Merlin’s weekly podcast with Dan Benjamin. We talk about creativity, independence, and making things you love.
Business management system for a start-up?
thatcanadiangirl | Dec 16 2006
My husband and I have started our own business less than 6 months ago, as an aside to our day jobs. We expected to get some contracts and be relatively busy, but the response has been unbelievable, with word-of-mouth causing our name to spread like wildfire. However, I still feel that I haven't got the necessary tools to manage the business. My current system goes as follows: It certainly isn't centralised or easy to maintain, and as I'd rather spend time on really dealing with the clients, rather than fudging spreadsheets together, I thought I'd ask the wise people of 43folders to suggest some applications which could help us out. We considered writing our own, but I would imagine something already exists. My wishlist goes like this: I've tried a few systems like Zoho, Sidejobtrack and a few bigger systems which are meant for larger businesses, but I just haven't found the right thing yet. I quite like the Basecamp simplicity but my husband doesn't like it, and wants something that offers a better calendar-style snapshot of the month ahead. I'm also willing to pay a reasonable price if the app really fits the bill. Would anyone have recommendations on the best apps for this type of work? Has anyone tweaked any of the systems above to meet their needs? 11 Comments
POSTED IN:
 Money stuffSubmitted by unstuffed on January 21, 2007 - 1:26am.
thatcanadiangirl;7722 wrote:
Oh and in response to rmathes, that's a fair point. We currently keep a spreadsheet of all expenses and incoming cashflow, as well as a big folder of all receipts, etc for each month. At the end of the year, we're meant to be able to just hand this over to our accountant and he'll make out heads from tails out of it. So I think I'll try to organise this system better to ease his job, but I don't think we necessarily need accounting software. I can't speak about going limited, because I haven't, yet. But a couple of points about keeping financial records: 1) Most accounting packages have a pretty scuzzy user interface. At least, I think they do, but then UI is one of my hobbyhorses. I've found that a massive amount of software has a UI that's designed to show off what the software can do, rather than easily allow what the user wants to do. I've paddled about a bit with MYOB and Quicken/Quickbooks, and they're okay but not great, and probably a bit heavyweight for a small business (although it sounds like you're rapidly becoming non-small!). 2) It might be more cost effective to get a bookkeeper to keep your books, rather than getting your accountant to do it. Accountants are good for preparing tax, but they're way too expensive for a routine task. You could hire a bookkeeper to do all your finance-wrangling every few months. 3) That said, I don't know that you'll need either one. What's required for business financial records is basically incomings and outgoings: anything else (like budget to actuals, bank reconciliations, etc) is for your own knowledge, not for tax purposes. Doing bank recs is A Good Thing, particularly when you've got deferred payments, but you're probably doing that already. So ultimately, you can easily keep all of your financial records in spreadsheets forever, and not lose anything. You may also find that you tweak as you go, by adding budget functions, say, or invoice tracking, or whatever, so that your system becomes more featured while still easy to use. I'm planning on building a really simple accounting system later this year, so if you're still using the spreadsheets we might be able to share some questions and answers. » POSTED IN:
|
|
| EXPLORE 43Folders | THE GOOD STUFF |
