– Yvonne Tuttle, Team Management Systems, Inc.

How efficiently are you running your contracting business? The more efficient and productive you can make your company, the greater profit you will realize at year-end.

Are your employees putting in 40-hour work weeks? Is your middle management able to curtail some of the previously needed overtime? Are you able to occasionally sneak out of the office to hit the greens without having a panic attack? Are your customers happy and your competitors envious?

Is everyone in the office stressed out about too much work and not enough time in the day? Are the files taking up a big portion of your precious office space? Do you feel you can’t afford to take a day off from work? Does it seem that everyone around you is working hard, and yet things are still not getting done in a timely manner? Is customer satisfaction waning?

Inefficiency wastes not only time, but also money.

In many HVAC/R businesses, countless hours are being wasted daily. Often the heart of the business is in the files. Those same files are demanding on the company space and your employees’ time. How much time is spent filing, re-filing and retrieving files? This old method of doing business is extremely counterproductive and inefficient. Getting rid of the files altogether or simply reducing them and relying on a computer system is a no-brainer. Without the mountains of files, you will find that the time (man hours to do a job) and space savings will lower your operational costs, thereby saving money.

If your office has moved into the technology age and left the paper trail behind, you have taken a step in the right direction. Now it is time to examine your computer system to see if it is actually the best industry-specific system you can have in today’s market. If you are running separate computers for different tasks or various software programs, you are losing productivity. This loss of productivity directly affects your bottom line.

Take control of the workflow

In order to achieve greater efficiency in the workplace you must take control of your workflow. Once you are able to control your workflow, your employees will work faster and smarter. You will literally stretch the day — not by increasing the working hours, but by improving the efficiency.

A specifically designed computer system that allows multi-tasking and shared data will allow your employees to work in cooperation. No extra time will be spent on double entry of items. Since the data is fully shared by all computer users, employees are able to find their answers with the touch of a button. Your employees will be able to work effortlessly, which encourages cooperation, and simplifies coordination.

The right computer system is efficient today, and provides options for the future

With your employees working faster and smarter, you will gain the competitive edge. By cutting costs and increasing efficiency you will raise your profit margin. However, you must always be looking a few paces down the road.

In the near future, you may want to explore the option of extending the resources beyond your office environment with remote employees. Extending the workspace allows people to be able to work wherever and whenever they want. This is not just a plus for the employee, but also cuts down on overhead for the company. If your technicians prefer to check their scheduled calls from home before heading out for their first job, your system should be able to connect them to office resources. This cuts down on man hours, increases efficiency and should result in a quicker response time for your customers.

Technology should pay for itself. Productivity with less effort allows businesses to grow, deliver higher quality services and compete in today’s market. It’s all about the bottom line — and “time’s-a-wastin’.”

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