By examining the postal operations manual, we can learn a thing or two about how to run a large organization with many small regional offices

The postal operations manual may seem like an odd place to look as a prototype of a great operations guide but it makes sense to look again.  Let’s put aside the jokes the perceptions of “going postal” for a moment and step back and see what this organization has accomplished.  Running almost entirely on the cost of those little stamps you buy, this vast international organization handles a volcano eruption of physical mail each day.  For the most part you never hear of any problems and that is because of a well prepared and enforced postal operations manual.

Most of us think of the post office in terms of the local office we use and the carrier who brings the mail. That is why when you are pondering how a very large franchise operation might run, the postal operations manual could be a classic in how to franchise a business.

Each post office can be seen as a franchise of a much larger organization. And yet from office to office and city to city, there is a uniformity of service and in how postal workers look and perform. That is the result of good management from the top right down to the those humble carriers who avoid your dog each week.  And it is the result of that postal operations manual that could easily be adapted to transform into a franchise operating manual with very few modifications.

Good ideas are in the postal operations manual but its not the perfect franchising template.

Discipline and well defined expectations are part of why the postal operations manual is such a great management tool.  Both of those high minded values would fit in your franchising organization as well.  If you are preparing a franchise operating manual for your business, spell out the expectations in clear English along with the expectation that a strong sense of discipline will be used at the franchise level to enforce uniformity in how your franchises are perceived by the public.

Franchise managers are capable of having that kind of discipline. Franchise managers are often successful small business people with plenty of drive, business savvy and discipline that they bring to you when they filled out that franchise application and paid to own a franchise of your business.  So don’t be afraid to present them with a document that has the same high standards of the postal operations manual.  They can take it.

However, there is some wiggle room in making your franchise operations manual unique.  The commission of the postal service as reflected in the postal operations manual is not the same as the objective of a business franchise operations.  You are out to make money and lots of it.  You are out to take over a market from stiff competition and one way to do that is to foster a corporate culture of innovation mixed with compliance.

These may not be strong values you see in the postal operations manual. If you can take a look at that document, you will see an excellent template for running a huge multi-national franchise operation.  Learn well those lessons from the postal operations manual.  But do not let that template take away the sense of cooperative management, entrepreneurship and innovation that you want in your franchise managers.  After all, nobody is going to “go postal” in your franchise chain. Instead they should pour that energy into making piles and piles of money for you and for their franchise as well.