Growthwise is still a fairly new business. We will celebrate our 3rd birthday in July this year. We started out all guns blazing and setup a system that we had previously used. The system was picked mainly for its Document Management capabilities. It meant that we had to purchase a server with more grunt than we would normally have needed (which obviously equated in more cost) not to mention the $20,000 setup fee for the actual software and training. Despite this cost the system was very stand alone meaning we were forever double handling data. We had to transfer names from one system to the other. We have to transfer client’s data from one system to the other. We had to continue to download software updates and patches and ensure these were updated on our systems after hours. We also couldn’t access any of our data on mobile devices like our iPads or iPhones. We were dealing with an archaic system that certainly didn’t help with our productivity.

So off we went searching.

In the last three years we have trialled countless systems. We have pushed these systems to the limit, asked the support teams hundreds of questions and constantly asked ourselves internally how we could use these to improve our own systems. The 1st system we implemented internally was Xero (and paycycle). We were old MYOB users and were used to having to enter all of the data in. Implementing Xero saved us just over 40% of our Internal Accounting time and we now had our weekly payroll down to a record 1 minute 37 seconds! We also had access to our data from anywhere which meant we were naturally looking at our results more. When you see such improvements to your own internal process it’s only logical that you start telling EVERYONE you know.

But it was really more than that for us. Utilising the wonderful Xero ecosystem we started testing other add-on systems and partners. We started using Capsule CRM to record all of our external partners such as Bankers, Insurance brokers, IT technicians, Lawyers etc. We could add correspondence we had by adding an email address to the emails we were sending and had a central place for information. We could also add tasks for follow ups and any other detail we had.

That led us to look at Workflow Max. We were obviously fed up with our internal Workflow Management system and needed to look at something that integrated with Xero. We started a trial and basically fell in love. But it wasn’t just the fact the software is cloud based and integrated to Xero that we loved. It was the fact that we were looking at our own internal processes in an entirely different way. Accounting software (like many other Industry specific software) tends to be rigid. It tends to only allow you to operate in a certain way. You are basically dictated how your business should run. When you start looking outside the square to different software solutions you realise your own business is not being run in the optimal way. Workflow Max allowed us to review everything we did and make improvements. It also cut down on data entry time, gave us access anywhere anytime and allows us to give suggestions that actually end up in the product.

The next step was to start looking at other systems our clients could use. We have implemented Workflow Max for our clients in a range of Industries including Architecture, Media and design. We have implemented Unleashed for clients with inventory systems, Vend for clients who need POS systems, GeoOP for clients in mobile workforce situations. All of these systems allow you to be more efficient, give you real time data to make accurate decisions and in all of the cases so far add profit to your business. And best of all…..they are all integrated, meaning no double data entry.

Our own journey to Cloud Computing started over two years ago and has completely transformed the way we do things. We can now jump into our clients Xero, Vend, Unleashed, GeoOp files as an example and give them REAL TIME feedback. When we have discussions about how the business is travelling both internally and with our clients it’s with up to date and accurate data. It’s giving small business better software than larger competitors.

With the new Financial Year looming it’s a perfect time to start looking at ways to improve your internal business processes. We’ve tried and tested AND implemented many systems for our clients. And we want to keep spreading the word to other small businesses that can benefit as well. If you know a small business that would benefit….or are interested for your business let us know. Over the coming weeks we will post a little more on the other internal systems we are using and how they are of benefit to us.

We have also shared our love for Workflow Max via video

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SuQJMQKA3m8

Faster Bank Reconciliation

Have you ever wished you could change the GST code when reconciling from the main bank reconciliation screen without having to go into the Add Details section. Well now you can! In fact you can also add Tracking Information as well.

So now if you need to change the code form GST on Expenses to No GST you can do so from just clicking on the drop down arrow. You can also add tracking category details using the drop down arrow as well.

New Look

You may have noticed a slightly new look this morning with everything now being centered.

Budget Updates

By far my favourite feature is the new Export and Import functionality for budgets! So now we can export your actual figures out of Xero, make changes and re-import them back into Xero. While in Excel we can increase and decrease certain numbers, perform some variance analysis and ensure we have the budget back in Xero to compare budget to actual each month. And just in time for the new financial year planning.

What was scrapped?

There were quite a few promises from last years budget with plans to start this year that have been scrapped. Namely:

• Cutting the Company Tax Rate – Yes the proposed reduction in Company Tax Rate to 29% has been axed.
• Cutting the Tax on Interest Income – the proposal to reduce the tax you pay on Interest Income by 50% has also been axed.
• Standard Deductions for Income Tax Returns – the idea of giving everyone a standard deduction of $500 without the need to keep receipts to simplify Income Tax Returns has been axed.
• Allowing those with less than $500,000 in Super aged over 50 to contribute $50,000 not the standard $25,000 each year to Super – this reduces the incentive to boost your retirement savings for those in the over 50 bracket who dont have a lot in Super (note this is *apparently* not scrapped completely but will be starting July 2014)
• Mature Age Workers Offset of $500 has also been scrapped. If you are aged 55 or over now you will still be eligible.
• Entrepreneurs Tax Offset has also been scrapped. This only applied to businesses with a turnover of less than $75,000

What’s in and good news for small business?

