10 Productivity Tips to Help Small Business Entrepreneurs Save Time

Recent advancements in technology are changing how small enterprises think and implement their short and long-term business goals.

Challenges brought about by the pandemic has also helped businesses realize the need to diversify their product portfolio and exploit all the benefits that come with IoT. Incorporating modern technology adds value to products and services, and it’s also a tool for improving consistency and safety.

Engaging IT niche companies like Deloitte is strongly driving operational improvements and enhancing a peer-to-peer culture in small businesses. Other companies altogether are exploring niches in the industry to provide quick efficiency solutions to businesses.

These are the top 10 business strategies to help your business save time and turn over more profits.

1. Replacing Office Paperwork with E-signs

E-signs run programmable software that integrates well with the content management systems to allow your clients to sign documents legally. This process breaks the barrier of having to physically store the signed paperwork and instead store it in a database streamlining the business process for more efficiency.

Companies that offer e-sign solutions comply with stringent requirements such as the Uniform Electronic Transaction Act (UETA) to enable businesses to use electronic signatures and documents with the same authority as paper documents.

Using e-signs has many benefits, among them, less paperwork, easy retrieval of documents, valuation of the company, and increased investor confidence.

2. Reduce the Frequency of Board Meetings

Board meetings are great, as they help your staff to go over business strategies and highlight the successes and the lessons of failure. But they can also be a way to waste valuable time and money. Consider integrating project management software in your business operations so that employees can still collaborate on a project without necessarily having to meet.

Periodically training your staff is a great way to ensure they are competent enough to make business decisions on their own, without the need to call for regular meetings.

3. Prioritize your Most Urgent Business Needs

While starting small businesses have to reach the short-term goals first while focusing on the long-term ones. And it all starts with prioritizing the small daily tasks, slowly getting you closer to reaching your milestones.

Following a strict schedule, team members should focus on their tasks, meeting the critical needs of a business while keeping their focus on the collective goal of the company. A schedule saves you a lot of valuable time.

4. Account for Everyone’s Time

Quantifying staff’s activities over time helps you to determine how much value you are receiving in a given time frame. It all starts with assigning your employees with specific tasks for the day, monitoring those who meet deadlines while comparing with those who do more within the available time.

But this is not meant to flush out the lazy employees, but rather, to compare how well they perform as individuals vs. how they fair as a team.

5. Automate Workplace Tasks

Automation helps small businesses save on time and paperwork space. If you can’t afford to hire additional employees to implement the automation process, consider outsourcing. Dedicated third-party companies can help you through content creation, SEO, web design, and more while you focus on your business goals.

6. Consider Hybrid Cloud Solutions.

Every year, hundreds of businesses experience downtime, losing a lot of data. Network downtime can cost your business a lot of time and money, and even some valuable customers. Hybrid cloud solutions combine both on-site IT infrastructures with cloud solutions to ensure that core activities are ever available online.

Hybrid cloud solutions also enhance the flexibility of your business so that any employee with access to the system can work remotely. You also save a lot in office space use, as you don’t need to store more dedicated servers in your IT room.

7. Identify other Related Market Niches.

Small businesses don’t have the luxury of conducting extensive research into their industry. But that doesn’t mean you are locked out of all markets if your current business model doesn’t turnover significant profits.

You can try brainstorming among your team to identify other niche markets you might explore using the available resources. One main advantage of exploring a niche that has a ready market is the efficiency that comes with it, time savings doing what you’re good at, and the ready profits.

8. Delegate Tasks

Although it comes with an element of risk, it boosts the staff confidence at work. Identify employees who excel in a particular field, and have a proven track record of completing tasks on time. Allowing your employees to advance their leadership skills while gaining new skills has invaluable benefits to the growth of your business.

9. Practice Positive Reinforcement

Giving rewards, constructive criticism, or even a pat on the back help your team to stay motivated. Incentives such as a free holiday can make the staff scale up their productivity and the quality of deliverables, helping your business to meet the set goals.

10. Set Realistic Goals

While it’s easy to become over-ambitious starting in a niche market, you have to break down your long-term goals into small deliverables that the staff can implement.

Clarify the expectations, and the schedule, with clear directions to your employees and supervisors. Clarity will help your team to have a clear focus, setting achievable personal goals.

Final Thoughts

It is common for small businesses to have unclear goals or a vague approach to evaluating efficiency at the workplace while starting. Ultimately, you will never go wrong with technology, as it is sure to streamline activities like record keeping, performance evaluations, and team networking at the workplace.