The Wize Way

Episode 76: How to Make Instructional Videos for your Business

• Wize Mentoring for Accountants and Bookkeepers • Season 1 • Episode 76

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What if you could make your team's efficiency skyrocket just by incorporating one simple practice daily? 

In this week's episode of The Wize Guys Podcast,  be ready to accelerate your understanding and application of self-leadership, video creation, and documentation. This power-packed episode is jam-packed with insights and practical demonstrations. Our journey begins with an exploration of self-leadership, focusing on its critical components: self-discipline, experience, and emotional control. We then venture into the world of video creation, as I walk you through creating a standard operating procedure (SOP) video using Loom and Camtasia, right from screen recording all the way to adding it to your intranet. 

Have you ever wondered about the secret to improving efficiency in your team? Hint: it lies in SOPs. To help you grasp this concept, I share the process of recording an SOP with Loom and discuss the benefits it brings. I emphasize how documenting just one procedure per day can lead to significant progress in your team's efficiency. We talk about the importance of recording videos for every team member and using these videos as part of the induction process for new hires. I also discuss how handy tools like iPhones can be used to record procedures for clients who require hard copies. 

As we near the end of our conversation, we delve into how technology has simplified the process of recording and documenting SOPs. I discuss the various options available to capture these procedures, from using phones to screen recording. We stress again the importance of documentation for efficiency. So whether you're a budding entrepreneur or an established business person, this episode will provide you with invaluable insights on mastering self-leadership and understanding the vital role of video in business operations. Tune in, learn, and let's make your business more efficient together.

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PS: Whenever you’re ready… here are the fastest 3 ways we can help you fix and grow your accounting firm:

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3. Book a 1:1 Wize Discovery Session – Spend 30mins with our Wize CEO, Jamie Johns, a $7M firm owner who is ready to give you his entire business plan to build a firm that can run without you – Find out more here

Jamie Johns:

You've got to master leading yourself. So that's about self-discipline, that's about experience that's about controlling your feelings, so you've got to lead yourself.

Brenton Ward:

From Wize Mentoring is The Wize Guys Podcast, a show about accounting and bookkeeping practice owners and the many stories, lessons, and tips from their experience of transitioning from a time-pull practice to a business that runs without them. I hope you enjoy and subscribe.

Jamie Johns:

This one here, for example, is our business card policy video and I got our admin person to put an intro on this, for example. Now, maybe, if I can just turn the volume down, hopefully that has come through, but if I play that you'll see here that it has the intro to it. So it depends how professional you want to get, but you can see there that it comes into our intro. There's a little bit of music and then it goes into the actual policy itself and it talks the person through the word doc or it talks them through the Excel doc and this could be anything from bookkeeping or whatever. So that's, and we use Camtasia to do that. And then, of course, we have a video of a video of how to do this as well. How do you actually, how do you put a intro in there and how do you put an outro and all that sort of thing.

Brenton Ward:

So the question from Steve there, Jamie, was if you're using Loom, so Loom, when you record your screen, then it gives you a link to that video which is housed on Loom, and it'll be the same for some other platforms. But then do you then just paste that link into your intranet and send people to the Loom videos on their site, or do you download the video and then upload it? How do you?

Jamie Johns:

Yeah, with Loom. So to answer the question with Loom it just has a hyperlink, brenton. So if you get that hyperlink you can then put it straight in, like straight into here, for example. So there's your business card.

Brenton Ward:

Put you on the spot. Could we just show you how easy it is to create a standard operating procedure with Loom? Record your screen for two seconds and then, as if you're recording the business card policy, and let's just do it on the fly.

Jamie Johns:

I don't know how it's going to affect the technology. But yeah, you just basically hit record and then you can decide which screen you're going to share and away you go. It might get jammed because of the microphone and whatnot, but that's recording your screen.

