At the height of the COVID-19 crisis, a record-breaking 3.28 million American workers found themselves filing for unemployment benefits as businesses everywhere closed shops. The shock waves sent by the pandemic affected a lot of big industries, including hospitality, travel, construction, manufacturing, restaurants, and bars. Accordingly, businesses that are still in operation must employ certain strategies to remain in business, such as making changes in their workforce and in the ways they operate daily.
Speaking on changes in operations, businesses now have to double down on their efforts to ensure smooth day-to-day functions if they don’t want to get drowned by the competition. As COVID-19’s ill effects are pretty much felt worldwide, the already competitive business realm now becomes a cut-throat industry where only the fittest would survive.
Here are five easy hacks to ensure that your business operations are buttery-smooth each day:
- Keep your vehicles and machines in great condition. If your business relies extensively on your service or delivery vehicles and some manufacturing machines, then it’s only logical to ensure that they are in perfect condition. For example, if you own a Subaru vehicle that you use to conduct client meetings and other business-related matters, you should have it regularly serviced by a qualified mechanic or service shop. Among other maintenance tasks, a Subaru brake replacement, engine check, and electrical system maintenance are needed to ensure the roadworthiness of the vehicle. The same care and attention should also be given to the machines that you use daily.
- Consider investing in digital business integration. Today’s clients are increasingly gearing towards doing business digitally, especially in light of the COVID-19 pandemic in which social distancing has become the norm. With this in mind, you have to seriously consider integrating your manual business operations with digital technology like mobile apps, online collaborations (using Zoom, Skype, and other similar tools), and social media presence. With these digital technologies fully and seamlessly fused with your manual operations, you can make processes smoother and possible even remotely.
- Automate every possible repetitive process. Some processes are best handled by humans and then some would be more cost- and time-efficient when taken care of by robots, digital assistants, and similar tech tools. It can be as simple as using a mobile app to send digital invoices to clients or pay stubs to employees. You can also automate bank payments for your monthly utility bills or inventory purchases. The key is to use automation in a way that would allow you to use your physical and human resources more efficiently by letting modern technology take care of the menial tasks.
- Keep meetings and distractions to a minimum. You don’t have to hold staff meetings every week or make each meeting last for hours when one hour would do. Remember that every minute wasted is a dollar or more wasted in profits, so you have to be very efficient and systematic with the way you hold your regular face to face or digital interactions. By keeping your meetings short and sweet, you’ll have plenty of time to allocate to more productive things to drive productivity and profits up.
- Get a task management software. As a business owner or manager, you have to always be on top of your daily operations. One simple way to achieve a high level of situational and operational awareness about your business is to use task management software such as Trello. Such a tool will allow you to assign tasks, monitor their progress, and collaborate with key movers in your business. This way, your daily operations will run smoothly and tasks will be completed more easily.
With these tips to serve as your guide, achieving efficiency in your daily business operations will be a walk in the park.
