[Denise McGill is back, with another smart guest post. Today, she wants to help you save some time in your day.]
How many productive hours are lost in a typical day due to lack of training, standardization or outdated materials? Utilizing time management and having the tools to be productive can cause fewer headaches for business owners and increase employee job satisfaction. Removing the roadblocks and frustrations that employees come across, makes them more efficient.
If you or an employee is spending longer than necessary to prepare correspondence or a spreadsheet for a meeting in the morning, then these five tips will increase performance and save time normally lost during the workday.
Create templates or master forms for email correspondence – This is a huge time saver whether you are a sole proprietor or a large corporation. For instance if you have a technical support department and find the same questions popping up over and over again, design a standard email response to answer those questions. Of course, you are free to tweak those emails as necessary, but a template gives a foundation to build on. A well thought out email response presents a standardized response, appears professional and eliminates spelling errors as well
Include an automatic email signature – Full contact information should be included with every email sent. You can easily utilize this function within your email software. Don’t make customers search for contact information.
Learn to use the software on your computer – Hours of productivity and time management can be lost in a day if you have employees that cannot adequately use the basic functions available on a spreadsheet or word document. Not knowing how to format or use basic formulas can have an employee laboring over a project needlessly and ultimately missing deadlines. If the budget is tight, have an internal employee teach the basics of the computer software your company uses – it is well worth the day spent to bring everyone up to speed.
Prepare job function manuals – Lose the tribal knowledge mentality. As employees leave the business, they take their knowledge with them. Job descriptions with step-by-step instructions on how to perform the job should be created so new employees can step right in without skipping a beat. Nothing is more frustrating to a new hire than winging it until they figure out their new job the hard way.
Delete or archive outdated material on the computer – Are there five versions of the same document on your computer – each with slight variations to them? Using outdated material can cause havoc internally and well as with customers. Be sure to archive or delete information that is no longer in use. It is also handy to use the “view header footer function” in your document to insert creation or revision dates on forms. This assures you are using the most current version of the document.
Standardized information, updated documents, and clearly defined job functions are key to a smooth running business.
About Denise:
Denise McGill is a freelance copywriter specializing in catalog product description, copy makeovers, web content, landing pages, promotional materials, articles and more. Visit her website at
http://mcgillcopywriting.com for more information on giving your business the competitive edge.
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