Jamie Johns:

Yeah, so that's recording my screen right now, and then when you finish recording, you can just go finish, and then you can see it's copied, the URL, and you can see there. So that's then that's copy video link. So there you go. You've just created your first video in a matter of seconds, yeah. And then once you've copied that, you can, you know, you can pop that in I'll jump back to the wise over, for example, then you can just, you know, you can edit this and just to show that you know the practical application of using this, you can just edit that and you can put in, you know, click here, for example, and then with this link, you just pop it straight in and away you go, you can, you know, pop that link in there and save that and basically you're done. You just republish it and that's like you can. You can tell me how long that took to do? Brain.

Brenton Ward:

Literally minutes, and there's a, I guess, a couple of ways to skin a cat in terms of if you're recording your screen locally on your computer, then having a directory of, you know, central directory of videos that you can then upload to your your internet. There Some of the comments in the chat. Jonathan said you just got to be careful. You know, using Lume, that you're not. You haven't got the video set to public, so you know you can create a private portal on Lume so no one else can see the videos.

Jamie Johns:

And that's the same with you know Vimeo, so we've used Vimeo a lot over the years and also, you know I've seen a lot of people use YouTube as well. So you just got to put the link on private and then people within your organiser can use it. But another process, brent, is, you know, if you do get people posting things on there a party of policy they can just go into draft and then you know, until you know you might have your weekly senior client managers meeting and they sign off on it. You know that that. So, yeah, just a process for it. But again, it's a it's about progress, not perfection. As soon as you make, as soon as you make a start, you can. Then you can. Yeah, obviously you can aim for perfection, but you can always just keep improving your system and you know that's. That's sort of yeah.

Brenton Ward:

So I mean just in terms of, like, the core ingredients for a standard operating procedure. Do you guys have any particular criteria around that in Sky Like, does every SOP have to be attached to a video as well, like you can't have just the document, you have to have an explainer video. How do you guys position that?

Jamie Johns:

Yeah, we focus a lot more just on the videos. Brenton, we've been down the path of, you know, trying to put step by step in Word documents, for example, you know, like literally typing them out. And years ago, you know, I remember I did work experience at one accounting firm. They, you know, they had folders and folders of of how to do stuff. But the trick, the tricky bit then comes, brenton. Well, what if? What if we change systems? What if there's an update to that system? Do we have to go in and then update all that?

Jamie Johns:

You know, years ago even, for example I'll just give you a classic example like I bought a lawn mower a while back and years ago you'd get a massive manual, you know, with a lawn mower. Or the other day I bought an e-bike, you know. So what's the first thing they do? You know, you get a. You get a. You either get a CD-ROM with it that you can watch the video, or alternatively, I give you a, you know you, you get a link and a sign up, an account, and then you can, you can watch the videos about your e-bike. So the days we're having texts is pretty much past now. It's it's more about having that online platforms that you can access on how to do stuff. You know YouTube's a critical one. You can or you can almost Google YouTube how to do anything. You know, so we. So the best advice I can give everyone is like go down the video path, because it's just so much quicker and obviously you can. You can share your screen, for example and record your screen.

Brenton Ward:

As you, as you innovate and change and improve the systems, you, it's not hard to then re-record a couple of minute video, as opposed to spending hours updating a procedure manual or whatever.

Michael Ferris:

That's right.

Jamie Johns:

That's exactly right and and just you know. The other thing is if, for everyone who's using the Y Ys Hub, you know there's a set of, there's a set of videos in here at how to use it as well. So you know, there's, there's an overview. So I think a lot of people you know will often ask our support how do I do this, how do I do that? So there's there's a lot in there as well, just in the instructional videos as well, but but even at a high level, you know.

Jamie Johns:

Step six, coming back to what I said earlier, step six is about you know your systems and processes and there's some of the fundamental ones that that that people can have a look at in that's actually in the Ys, in the Ys vault as well, but again, that that talks about oh, here you go.

Jamie Johns:

So recording standing operating procedures so you can have a look at 16.13, which is a bit more of a deep dive into into doing the SOPs as well. So, yeah, so it's, it's all there. It's just a matter of focus and creating new habits in your firm and, sure enough, after a year of just continually adding to this, you'll get 80% of nearly everything you do in your how-to section and creating a vault of how you do things at your firm, because for every firm it'll be just. For every single firm it'll be slightly different. Every firm has slightly different cloud stack, different ways of doing things, so the important thing is to document it and get all the IP out of your head into a place people can find From a bigger picture. It's like when I met Ed, brent and you and I said, Ed, how do we get all your intellectual property out so that we can share that with the world? Well, I think we're up to 130 videos now.

