How to Maximize Your Time

Labels: organization, small business tips, time management, virtual phone system

Buried Under a Pile of Paperwork? Here Are 6 Simple Ways to Dig Yourself Out.

We’ve all been there. So busy that it seems you can’t keep up with the stacks of paperwork and emails that keep coming in. It’s easy to feel overwhelmed and helpless. Not to worry. There are actually several easy things you can do to unbury yourself, get organized and stay on top of your day to day communications so you don’t get bogged down again.

Schedule time to tackle your messages. According to a recent study conducted by the Institute of Psychiatry at the University of London, a person’s IQ drops 10 points when they're fielding constant emails, messages, and calls - the same loss you'd experience if you missed an entire night's sleep and more than twice the 4-point loss you'd have after smoking marijuana. Take back control of your sanity and your productivity by scheduling a set time each day during which you will tackle your mail, email and voicemail.

Separate your paperwork into three piles. Mark one pile “action items”, one “reference items” and the other “recycle”. Keep the things that require you to take action readily available, file away the items you may need for reference at some point and recycle anything you don’t need. (If you’re not sure about what you can and can’t discard, check with your attorney, accountant or financial advisor first.)

Create a good filing system. Figure out what works best for you and put it into action. I’d suggest starting with a list of categories, creating files for each and then placing them in alphabetic order so that they’re easy to access when needed.

Keep important documents separate. A while back we discussed the importance of preparing your business for a natural disaster. One of the best ways to do this is to keep your most critical documents like insurance policies and licenses in a safe place, preferably off-site, such as in a safe deposit box. Copies can be kept on-hand for reference.

Invest in a shredder. Small to medium sized shredders can be purchased at just about any office store and are relatively inexpensive. Use this to get rid of anything that contains confidential or identifying information. Try setting aside a specific time once a week to tackle your shredding so it doesn’t pile up and get out of hand.

Take charge of your junk mail. If you find yourself fielding endless piles of magazines you don’t read, catalogs you don’t need or other unnecessary paperwork, take charge. If it’s email, click “unsubscribe” at the bottom of the message to remove yourself from the distribution list. If it’s physical mail, unsubscribe to any subscriptions you don’t want anymore and get yourself on the National Do Not Mail List.

Putting these six simple things into action will help you dig out (and stay out) of that pile of paperwork, get organized and stay focused and productive.

Labels: organization, small business tips

Getting Organized for the New Year – Simple Ways to Add Hours to Your Day

Many people are super organized at the office – every paper in its place, every file stored neatly in a drawer. But when it comes to their homestead, well, that’s often the dirty little secret. The truth is there are many areas of home life that can cost you valuable time. Who hasn’t spent the better part of a morning trying to locate their keys? Finding ways to be organized at home as well as the office can save you minutes, even hours a day. So, in honor of ushering in a brand new year, let’s look at a few areas of your home that may be due for some positive changes.

Foyer – One of the simplest ways to organize your home is to place a small table right by your door with a basket or bowl on it. Every time you enter, toss your keys into this bowl or basket. Make it a habit and you’ll never lose your keys again. This is also a great place to keep any items you have to bring with you, say a file or your outgoing mail, or keep your to-do list so you don’t forget any important tasks. You’ll be surprised how much time you’ll save by having everything in one place.

Kitchen – Most of us are guilty of it – using our kitchen as a catch-all where everything is just sort of thrown about. This is fine, until you need to actually find something. Then you’re left sifting through piles and drawers and cupboards, wasting a ton of time. This can easily be eliminated by simply designating specific locations for specific items. Pick one drawer in which you’ll keep your scissors, tape, pens and paper; another for small everyday tools, etc. The hardest part is training everyone in the house to stick to this strategy, but once it’s in place you’ll never have to go searching again.

Home Office – Whether you work there exclusively or just use it as a space to catch up on your overflow, keeping organized here is critical. Simple desktop organizers can do wonders for keeping track of things like stamps, paperclips, pens and envelopes. Use separate files to keep track of bills that are due and those that have been paid, and file important documents away in a drawer as soon as you’re done using them.

It takes discipline, but making a few simple changes at home can have a tremendous impact on your overall productivity. By staying organized, you’ll always know where to find whatever you need, whenever you need it and can spend the valuable time you would have otherwise wasted chasing your tail doing something more important, like running your business. Here’s to a more organized 2012!

Labels: organization, small business tips

Organize Business Receipts: How to Create a Simple Filing System to Keep All Your Business Receipts Organized

There are many reasons to keep your business receipts organized and ready at hand, from tax audits to insurance claims and product warranty issues. The problem is coming up with a simple and effective system that’s easy to maintain, so that you don’t just end up cramming them all into your pocket to be dealt with on some ‘deferred’ date.

There can be different ways to arrive at the same end. The method I’ll be sharing with you today is an old secret that has passed down in my family from generation to generation (well, to be more precise, I’ve learned it from my girlfriend, who took it from her ex... so 'stolen secret' and 'extended family' might be more appropriate). What's awesome is it's cheap, simple, and effective.

