Managing Your business

I was speaking to a small business owner last week, who is interested in running his business remotely, but was concerned that he wouldn't be able to stay on top of issues while he is away.

When I enquired about being able to track orders and identify problem areas, he mentioned that he doesn't enter orders until he is ready to bill. All orders are generated using WORD. QuickBooks is only used for billing. Therefore he can't tell when orders encounter problems. This seems to be a common problem with small businesses. They utilize the software to make printing and modifying documents easier, as well as tracking financial transactions, but don't use the real power, which is the management of their business.

In this example, if every order was entered in QuickBooks, as well as the supplier purchase order, the whole transaction process would be captured. With this, you know exactly what was ordered, when it was due and can check status and delivery dates. The software can help you to manage your business.

In addition, when you use the software to rack all activities in the business, you now have a wealth of information, about your customers, your sales, your performance. All of this information may not be standard reporting from the software, but all of it is available to help you understand your business.

Understanding your business and making better decisions is what bring value to your expenditures on Information Technology, instead of just being an operational expense.