Julia Langkraehr’s Blog

How an operating system helped our business: guest post

In the second of our monthly guest posts, Jane Wheeler,  from our clients Hine Legal, describes how introducing an operating system into their business has helped them focus on their priorities and solve issues facing them.

Hine Legal is a specialist employment law firm.

It was set up by Nick Hine in 2011.  Nick’s vision was to provide practical, user-friendly employment law advice for businesses and individuals.  The firm currently has 7 employment lawyers and 2 support staff.

It advises on a range of employment matters: for businesses, it advises on all issues arising in the lifecycle of the employment relationship (so, drafting new employment contracts, advising on difficult matters in the workplace – such as sickness and poor performance – helping businesses handle employment claims and providing practical training for managers and HR to equip them to deal more confidently with matters in the workplace when they arise).

For individuals (typically senior executives and board level individuals) Hine Legal advises on navigating tricky situations in the workplace.

Logo for Hine Legal operating system blog

From the beginning, Nick has always been very strong at “financial hygiene” and ensuring that the business is run prudently and commercially.

The systems and processes of the business have been less rigorous.  Nick (in common with many business-owners) found himself over time doing all aspects involved in running the firm, from managing the finances, to dealing with operations to overseeing sales and marketing.

With that in mind, Nick decided that introducing an operating system that could help future-proof the business was the answer: improve its systems, enable the firm to achieve growth and free up some time for himself to get involved in those aspects of the firm that he enjoys most.

Discovering EOS

This is when we came across EOS!  We were attracted by its simple tools.

In particular, the scorecard sets out a series of straightforward metrics by which we measure the business on a weekly basis, and we can see quickly and easily whether the key metrics are on track or off track.  We can then prioritise what to do about them.

The weekly Level 10 meetings for the whole company are now very important to us.  The Level 10 meetings felt a little formulaic and stilted at first.  We could see that the team was uncomfortable at first.

I was concerned that, with the strict agenda of the Level 10, we would lose some of the emotional or people element which is important to us as a team – and especially as a team of employment lawyers.

Read: How to run an effective meeting

14 months on, these meetings have become a very natural part of running the business.  They  enable us to come together as a team, update each other in a time-effective manner on key issues for the business and solve any issues as a team.

Running our business using EOS has enabled us to be more focused.

We regularly get approached to speak at events and to take on new projects, and EOS has helped us “shut out some of the noise” and filter these opportunities more effectively, by focusing on our core strengths and the priorities (the Rocks) for the quarter.

Julia, our facilitator, has been great too – holding us accountable and helping us to work together as a healthier and more open leadership team.

If you’d like to learn more about the benefits of introducing an operating system such as EOS in your business, contact us now.