​Customer onboarding: Create the best impression with your new customer with a solid onboarding process. Set expectations and demonstrate that they made the right decision in engaging your company. Have a clear set of activities in mind—that could be an introductory phone call with a follow-up email, for instance—and ensure all your team members know what’s expected of them. We’d argue that this is in the top three of processes that every business needs.

Account management: This process defines how you communicate with your customers on an ongoing basis. Arranging regular checkpoints allows you to investigate opportunities for upselling or extending the service you provide. Your information technology should be set up to help here, providing you with up-to-date customer information to personalize your outreach.

Customer offboarding: Although unwelcome, you can ensure your customer receives the best experience when you stop working with them. The smoothness with which this happens can make the difference between a future referral and making your company one to avoid. Again, make sure your information systems are up-to-date so you can personalize this—and gather relevant information to decrease the chances of it with future customers.

Budgets: How you calculate and monitor your company’s budget is of the utmost importance. A process to ensure that expenditure is kept in line and that the budget is being tracked over the financial year will reassure you that your business is operating within its means.

End-of-year accounts and annual returns: This process describes how to compile the end-of-financial year accounts and annual returns. Although the exact procedure will vary from country to country, a robust process will ensure that information is submitted accurately and on time.

Payroll: Setting up a process for running the payroll, whether it’s monthly, twice a week, or even weekly will mean that nothing is forgotten. Ensure that all relevant additions and deductions are made and that any unique circumstances are taken into account.

Taxation: This process relates to the country’s taxation laws. Businesses benefit from reductions in tax, so a process for preparing and submitting paperwork will mean you recoup the money owed to you.

Disciplinary and grievance: There are four main processes relating to the disciplinary and grievance procedures: responding to a formal grievance, disciplinary investigation, disciplinary hearing, and disciplinary appeal. There are multiple decision points in these processes, and it’s important to have clear expectations at every point. Although these processes are (ideally) likely to be used infrequently, it’s important that you comply with the employment law when they are needed. Any business process modeling you do needs to take this into account.

Employee leave: As well as a clear process for how employees request holidays and notify employers of the need for sick leave, there is also parental leave to consider. Having processes in place for when employees request maternity or paternity leave will help manage the transition period. State-of-the-art software can make this easier—for instance, by automatically checking requested dates against a global calendar and informing HR of how many staff members are away.

Employee onboarding: Businesses often underestimate how important their employee onboarding process is to the retention and ongoing success of their staff. A comprehensive onboarding process will reassure employees they’ve joined a company that cares about supporting its staff.

Employee offboarding: Similar to how a customer offboarding process can encourage positive reviews and referrals, a smooth employee offboarding process will make sure nothing is forgotten and will leave your former team members with a good impression of your company.

Flexible working request: A request from an employee for regular flexible or remote working is a right for certain employees. Human resources are responsible for handling their requests in the correct way. This may be an ongoing process, as you may make it reliant on fulfilling certain metrics, so it’s important not to treat this as a one-off event.

Performance and appraisal: Transparent processes for performance reviews and appraisals help your employees understand what they need to be successful in their role. Letting them know what metrics are being monitored and what their managers are documenting can help them respond appropriately. In addition, effective processes should clarify what constitutes performance that needs to be improved upon.

Recruitment: Recruitment is the main HR process that interacts with people who are not yet employed members of staff. As such, it’s even more important to have a process that ensures fairness and transparency when it comes to decision-making. If candidates are aware of the process up front, they will be more likely to have a positive experience with your recruitment team.

Redundancy: While every business hopes to never have to use a redundancy process, if it is needed, it’s one that has strict rules around how it is enacted. Depending on the employment law in the country in which you operate, redundancies may be subject to a number of reviews and may involve external parties to help ensure it is compliant.

Partnerships: Instigating and developing partnerships with other businesses in similar or complementing sectors can be a key way to grow your business. Ensure that you make the most of these connections by following a process designed to keep your partners and stakeholders in the loop and thinking of you first whenever a relevant opportunity arises.

Policy review: A process loses its worth as soon as it stops being reviewed and updated. Regular policy reviews not only mean that errors are reduced and that your business stays compliant but that you can actively look for places where improvements and efficiencies can be made. This is key to a successful business process improvement strategy.

Procurement/tendering: Every business needs tools or software to run on. Documenting how you manage procurement or a tendering process will mean that you take all factors into consideration to achieve the right outcome for your business.

Strategy: Your business strategy is the way you make decisions over what to do (and what not to do) and shapes the overall direction of the company. It’s important to understand your core business goals, to review your targets at regular intervals, and to have a clear process for setting and defining these targets.

Competitor analysis: Especially in a crowded industry, it’s key to keep an eye on your competitors. Having a process you can refer to that allows you to conduct a thorough competitor analysis will allow you to spot opportunities for differentiated positioning and offerings.

Customer acquisition: The ways in which you acquire customers will be unique to your business. The strategies may be common, but what makes your business successful is the knowledge and expertise you have built up in this process. Your team members should know exactly how you do digital marketing, how you do a sales call, or how you approach events. Having a documented customer acquisition process is essential.

Publicity: Whatever your industry, you will need to promote your company to potential customers. This could be through events, mentions in the press, or more traditional advertising. However you do it, putting together an optimized process will make sure that you don’t miss out on any opportunities. If you’re outsourcing any aspects of this, make sure you have a process in place to check in with the third party.

Newsletter: A common strategy to capture and nurture your leads before they purchase from you is to have a process for compiling a newsletter. Your newsletter should reflect your business and the image you want to send out. Don’t be afraid to add some information about what your company has been up to behind the scenes—people love the personal detail.

Campaign: Whether this is a digital advertising campaign or one centered around print materials, there are commonalities between each campaign you carry out. The aim or desired result needs to be decided up front, as well as criteria such as the budget and the audience. Having clear metrics that you can track is key to monitoring the success of your campaigns.

Website: A business website is the modern-day shop window. Ensuring it is kept up-to-date and that it accurately reflects your target audience is an ongoing job. You don’t want any bottlenecks where the entire content and sales teams are waiting for a single web developer to update everything! Make sure your process for updating your website avoids these potential problems.