At the end of this tutorial, you’ll have all those loose receipts housed in a single binder that spans a full tax-year. So let's get down to it!

What you’ll need:

• A sturdy 4" D-ring binder ($12 - $21 at Office Depot)
• A set of tabbed dividers with an index page ($3 - $8.50 from Avery or Office Depot)
• A few 8.5” x 11” transparency films (Optional. Preferably compatible with your printer. Inkjet $17.50/20 sheets at B&H)
• Plain 8.5" x 11" paper sheets (preferably recycled)
• A stapler with staples
• A three hole puncher

What you’ll do:

1. Separate bills from other receipts.

   Your bills are expenses that occur on a regular basis and usually carry a statement. These include Electricity, Internet Service, Phone/Cellular, Rent, Property Tax, etc.

   Other expenses consist of purchases made on an as-needed basis: food, equipment, supplies, etc.

   It’s a good idea to separate the two for easy reference down the road (see below)

2. Organize your receipts.

   It hurts, it burns, it’s terrifying—but you’ll have to face this task sooner or later, so might as well get it out of the way right now.

   Don’t skim on it either, least you’ll have to redo the work all over again. Dedicate ample time. Crank up your favorite music. Order some take out. Perhaps invite a friend or a colleague to join you—whatever it takes to put yourself in a good space and make the experience less painful.

   Once you’re ready, start going over the receipts and separating them by categories and dates. Your categories can be general at this point, like ‘Vehicle’ or ‘Computer’, and you’ll probably start getting a better sense of the categories you’ll end up having as you move along.

   Once that’s finished, look over the groups of receipts you’re left with and ask yourself if some categories can be merged, and others re-categorized more accurately (for instance, ‘Vehicle’ and ‘Gas’ might go under the broader ‘Transportation’, and Computer and Printer might go under ‘Electronics’ or ‘Equipment’).

   How broad or narrow each of your categories should be will depend on the nature of your business. For instance, if you own an IT company that relies heavily on electronics, you might want to break ‘Electronics’ further down and be more specific, as opposed to someone who runs a trade, for instance, and only uses one computer for database. He, on the other hand, might find Transportation a bit too broad (etc).

   Ultimately, you’ll have to exercise personal judgment. The goal is to be able to think of something and know exactly where you’d look to find it.

3. Prep your index page and tabbed dividers.

   Now that you’ve honed in on your categories, it’s time to put together your index page and tabbed dividers. The index page gives you an overview of your entire binder, so you could quickly run a finger down and find whatever you need. Think of it as the table of contents in a book. The dividers separate the different sections. Think of them as the chapters.

   Avery sells different-sized sets, from as little as 5 tabs to as many as 32. I find 12-15 a good number. More, and the index page starts feeling a bit cluttered and heavy on the eyes. (I’d just as soon use two shorter sets than a long one, but this might be a personal preference)

   If you’ve come up with a lot of categories, consider putting your regular bills on one set, and all other expenses on another. This will keep the presentation cleaner and enable easy reference. Again, play around until you find a setup you feel comfortable with.

4. Label the index page.

   Some index pages come with pre-printed categories, but I find this can be limiting and suggest you buy blank ones and enter your own titles. This will ensure they're best tailored to your needs.

   Next, instead of writing directly on the index page, consider using a transparency film. This will give you the flexibility to make changes in the future or to repurpose the entire tab set and index page down the road. On the other hand, should you mark the index page and later on wish to make some changes, your only remedy would be whiteout or buying a new set.

   The actual labeling can be done by hand or printed out. I find printing gives a cleaner look. If you decide to use a transparency sheet, look for a brand that’s compatible with your printer.

5. Do the same for your bills statements.

   Here the matter is even simpler as you need not fuss with categories. Simply enter a description of the bills on the index page. When you proceed to file the appropriate statements under each section, you’ll have one or two statement per month at the most (depending if it’s monthly, bi-weekly, quarterly, etc

6. Putting it all together.

   Now comes the fun part (well, fun considering what we’re doing). With your receipts organized according to categories and dates, and with your binder labeled, we can finally start filing the receipts.

   Starting with the first category, take a sheet of blank or recycled A1 paper, three-hole punch it, write the corresponding month at the top (i.e. January), and staple the receipts to one side of the paper (the blank side, if using recycled sheets). Keep it neat and don’t overcrowd the page. Four per sheet is a good number; two if the receipts are long. If there are more receipts for a given month, start another page.

   Now, depending on your patience and the volume of your receipts, you can elect to organize them in an ascending order within each month, or simply group them with no internal order.

   Going this extra step will obviously make future reference easier, but it would also require more of your time right now. I’d say it’s only really necessary when you have a lot of receipts for a given month under a category (say, more than two pages). But again, you need to find your own comfort level.

   Once you have finished attaching all the receipts and filing them under the appropriate category, make sure you add enough blank sheets of paper for the coming months (one for each month), and insert a few more at the back of the binder for quick access should you need them.

