How to Systematize Any Business—Even If You’re Drowning in Chaos

July 20, 2025
Blog, Business Operations
2 min read
Outdoor natural nightlight photo of Dr Connor Robertson smiling

Most business owners I speak with don’t need more ideas.
They don’t need another book, course, or flashy CRM.
They need one thing: a system.

I’m Dr. Connor Robertson, and I’ve helped founders across multiple industries, from short-term rentals and digital agencies to physical service companies, install the missing infrastructure that turns chaos into consistency.

What surprises most people?
It’s not hard to systematize your business.
But it does require discipline, documentation, and a mindset shift.

Let me walk you through the exact process I use with my private consulting clients step-by-step.

Step 1: Start with Recurring Activities

If a task happens more than twice, it’s eligible for systemization.

The first step is identifying the repeatable actions in your business. Here are common examples I see:

  • Client onboarding
  • Proposal creation
  • Weekly reporting
  • Payroll processing
  • Ad campaign launches
  • Lead qualification and routing

Start by making a simple list. You don’t need fancy tools. Just name the top 10 things your team (or you) does every single week.

Step 2: Document It Once

The best systems start as screen recordings.

Don’t wait until it’s perfect. Just record yourself doing the task. Walk through every click, step, and decision. Then hand it to an assistant or team member to transcribe it into a basic SOP.

Now you’ve got a repeatable process and the first brick in your operational foundation.

Step 3: Delegate with Accountability

Systems mean nothing without accountability.

That’s why I teach teams to assign ownership. Every recurring process should have a single responsible person.
They’re not just doing the task. They’re improving it.

We install KPIs, quality checks, and regular reviews to make sure it’s working and evolving.

Step 4: Track Exceptions, Then Refine

This is where most businesses fail.

You build a system. Something breaks. You blame the system and go back to chaos.

Not in my world.

We treat every exception as data. Why didn’t it work? What changed? What nuance did we miss?

Over time, the system becomes airtight, and that’s when scale gets fun.

Real Estate and Operational Leverage

In many businesses I support, especially in real estate-adjacent verticals like property management, vacation rentals, or facility services, operations fall apart because there’s no underlying documentation.

People rely on tribal knowledge.
And when one person leaves, the entire thing crumbles.

If you want your business to grow past $1M or $3M or even $10M, you must create a playbook that anyone can follow.

This is especially true in real estate-related businesses where things move fast, regulations shift, and property turnover is high. Without systems, mistakes become expensive fast.

Marketing Systems Work the Same Way

A huge part of my work is helping companies move from “random acts of marketing” to actual systems:

  • Lead generation with trackable ROI
  • Automated nurture sequences
  • Pipeline visibility
  • Scheduled reviews

Once it’s documented, assigned, and tracked, marketing becomes predictable.
And when marketing is predictable, revenue follows.

Final Thoughts from Dr. Connor Robertson

The most successful business owners I know didn’t just “grind harder.”
They got out of chaos by building the structure they should have had from day one.

Systematization is how you buy back your time.
It’s how you build a company that runs without you.
And it’s how you scale without burning out.

If you want help figuring out where to start, keep reading. This is what I do.

—
Written by Dr. Connor Robertson

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