Flow Archives - BOLLYWOOD SURKHIYAN

Powerful Tips for Home Offices That Will Drastically Increase Work Flow

If you work from home then you will probably be familiar with what a struggle it is constantly to remain productive and to get work done when you’re surrounded by distractions. When your work environment is the same as your home environment either all the time or sometimes, it’s far too easy to make excuses to pop to the kitchen or to pick up that tempting book lying on the coffee table and these things can actually destroy our productivity.

Another problem is that home offices are designed and maintained by us. There’s no boss telling us to keep our desk tidy and no HR team to advise us on the best posture or the best point in the room for enhancing productivity. Below are some fixes that can help you stay on task.

Paper Trays

Having papers everywhere is a problem that affects not just home workers but pretty much everyone else too. The first solution to this issue is to get paper trays which allow you to quickly and easily ‘dump’ your papers out the way so they at least aren’t making mess.

Here you’re going to have two trays. One will be your ‘working memory’ and one will be your ‘short term memory’. Anything that you’re done with but not ready to get rid of will go in your ‘short term memory’, whereas anything that you’re currently still working with or that you’ll be able to throw away later will go in your ‘working memory’. At a predefined time every day/week/month you’ll then sort through the trays and move anything from the short-term memory tray into a filing cabinet – your ‘long term memory’. This mimics the way the human brain stores information and it makes it much easier to keep on top of everything.

Portable Scanners

Portable scanners are scanners that can take paper through a feed in a similar manner to a printer. Some of these can even take multiple sheets of paper at once and this actually makes it much easier to quickly scan reams of documents, while OCR (Optical Character Recognition) software will automatically catalogue and organize them. This allows you to get rid of an awful lot of paper and to thereby create far less paper for yourself. Likewise you should of course go paperless with your bills, statements and everything else you can.

Desk Toys

If you do struggle with procrastination then a desk toy can go a long way to help. This can include things like small rakes and sand pits, or like cat’s cradles. The reason these work well is that they provide work for idle thumbs but aren’t nearly as engaging as a mobile phone. In other words, you can play with these little toys while your computer loads and not risk getting ‘sucked in’. They also add to that business feel and make your home office feel more like a real place of work.

Cash Flow – Want Some Tips?

You’re up and running but projects are taking longer than you expected. You’re running into problems that are chipping away at your finances. Customers aren’t paying as quickly as you thought they would. Expenses don’t stop and wait for you to have money. Opportunities to buy materials at an attractive price don’t wait until you have money. These and other issues affect your ability to keep yourself in growth mode. Here are three tips on where you can start having a positive affect on your cash flow.

1. Cash Cow. Looking at your operation, there’s something that is an entry-level product or something that you created in-house to streamline your own processes. Consider putting some emphasis on the quick products that can create a steady flow of income. A high-tech company had a test unit that field engineers took out into remote areas to test the strength of the product. No thought had been given to the marketability of that simple unit and it had the potential to generate sales in remote areas around the world. It was the most inexpensive item that the company built and had never been considered as a product. Another company had a little program that helped their own test engineers with their work. It was another unidentified product that could generate steady income. The owner of a small recruiting firm created a program to simplify his job. With very little effort, it could be used to manage any small business. The last time I saw him, he said that he had sold a number of the programs and made millions with them. It may not even be the business you’re in but there could be a steady income generator hiding in your operation.

2. Changes. This is not about bringing in more money. It’s about plugging leaks. My father was a General Contractor when I was a baby. The first and only project he ever had was a beautiful home in Marin County in Northern California. Dad had a partner – George. George was a customer pleaser. While Dad was out buying materials, George would be ripping out the bathroom because the homeowner realized they didn’t like the color of the floor to ceiling tile as much as they thought they would. Of course, that meant that the coordinating floor tiles had to go, too. George always promised there would be no charge for changes. The project made the cover of Better Homes & Gardens but it drove Dad and George into bankruptcy. If you were building a bridge between two cities you would have agreement on the specifications, completion date, and costs. If, when you were 90% done, the Mayors came to you and said they made a mistake and should have had one more lane in each direction, you could probably say, “No problem. We planned for future expansion in the design.” When the Mayors wanted assurance that you would still complete the job by the same deadline and for the same costs, you would discuss the increased time and money. You may not be building anything as big as a bridge but don’t let change requests eat up your cash.

3. Connections. Keeping your nose to the grindstone does a couple things. It wears you out and it prevents you from discovering information outside of your company that might have a significant effect on your operation. One small company struggling with cash flow issues didn’t have anyone available for networking. They brought in an operations management consultant whose marketing efforts were all about networking. As problems came up in conversation, the consultant had connections who had answers. Some zoning issues that created a safety problem for the employees had a surprising solution when the consultant mentioned the issue to a networking contact who was a commercial building contractor. The consultant knew an attorney who specialized in another area the company needed help with. A casual conversation between the consultant and a networking contact revealed a previously unidentified market for the customer’s product. All three of those happened over a two-day period as a result of the consultant’s ongoing networking efforts. It’s worth your time to stay connected to people outside of your company.

Conclusion: These kinds of solutions can be an ongoing benefit for your business with clear, concise communication of the problems that are restricting your cash flow. Keep your eye out for the kinds of opportunities you’ve seen here.

Business Plan For a Beauty Salon – Cash Flow Decisions

Creating a business plan for your beauty salon presents the perfect opportunity for you to create a functioning cash flow statement (sometimes called the statement of cash flows). This will allow you to make key decisions about cash flow going forward.

Creating the Cash Flow Statement

It is highly recommended to start with an Excel template or financial model example of some kind for your salon’s cash flow statement. It need not be an model specifically tailored towards a beauty salon, but should be for a similar business (i.e., one that makes revenues through services and product sales, pays rent for a location, etc) so that minimal customization is required. Starting with a template can save a great deal of time in the creation of the statement.

Three Sections of a Cash Flow Statement

This will describe cash inflows and outflows in three areas: operating activities, investing activities, and financing activities.

Operating activities include cash brought in from customers in the form of sales and cash paid out for operating expenses. This will generally represent the highest inflows and outflows on the cash flow statement and should result in a positive number each month for a profitable company.

Investing activities do not mean the company’s purchase of stocks or bonds (although this kind of rare activity would be included here). They are generally activities where the salon invests in itself. Whenever a capital purchase of an asset is made (equipment, leasehold improvements to the salon, furniture, etc.) the payments made will represent a cash outflow. If these assets are ever sold off, the money brought in will represent a cash inflow here. Generally, a functioning company will have negative cash flow in the investing area.

Financing activities are related to the funding of the company by investors and lenders. When funders put money into the company in the form of equity or debt capital, this represents a cash inflow here. When dividends are paid out, shares are bought back from equity investors, or lenders are paid back their loan principal, financing shows cash outflows. Note that paying interest on loans represents an operating activity in the United States.

Cash Reserves

By seeing how low the ending cash balance each quarter, month, or week drops to, you can determine what size cash reserves the company will need. Make sure that cash reserves cover all negative balances as well as at least thousands of dollars more as a cushion to prepare for cost overruns or revenue shortfalls.