connections
Unlimited black-and-white printing
Mail and package handling
Private meeting and phone booths
Guest reception and greeting
Custom build-outs
Daily porter service
Nightly office cleaning
When you don’t have to think about these features — they’re just there whenever you need them — you and your team can focus all of your efforts on getting the job done right the first time through.
What about comfort and flexibility? Bond Collective offers those as well.
All our office spaces are furnished with the highest quality in comfort and design. Many areas within Bond Collective allow for easy reconfiguration to accommodate an impromptu brainstorming session or emergency meeting — that’s flexibility in a nutshell.
Or, if privacy is paramount, take advantage of reserved conference rooms for two to 20 or more.
And let’s not forget about community. Working side by side with other like-minded professionals provides connections, stimulation, innovation, and a whole host of other intangibles that you can’t get from working in isolation.
Take advantage of all that Bond Collective has to offer to help you properly manage the three Ps of your business: people, process, and product.
Visit any one of Bond Collective’s many locations in the United States, including workspaces in New York, Pennsylvania, Washington D.C., Illinois, Tennessee, and Texas. Or call us today to find out more about everything we have to offer.
And while you’re at it, schedule a tour to experience first-hand how the boutique work environments at Bond Collective can benefit your business.