Brenton Ward:

That's in an operating procedure of Ed's mind. I just think as well. You've just seen how easy it is. This adds to. This is a balance sheet play, but it's a quad-two activity so it does take time. But I'm just thinking there. If you were to record one standard operating procedure per team member a day, which would take five minutes to do that's five a week, say 20 a month for 10 months a year that's 200 standard operating procedures documented in your practice a year. Your entire business would be completely documented within a year.

Jamie Johns:

Absolutely. You've just got to the question. Every time, every time you have to show someone how to do something, just stop and think should I record this Because other people can benefit from this? This is about leverage. How many times have I had new wise members in the position I was in? I've got no time. I've got no time. Why don't I have time? It's because one I'm not delegating effectively. You don't want to abdicate, but how do I delegate? Give people the power, give them the tools, give them the videos, give them a policy, a procedure.

Jamie Johns:

How do we order business cards? Like every firm watching here now, do you have a policy on how to order business cards? Or what about the uniform? The question is if I need business cards or if I need a new uniform or a shirt, or if I need to order stationery. Ask yourself do they have to come to you? Do they have to come to you as the firm owner? Do they have to come to you to work out what to do? If the answer is yes, they do have to come to me. Then do something about it. Create the policy, because every time you create that policy or create that video, that's your time back.

Brenton Ward:

Every standard operating procedure is one step closer to being freer.

Jamie Johns:

It's one step closer to freedom and it's one step closer to getting your firm to run without you, so that all the IPs are not in your head. It's such a simple thing but we just forget it. I think we get so focused just running on that treadmill and watch the next job. But you absolutely are it, brent. It's what they call quad 2 activity. It's not urgent but it's important. It's a bit like Ed says should I stop and service the car? Or it's a bit. The other analogy is like the guy who's flat out in the woods chopping wood and the other guy comes along and says hey, mate, why don't you sharpen your saw? And the other guy says I'm too busy.

Brenton Ward:

Kristy has just raised a good point and something I was thinking about. As well as they call it, we like to think it as in case of a sudden holiday, which is so important, around having no one person being the retainer of all the knowledge of how you run your practice. So even if the person who's in charge of ordering business cards, if they were to leave tomorrow again coming back to your question who's going to know how to do the business cards? It's going to chance, so it's going to come back to the practice Whereas if everyone took the time to document that policy, the new person could step in and just run that path.

Jamie Johns:

The critical thing is what I really love because probably because I like the sales side of it is document your process of how to follow up a new lead, because Ed always said to me, if you're not growing, you're dying. But these are some of the key areas and there's some standard, there's some guidelines in the wise vote around the process. What are the exact steps to follow up a new lead and then have your sales playbook? Do we do packages? The more that you can document that. It's just such good leadership because it allows other people to deliver their services and if a new client comes in, having a package like a box there that you can say almost like a menu of services as well, bryn, it just empowers other people to deliver those services and follow up that prospect, and not you. So this whole process is really about building, having extra ordinary systems so that you can have ordinary people, and that's the key, because I always used to say I'm just an ordinary person. If I can build these SOPs, so can you.

Brenton Ward:

Speaking of ordinary people. I've just spotlighted Michael, who's one of our wise mentors. I'm joking, you're an extraordinary person, mick. You've just said there key person dependency is a real risk. Can you just highlight for us your experience in your journey of documenting pro books?

Michael Ferris:

Yeah, so my SOP journey actually started a couple of years ago when I saw Jamie on a panel at an industry event and he talked about how he had everything documented at Sky and I thought I'd love to just have a look at this intranet one day. And here I am living the dream now. So that's been really good and it's certainly inspired what we're doing here. And Ash, my practice manager, is on this video. She's working very hard to document the admin side of it and then the production side of it as well, and we have our senior production manager overseeing a lot of those videos and their creation to make sure that they reflect what we do at the moment and to make sure they're nice and accurate.

