I came across a blog post about the domino effect and it got me thinking.

Obviously, one little thing left undone can cause another little thing to happen and so on until there is a problem – for example, miss one weeks back up of your computer doesn’t seem like a big deal until you have missed many weeks back ups and then your hard drive fails…

This is where contingency plansand attention to detail are important. Sometimes we get busy and it is easy to leave things until later (and the reality is that with only 24 hours in a day, some things have to be left until later) but we need to watch out for the important things not being forgotten. Maybe a set time each week to review important things could be a valuable use of time.

Here are five things I think should be regularly checked before they become a problem:

1. overall safety – broken chairs, loose power cords, overloaded power points, faulty machinery can cause serious damage if left to get worse
2. back up systems of data and software
3. suppliers – little issues may build up until you are left unable to fulfill client needs so check suppliers are on track before it gets critical
4. customer service – if you have staff, are they treating customers the way you want? are you keeping your word on things like sending out newsletters? how long does it take to reply to emails?
5. accounts – is data processed with some regularity? do you pay invoices on time every time? are you aware of those customers who are slow payers?

Of course, not all domino effects are negative, so I’ll post about that tomorrow!