Spring Cleaning At Work?

Spring cleaning has long been associated with the home. After being stuck inside all winter, we fling open our windows, grab a mop, and begin to scrub, clean and reorganize our homes from top to bottom! The tradition of spring cleaning has many documented roots; some were religious, others cultural and others simply practical. However, Spring Cleaning should not end at home. Business owners and Business Leaders need to Spring Clean as well. Not necessarily with a mop; but a spring cleaning all the same. Here is my list of Business Spring Cleaning:

Document Clean-up Most offices have some level of "paper build up." Despite our electronic age, we are still inundated with paper. It doesn't take long for an office to go from the picture of organization, to a "snowstorm" of paper. So, as the snow melts; take 15-20 minutes, once or twice a week to dig through a pile. Sort the pile into three smaller piles: Shred/Throw Away, Scan (keep in electronic format then shred/throw); and Keep in Paper Format. Put the paper in it's new respective place and move on! When talking to clients about cleaning out paper, I inevitably get asked about tax documents. I am not a tax expert, however, I have been told by a couple of CPA's that keeping electronic copies of receipts and documents is perfectly acceptable. I have found a great resource via a local CPA firm, that you may want to check out: Record Retention Guide. I also recommend talking to your CPA to receive his or her feedback.

Goal Clean Up Back in November or December, you sat down and developed your 2014 Goals. At times, we tend to etch our goals in stone. Instead, we need to review, update and change our goals on a regular basis. Spring doesn't only represent the beginning of warmer weather, but the beginning of the second quarter. A great time to evaluate, and "clean up" your goals Start by getting a status report. Are you on target? Have things started the way you thought they would? Are there goals you thought you would take all year to complete, but are already done? Once you have your status report, you need to look at the whys? Why are you on target? Why are you not on target? Why have you not been able to start a goal? The "whys" empower Spring Cleaning. The "why" lets you make decisions on changes you need to make; the "goal cleanup" that needs to occur. Perhaps a goal hasn't been started because it sounded good in November, but now proves to be off course for where you business is going; or an unexpected roadblock has occurred.  You may need to remove a goal, change it, and even add new ones. Don't stop at the goals themselves. Don't forget to look at the plans for goal achievement. Are there tactics that need to be added, changed or removed?

Your To-Do List Whether written down, kept on your phone, or in your head, every one has some sort of To-Do list. We put things on the list, check things off when they are done, move things from one list to another...and it feels like the list will never be completed! Spring is a great time to "refresh" the list - and perhaps clean it out. If your list is not written down, that is a good place to start. Write it down! In order to truly be able to clean up your To-Do list, you need to be able to visually review it. Once on paper, reorganize it into three categories: Must do/keep, Must get someone else to do, Just get rid of. There are bound to be things that you can give to someone else to to do. Do it now! Start with the things that can be delegated without training someone to do the task. Then move on to the things that may need some training. Now, look at the things that have been "lingering" and are no longer important, or a priority. Take them off the list. Once you have your updated To-Do list, go back and look at your goal clean up - make sure that any new action items from this are added to your To-Do list. Then, finally, think about starting to use some online management system of your To-Do List. This eliminates the little pieces of paper that are floating around the office and can allow for better delegation and project management. Some great resources are Asana, Trello and Wunderlist. All have free basic features, and smart phone apps, making list management on the run easy.

Your Finances Hopefully you, or someone you have hired, is balancing your business accounts on a monthly basis. If not, this is step one! After the checkbook is in order, it is time to dig deeper and look at some financial reports. Take a look at your Profit and Loss Statement - how does it look? Is spending up from last year at this time? Lower? Is income up or down? Does the spending look right? For example, does payroll expense look too high? You may be paying more overtime than you thought. Or, does it seem like the office trip you just took is missing from the expenses? Next, look at your Balance Sheet. While many of us don't use this report often, many CPA's, banking professionals and other financial gurus remind us that this is the single most important financial report. You can have a great Profit and Loss, but a horrible Balance Sheet, questioning the viability of your business! Take some time and look it over. Make sure that the numbers make sense. If they don't, ask for a professional to help "decode" them. Finally, look at your Accounts Payable and Receivable - how much is owed to you? Do you have a plan in place to collect those old lingering invoices? Are your payables higher than receivables? That could cause some challenges! It is my experience that business owners keep this type of analysis to the end of the year - but this can be too late. You may forget things. Clean up issues now and then create a habit of doing it monthly.

So, there you have it! A few basic steps to help you spring clean your business!