Brenton Ward:

So would you have any tips, nick, based on how you guys do anything? Would you do it any differently, or do you use any particular software or anything different to what we've talked about today?

Michael Ferris:

Yeah, so when we consciously do a video and we set out to record one, we tend to use Loom 99% of the time. But then, just touching on what Jamie's emphasized over and over, is, whenever you're training, someone record it, and for that we use Teams, because we use that as our video communication tool internally and there's a record button there. So we just hit the record on those sessions and Ash and I are just exploring. You know how we either re-record that in Loom as a polished version, and whether or not we do a written version as well.

Jamie Johns:

So the great point, Mick, a lot of firms use Teams these days and we do as well. And yeah, a lot of firms forget that using Teams, you can actually record the session and the video gets embedded in the chat thread and then you can actually download. You can actually download the video as well, Mick. So, yeah, great point on that.

Brenton Ward:

Yeah, let's say straight into your directory from Teams which is here.

Brenton Ward:

Just on staff guys, and I'll keep you in the spotlight here because you can shed some light on this. A lot of sole practitioners on the line today who are looking to recruit the right staff under the deep, narrow team structure. Had a question yesterday For practice owners looking to recruit staff at the moment should you hold off on documenting your standard operating procedures until you've got that person in-house and then you can start to record and document as you're training, or should you just get started?

Michael Ferris:

Just get started.

Brenton Ward:

Yes, Mick, get started, Jamie.

Jamie Johns:

Yeah, just make a start. Focus on progress and not perfection. Brenton, yeah, that'll be more of it. You just got to make a start and start recording today. You know. One of the things.

Brenton Ward:

That's pretty cool thing there is when you do start training the team members who've touched on it a couple of times today is record every single session that you do with that team member, because then that can be used for training for every other staff.

Jamie Johns:

Yeah, you can use it for induction too, like after you've had a new team member start, you can just say to them as part of your induction is look, there's six videos here I'd like you to watch as part of the welcome letter.

Brenton Ward:

You know as well, and that's a great, great point Kristy's just touched on as well. It's great to have for a new staff member, as part of their welcome series, a couple of videos to watch to start. Then that may be the videos that you record right now, and then you'd record all their training, which can be included in future inductions as well. But the message there is you have to just get started straight away.

Jamie Johns:

There's no top-notch present.

Michael Ferris:

Yeah, just one more example that we had recently when this financial year we swapped over to zero from Handysoft and that was just a huge project. But we recorded everything as we went and we actually set up a channel in our teams for policy and process updates. So every time somebody learned something about the new stack that we were using, we'd post the videos in there. And then we've had some new team members come on board since and one of the first things we do is just point them to that channel and just say, start watching some videos, and that'll get them up to speed with where we're up to.

Brenton Ward:

Oh, yes, perfect. Yeah, I am going to get one, jamie, you talk, while I'm just trying to find I was just yeah, I'll just stop sharing for a sec.

Jamie Johns:

But another hint I was going to say, brent, was I've seen some firms in my travels. They'll actually record. For example, some firms won't send out packages of tax returns or financial statements whatever, and in particular, some clients want a bound hard copy. But I've seen one firm they actually got an iPhone and they videoed how to bind the package up, and that was just another example, and so they actually put the mobile video on their how-to list as well. So it's not limited I just wanted to say it's not limited to what you can record on the screen. You can get your phone and if there was some other video that you needed to do was how they opened the office back door.

Brenton Ward:

Yeah, well, no one knows in an office how to use the printer.

Jamie Johns:

No one ever knows how to use the printer.

Brenton Ward:

That always comes back to one person. So, recording how to use the panel on the printer screen is a perfect example of that.

Jamie Johns:

Yeah, exactly. So it's not limited. These days with technology and phones, you're just not limited to recording the screen.

Brenton Ward:

You can use your iPhone as well. It's not that. Straight into the cloud and away you go.