WATCH: VBP Family Day 2018

WATCH: VBP Family Day 2018

by | Jun 25, 2018 | VBP Culture, Working at VBP

“Family is not an important thing. It’s everything.”

At VBP, we respect each other and embrace diversity. People genuinely care for one another. Our bond goes far beyond the typical “co-worker” relationship—we are more than just a team; we are a family.

Celebrating One World and Family Spirit

This year, we held our very first VBP Family Day. Everyone had the chance to bring their families and loved ones along. It was an amazing Sunday filled with fun activities. In the same day, we also celebrated Father’s Day. We prepared a special tribute to all dads present in the event. There were talent presentations from families–kids sang and dance with their parents. Such a precious sight!

The VBP Family Day is a celebration of one of our core values: One World and Family Spirit. As we always mention, in VBP, we treat each other like family so it is also important for us that our loved ones get a glimpse of who we are as a company.

We believe it is important that our loved ones also get the chance to connect with our business by knowing what we do and who we work with; as well as understand our culture in order to build trust and confidence that we belong in a company that does not only give us the opportunity to grow, but also values what’s important to their team.

See photos in our VBP Careers & Culture Facebook page. And the highlights from the VBP Family Day 2018 in the video below:

Client Data Protection: Why we use LastPass and why you should too

Client Data Protection: Why we use LastPass and why you should too

by | Jun 12, 2018 | Outsourcing

Online security is one of the major priorities in businesses today. Especially with us in the financial planning industry, this is crucial in protecting our processes since most of the data (if not all) we’re dealing with are confidential.

Passwords are one common way to lock in these important information. It’s everywhere—from mobile phone apps to bank accounts to e-mails and other forms of communication—that sometimes it’s too hard to keep track of them all. Can you even count how many password-protected accounts you have created since the time you signed up for your first e-mail address?

It certainly is a hassle trying to remember all the unique passwords you have created. In VBP, we use a password manager called LastPass. It’s a “vault” that stores all our account usernames and passwords for different websites and platforms. It keeps everything in one place.

What we should stop doing

Admit it or not, we are all guilty of having poor practices in managing passwords. One of which is using weak passwords which makes it so easy for hackers to guess correctly with simple password-cracking tools. We are also guilty of re-using passwords. Using the same password across different accounts is something a lot of people continue to do.

Another common habit is having a master list or sheet of login usernames and passwords that is shared to everyone, and even writing them down in sticky notes in the desktop. The list could go on but for us who are in the financial planning industry, prioritising password protection management is a sure means to stay away from technical hitches.

Why we use LastPass

Using a tool like LastPass saves us time from remembering and manually listing down all our passwords. It also helps us to avoid the poor habits in password management. We use LastPass for the following reasons:

  1. It allows us to share our username and password (and even in groups) when necessary, without exposing the actual codes and pins. When there are changes in passwords, it automatically updates the shared ones.
  2. It is IP restricted which means that the staff can only use their LastPass accounts from the office internet connection.
  3. The client is in full control, they can revoke access and sharing anytime.
  4. Bulletproofing against phishing attacks and keyloggers.
  5. It has layers upon layers of protection in place to secure your data. Everything stored in LastPass are encrypted with a master key that only you have access to. To further protect this, they also have multifactor authentication and anytime someone logs in from a new device or location, you will be notified for verification.

 

Business Process: Why is it so important when outsourcing?

Business Process: Why is it so important when outsourcing?

by | Jun 6, 2018 | Learning & Development Activities, Outsourcing

Learn the most important tips for letting go of tasks and delegating to your staff

Businesses create processes  to improve overall operational performance and increase workforce efficiencies. Processes  are very useful in all areas of an organisation but oftentimes, they are poorly planned and structured. This causes confusion when different employees need to go through a process of a specific area of the business and there is no flow of the process. As a result, accuracy and consistency is highly affected.

Workflow VS Business Process

Most financial planning firms have some form of workflows. A workflow basically represents the approach on what needs to happen (set of tasks) to complete a piece of work (often specific to a client like a review meeting).

Meanwhile, a business process teaches us how to do each task in the workflow. Business process documentation is the process of creating materials containing manuals (ours are all online) and step-by-step guides of completing tasks and processes and provide tips and checklist to follow to ensure a consistent outcome for completing a series of task in a workflow.

Both of these work together to make a more efficient and systematic business operation. On our experience, firms usually rely on a lot of assumed knowledge on how to do tasks when they hire a staff. Therefore, it takes a long time to get someone confident and independent in completing workflows (not to mention a lot of handholding).

How to document your business process?

In VBP, we follow a standard process in documentation:

  1. Complete Workbook. The workbook allows you to think about your business process and create an outline of the process.
  2. Create Flowchart. By creating a visual flowchart or a swim lane diagram, we get clarity on who’s responsible for each step of the process.
  3. Client Training. All training sessions will be recorded for future references and will show a step-by-step demonstration of how the process is being completed.
  4. Edit and Save Videos. All videos will be edited. VBP will remove all unnecessary parts of the training video and retain only the important parts that are relevant to the topic being discussed making it easier and faster to reference in the future.
  5. Create manuals. In addition to the videos, manuals will also be created for the CSRs to easily browse through the manual if there is a particular step they need to review.
  6. Upload Materials to the Intranet. All of the training materials including your templates, reference material, links, videos, and manuals will be in uploaded to one centralised location–the client intranet. This will be the main resource of your CSR when completing tasks for you.
  7. Client Sign Off. After all of these have been completed, a link to your intranet will be sent to you for you to review the content.

Once everything is documented a process should have 6 key elements:

 

How does process documentation benefit your business?

There are 5 main advantages of business process documentation:

  • Tasks are completed exactly how you need them to be completed.
  • If you need to take leave from work, someone else can cover for you and help with your tasks.
  • Easily share task instructions with colleagues and new hires.
  • It increases efficiency as it’s easier to keep track of the progress of a task/project and identify any blockages along the way.
  • It adds value to the business especially when you consider purchasing, as it will be easier to integrate new business into your documented processes. In the same way when you plan to sell your business, having a structured and well documented process can add significant value to potential purchaser.

Some tools we use for documentation include: Zoom to hold client training or meetings, Snagit to record all training sessions, Camtasia to edit videos, Screensteps to create manuals, Lucid Chart to create process flow charts and Google Sites to host client intranet.

When a workflow is properly documented with clear business processes, the main benefit is, it is much faster to get a new staff member up and running as they have more confidence around the work being done.

Whether you are considering outsourcing or wanting to scale your business with internal staff, this statement holds true “Customise the Advice, Sytemise the Process”.