50 first calls

What's your ICP? What products do you sell? How did you build this automation? What does a lead mean to you? Rinse and repeat.

If you recognize the image from the article, not only do you have good taste in movies, but you also understand the pain of having to ask the same questions and give the same answers repeatedly.

Cutting through the jargon of "in a globalized world" and "in the digital era," let's get to the point: our memory resides on our devices. Calendars, task management software, alarm clocks, etc.

Since we know this, let's leverage it to the best of our ability, not just for ourselves but for others too. Let's create documentation that serves not only as reminders for ourselves but also as guides, tutorials, manifestos, and meeting facilitators.        

In the movie itself, our lead, Adam Sandler's character, utilizes documentation to navigate his situation. By creating a video showcasing the (spoilers ahead) journey of his family, he manages to skip through the first 20 daily questions he would otherwise face.

Where great documentation is crucial

In my experience, documentation reaches its pinnacle of importance during handoffs. Imagine welcoming a new client (YAY!), but where are the sales notes? What's the rationale behind their decision to choose our solution? Where are their goals and objectives?

Sure, it's tempting to ask again, but is it really harmless? Phrases like "there's no harm in asking" or "asking doesn't cost a thing" are misleading. Every question entails costs and rewards. Am I asking about something I should already know? The cost could be revealing a lack of attention, misaligned communication within your organization, or simply that the answer isn't important enough to be remembered. Damn.

A great example of effective handoff communication done right is how Eric Pratt , my boss and colleague at Instrumental Group , hands off clients when the sale is completed. Here's what he does:

1. Provides written documentation outlining why the client chose to engage with us.
2. Written documentation on the client's objectives and goals
3. Written documentation on potential avenues to deliver value to the client, drawing from his experience and discussions.
4. Ensures recorded conversations (and their notes) are easily accessible within the CRM.

Another great example of handoff was how Mariana Caldeira and the Onboarding team at Rock Content , back in my days, used the Onboarding as a way to show the Success team all the challenges - strong and weak points - that should be addressed in the client's journey. All of that using a "source of truth" platform, our CRM at the time.

But that's not all! Don't you think I'm missing something? Internal handoffs between the same teams might be event more troublesome.

I work to build solutions and processes that are going to help people. But my client might've outgrew the need that he wanted us to solve and not need me anymore. I might get sick, shifted to a new project or even fired. Where are the instructions, the concepts and the process explanation of the things I did?

Sometimes, there's room to pose questions and acquire the necessary information; other times, there isn't. While an internal call or sync might salvage a poorly documented situation, it's not always feasible.

During the dictatorship era in Brazil, officers conducted rounds to protect a bench. Even after the country returned to democracy, these patrols persisted for 40 years. Why did they finally cease? Through persistent questioning, someone discovered that the patrols were ordered to prevent people from sitting on the bench and ruining its freshly painted surface. By continuously asking 'why,' they unraveled the mystery.

Asking 'why' and changing processes are crucial. However, a missed lesson in this scenario is documentation. Why wasn't there a document outlining the purpose of these rounds? Why wasn't a timeline established for this activity? Not only written documentation would help to know the purpose of it, save time and money with pointless tasks but it would also empower people to seek information by themselves.

When you create a process, remember that people are going to use this, people are going to change this and people are going to have to own it.

How to create great process documentation

I'm a CRM and Data guy, so I'll give examples and tips that pertain to my world. Some are universal, yes. But, I'm not afraid to get nichy:

??Flowcharts and schematic designs

You don't have to get fancy; you don't have to be a designer. The objective is laying out the flow of communication and the different bridges and gates inside a process. There are plenty of platforms that do this well, and some even offer API communication with CRMs and ERPs, ensuring documentation stays updated when something new is added.

??Taxonomy and identification fields

Taxonomy, nomenclature, naming patterns—call it what you want, but you've got to have them.

Looking at an old asset and knowing exactly what it is might just mean you have a good memory. Understanding the function of an asset not created by you indicates you've done a good job with naming.

Two things I like to do in HubSpot, my CRM of choice, for naming assets are:

Following the naming pattern of [Direction/nature] Area | Objective & Implementation Date - Function/action.

Some assets examples using this logic are:

Form - [External] Marketing event management | Fundraiser campaign 2023 - RSVP email form        

Workflow - [External] Sales operations | Lead management SLA* - task and notification for leads out of SLA*        

List - [Internal] Success health management | Product usage 2019-Evergreen - companies with red health label for sticky product events        

Email - [External] Marketing operations | Lead nurturting on resource download 1 of 5 - email on downloaded resource with link for next content        

*service level agreement - a standard of action to be kept for a given process. In this case, a timeframe to reach out to leads.

Adding support information into descriptions, properties and folders

HubSpot has added properties into most of their assets, like workflows and forms. This is a great way to organize your automation library in a more segmented way than just relying on names.

Folders are also a good way to organize your assets and often overlooked by people.

And platforms like HubSpot now count with the help of AI features to help you out with descriptions.

Code is not exempt from this!

If you're like me, then you dabble with some python and js scripts to help you out. They're a much needed place for documentation as well. Trying to understand someone else's code is hard, trying to learn a process through a code snippet is even harder. There are ways to make this easier:

1. JTBD - Job to be done, objective, function. Everything needs a purpose and direction. What does your code aims to do? Why did you build it?
2. Limits - Your code can't do everything. What are the API limits? The enrollment limits? The size of the dataset you're able to influence? What are the times your code will run?
3. Comments and console logs - Why did you import that library? Why did you use that function? What is the code doing now?

Not all documentation are created equal

But don't go around thinking that it is enough to record a little video or write something on your process. Great documentation needs to be:

• Objective and written in a simple way: you're not trying to rank google on google, cut the fillers out. But, make sure to have complete information into all your documents. Your documentation shouldn't be a puzzle or a line in a poem.

• Searchable: people will need key words and search capabilities to go straight into what they need. Consider swapping video content for written documentation.
• Available everywhere, but done in one place: your documentation needs to be available on "the cloud" - on a smartphone, a computer, for you, for your team member - but it can't be pieced around. Oh, we have documentation on that, just search on our google drive, but if you don't find it look into Monday or Teamwork.

At Rock Content , I had the privilege of working alongside one of the industry's finest, Jo?o Dobbin , who spearheaded the team's effort to establish an internal Knowledge Base. It was truly impressive, especially for organizations like ours. This platform was integrated with Slack, enabling us to search for articles within channels and conversations and even request documentation directly from it. But what set it apart was its organizational usage, fully backed by our leadership, particularly Diego Gomes , who shares our passion for prioritizing data and documentation, a real data freak.

If you've got this far, thanks for the attention! Let's connect to share ideas and insights into data analysis, CRM management, marketing/sales operations and integrations.