In the late 1990s, there was a popular book called Don’t Sweat the Small Stuff. It encouraged readers to find ways to let go of the minor things that can often upset one’s focus or cause frustration.
On the surface, that may seem like a pretty good idea. Getting frustrated by little things can be a waste of time and energy. However, I believe that it is often the little things that differentiate one company from another and that can often prevent problems from occurring in the first place.
One of the operating philosophies at Lily is a relentless attention to detail in everything we do. While little details may not seem all that important, the reality is that the little details add up to form the bigger procedures or processes that govern how a business operates.
It is not enough to set a big goal or identify a Key Performance Indicator (KPI). If you expect to successfully meet a goal or make progress on your KPI, you are going to have to put some specific details in place so that the people who work for you know what is expected of them.
The details serve as a roadmap for your employees who are tasked with achieving the stated goals. This does not necessarily mean micromanaging your employees, but rather it involves providing them with enough information to accomplish the tasks that need to be completed in the way that you want them completed.
The details are the foundational elements of quality and accuracy. Details provide clarity, making it easier for others to understand your actions. Details are what lead to consistency across all of our locations, and focusing on them provides smoother, more consistent interactions with customers, regardless of who in the organization they are interacting with.
When a business gets the small stuff right, it instills confidence in its customers that it is getting the big stuff right as well. Ask yourself this: how much confidence do you have in a company if you notice a spelling or grammatical error—small stuff—in its marketing material or in a proposal to you? If you are like me, finding small errors like a typo causes me to pause for a minute and wonder what else they might have missed.
Details can spell the difference between success and failure. A savvy manager will never underestimate the value of the small details; they will, instead, always sweat the small stuff!
