I always think of allied business systems as the core business systems that you use to build and run your business. They can be used to create an efficient business model, to guide business decision-making, and to manage processes. I know that it is easy for me to get hung up on these things, but I think it is important to understand how all of this works together for you.
As a business owner, I also know that allied business systems can be really powerful. I once had the privilege of working with a talented but clueless designer who could build a business model, strategy, and process that had a very real impact on the way my company started and how it grew.
In the early 2000’s, when we first started working together, the design and coding of all elements of our business began to change. I knew that as a designer, I had to learn the basics of design, but I also knew that I needed to learn the basics of business. My job was to learn how to make the business work for our company.
It’s an easy job if you know how to code, but this is not only a design task. This is a coding task, and to be effective you need to learn how to code and design in tandem. We began to build our company around designing the process. For example, our first design came from a series of meetings with the CEO. We had to come up with a way to handle the CEO’s request to change the CEO’s name and position.
The job of a designer is to create an interface that works, not show you how. You can design great interfaces, but if nobody uses them, then they’re little more than a show to the users. Designers create the user’s interface, not a great one.
I think that designers have the job of designing not just interfaces, but the business processes of the company. For example, when we started, we were trying to figure out a way to make sure the new CEO had the ability to manage the company while the old one was out of town. But instead of doing this through the executives, we created a new executive board. One that includes the new CEO and his wife.
I was in marketing and we had the business process of a company. We had a board of directors.
There is a lot of business design jargon to learn, but the concepts are worth understanding at a high level. The executive board is basically a group of business leaders who meet regularly to make decisions about what the company’s products, services, and operations looks like. You might consider this board as the equivalent of the board of directors in an organization.
The executives board is where all the executive decisions are made and where decisions are made about the company. If you want to change the corporate look and feel you need to focus on the board of directors. Think of the board as the CEO’s conscience and the CEO’s mouthpiece.
The board of directors of a company has all the power in the company. It has all the power to make the company look and feel good (or not) and also all the power to make the company look bad. You can argue that the board is not the CEO. But I think the board is the CEO. A board of directors has the power to make bad decisions and bad decisions have the power to make bad decisions.
