photo by hacky

There are a bunch of unhappy people out there.  And the really scary part of that equation is that most of them are your employees (well maybe not your employees, but someone’s employees).

Several recent studies have shown that over 50% of employees are unhappy with their job and would consider leaving if they got the chance!  Imagine 50% of your employees leaving you next month…I imagine that would make you unhappy as well.

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A lot of people struggle with establishing processes for their businesses.  It feels bureaucratic, stifling and it can be some serious work up front to get things documented and figured out.

However it’s not rocket science…by any stretch of the imagination.

The trick, assuming that you’re a business that’s already up and running is that you are already following a process.  You may not be following it consistently, you may not have a great handle on all of the components (i.e. it’s not written anywhere) but in order to get the work done you are following certain steps to go from start to finished.

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photo by ed ludwick 

The following is a guest post by Mike Vande Brake, partner at Vande Brake and Baker CPAs.

It’s nearly time to begin making those New Year’s resolutions, the wishful thoughts borne out of our guilt for the things we typically let slip. Lose weight. Exercise more. Eat fewer sweets. You get the idea.

We can all come up with something we should be doing or at least something we ought to do better. Sometimes these things are trivial, and if we don’t keep our resolution, the impact is negligible.

But there are those rare occasions when a New Year’s resolution can completely change the course of your life.

Even in our business lives, we set goals: I will not avoid the person in the next cubicle but will, instead, be friendly and open to conversation even though my inbox is a mile high.

Yet for many business owners, particularly new ones, the day-to-day trials of working with clients, answering phone calls, or completing the day’s task list can be overwhelming. The thought of setting a goal other than “Be home by 5:30 p.m. one day a week” is a pipe dream.

There is one goal, though, that may make all of your dreams come true: organization

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Back in the early 90′s, there was a series of computer games called ‘The Incredible Machine“.  The games were a series of intricate puzzles that required you to create complicated, off the wall Rube Goldberg machines to solve simple tasks.

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I’ve talked to quite a few people lately that have recognized that they are the constraint for their business.

In order to make more money, based on the way they are currently working, they personally need to work more hours.  The problem with that approach is that they’re already working more than they’d like to be working, and generally it’s been that way for quite a while.

I hate to break it to them, but they actually have a JOB, not a business. 

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