7. What to do if you’ve got multiple categories on a single receipt?

   To the best of your ability, try to keep your filing system in mind while shopping and to separate purchases on different bills. It becomes intuitive as you grow more accustomed to your system.

   However, at times you’ll still run into this situation, and you can choose one of two options.

   •The simplest and most organized way is to make a photocopy of the relevant receipt and file a copy under both section, highlighting the relevant item.

   • The other (somewhat more involved) option is to file the receipt under one of the sections, and make a note under the other with reference to the item and section the receipt was filed under.

Conclusion:

So now you have an organized binder housing all your business receipts and expenses that’s easy to maintain and refer to. The hard part was putting it all together. Going forward, if you just keep updating it on a regular basis—every day, or at least once a week—with just a little bit of discipline, you’ll never have to suffer rampant receipts ever again.

Next tax season—or if your printer suddenly breaks down—instead of running around like a headless chicken shouting “Where is it?! Where is it?!” you’ll simply walk over to your desk cool as a cucumber, pick up your neat new binder, and hand it over to your accountant (or pull out the receipt for your printer and head over to the local Office Depot).

Now that’s classy!

Labels: avery, binder, filing system, organization, organize business receipts, prepare for tax season, table of contents dividers, taxes, transparency film

4 Ways a Virtual Phone System Can Boost Productivity in Your Business

Running a small business can be hectic: wearing different hats, juggling different tasks, staying on the nose while keeping ahead of the ball... this might sound like fun if you’re part of a circus troupe, but we’re talking serious business here!

Dealing with phone calls amongst all this hustle and bustle can be quite a challenge.

If you’re like many other one-man-band-ers who’ve been delaying a proper solution for a while, your system of managing all the scheduled calls, notes, and follow-ups is probably comprised mostly of sticky-pads and paper clips.

Now, you can keep on juggling all you want, but if your hands get tired or if you feel like taking a break, come on out and sniff the 21st century air. You’ll find there’s a much better solution in town that’s been putting that old circus act out to lunch.

Organization

A small business PBX keeps all your client information in one place. Call-backs, requests, comments—everything stored conveniently, updated automatically, and accessible by the entire team.

Moreover, each designated department views their own call records, so there can be no confusion or stepping over each other’s toes. Even if it’s just you and your partner—that’s four toes already...

Flexibility

Perhaps the best part of a virtual PBX is that it’s truly freedom personified. Since everything is up in the cloud, you can work anytime, anywhere, and on any device (to learn more about what makes virtual so awesome, check out 'Walking on Clouds--the Freedom of Going Virtual'). You’re no longer tied to the office, or even to your own computer.

They call it running a small business for a reason—and since you’re always up and about, the less hardware you have to carry around, the easier your life will be.

Efficiency

One of the greatest challenges faced by any small business is scarcity of resources—from supplies to personnel, there never seems to be enough of anything to go around—and that’s why managing them effectively is so critical.

A PBX system lets you designate departments and use your call tree to route calls simultaneously to the entire team, so that the first person to become available can answer the next caller. Making conference calls also becomes easier than ever as you need only dial a single number to reach a designated cluster of people.

IVR (Interactive Voice Response), which is a standard component in any PBX system worth its salt, can answer many common queries and provide useful information before the caller ever reaches a live agent. This takes a significant load off of your already overwhelmed staff. Some system providers, like Synclio for instance, even offer a Live Answer service for a small additional fee. This is especially useful if you’re running a small operation, as by letting their trained staff handle the few callers that still get through the IVR strainer you'll be freeing your own team to deal with a gazillion of other daily tasks.

It’s your business, reinvented.

Cost savings

It must be clear by now why a virtual PBX is infinitely cheaper than—and superior to—any physical counterpart (not sure? Try reading our '5 Reasons Virtual Systems are Taking Over the Physical World'), but what you may not realize is that, in many cases, it’s even cheaper than having no system at all!

Here’s why:

If you’re using multiple landlines or cell-phones, things can get pricey—fast. For a single low monthly fee, a virtual PBX usually gives you a local or 1 800 number and an unlimited set of extensions.

This means that both you and your customers can stop running into international calling charges whenever you’re dealing outside the province, and that you no longer need multiple landlines to accommodate your personnel—simply squeeze all the juice out of that single landline you already own by dressing it with all the extensions you’ll ever need!

The availability of unlimited extensions is also a great prospect for the future, as it can accommodate your business as it grows without running into any significant growth pains.

For a detailed discussion of what makes virtual PBX so cost effective check out 'A Fortune 500 Customer Calling Experience that Won't Cost your Company a Fortune', and for an overview of 1- 800 numbers and their benefits, try 'Advantages of an 800 Number for Your Business'.

If you haven’t made a switch already, no time is better than the present to treat yourself to a brand new phone system. Quit the act and get in on the action—here's to leaving the old circus days behind!

Labels: business, cost saving, efficiency, flexibility, organization, productivity, technology, toll-free, virtual PBX, virtual phone