In a nutshell – not much…..

• Immediate Write off of assets costing less than $6,500
• Immediate Write off of $5,000 for the purchase of Motor Vehicles

What’s in and good news for Individuals?

•  Increase in Tax Free Threshold. You can now earn $18,200 and not pay any Income Tax. The rates after this amount have however Increased from 15% to 19% and from 30% to 32% on income over $37,000. People with $50,000 in taxable income will save $753 in tax and people with $80,000 in taxable income will save $3 per year in tax.
• Education Tax Refund has been simplified and replaced by the Schoolkids Bonus meaning you no longer have to spend money on education or keep receipts. The old maximum Rebate of $409 for primary students and $818 for secondary students is increasing to $410 for primary and $820 for secondary. It wont be managed through the taxation system rather will be a twice-yearly payment into your bank account. You still need to be eligible to receive Family Tax Benefit Part A for this to apply.
• Family Tax Benefit Rates will change but not until 1 July 2013. Rates will increase $300 a year for families with 1 child and $600 a year for families with more than 1 child

So where are the catches?

The focus this year seems to be on means testing everything.

• Medical Expenses Offset is now going to be means tested. If you earn more than $84,000 as a single or $168,000 as a couple you will need to have over $5,000 in out of pocket medical expenses (compared to $2,000 for everyone else) and will only be able to claim 10% Offset as opposed to the current 20%
• And don’t forget Private Health Insurance Rebate will be means tested from the 1st July 2012 making Private Health Insurance more expensive
• Living Away from Home Allowances have seen some major changes. You will need to physically have two homes in Australia that you are maintaining. What it really means is if business want to attract highly skilled and specialised people from overseas the cost of doing so has just risen dramatically.
• The $1,500 incentive for employing Australian Apprentices has been scrapped. An additional $500 has been added to the Completion Incentive bringing it to $3,000.
• People who earn more than $300,000 per year are encouraged not to contribute to the Superannuation Environment with double the rate of the existing tax. Don’t forget though they can only contribute $25,000 to Super in any case. So moral of the story if you earn $299,000 you will pay $3,750 tax on your Super. If you earn $300,001 you will have to pay $7,500 tax on your Super….yet you can’t contribute more to ensure you are setting yourself up for retirement.
• Non-resident workers will lose the Living Away from Home Allowance and will have to pay a higher tax rate (32.5%)
• Low Income Tax Offset for minors has also been scrapped meaning you can no longer split in your Family Trust
• When you retire if your Taxable Income is over $180,000 you will be taxed at your marginal rates instead of a reduced rate of 15% on any ETP’s paid.

It would seem this budget focuses on increasing taxes and increasing compliance. The big one I haven’t mentioned yet is the additional funding given to the ATO to up GST Compliance Activities. What that means….more GST Audits & holding on to your refunds for extended periods of time for additional checking. Its now more important then ever to ensure you have your records in order and you are lodging AND paying your liabilities on time.

In a nutshell If you don’t have a system tracking everything like Xero expect to be spending time this year collating and summarising your receipts for your GST Audit!

All in all a very disappointing budget for small business.

Saturday marks the end of the FBT Year. Yes, that’s right it’s a completely different year for fringe benefits tax than it is for your normal income tax.

So what does that mean to business owners? Most businesses that have Employees (that includes yourself) will be caught in the Fringe Benefits Tax System.

If you provide your employees with a benefit other than Salary/Wages/Bonuses/Super then you are likely to be providing Fringe Benefits to your employees. Now just to make things interesting some benefits you provide employees will attract an actual tax whilst others will be exempt. The bad news is that even if you don’t have to actually pay any tax on these benefits you still have to prepare that dreaded return & keep all the necessary records to prove your exemptions.

What do we mean by a benefit other than Salary?

If you provide your employees (including yourselves) with a car, mobile phone, gifts, access to sporting event tickets, entertainment or even just put on a Xmas party you will be providing Fringe Benefits to your employees & will be required to complete a return.

Don’t stress though! We will take care of that for you.

So what records do I have to keep?

Some examples include maintaining a log book for your vehicles, declarations of private use for Mobile Phones etc and actual Entertainment Benefit Records. We will be in contact with you today to ensure we have your odometer readings. We will gather the other information from Xero & let you know over the coming weeks what else we need from you.

HTML Graphs

For those of you who use Xero on your iDevices you will be pleased to know you can now see the graphs!

Invoice Changes

You can now easily Reorder the line items on your Invoices and insert new lines. You will now see an extra column on the left hand side. You just click, drag and drop to change the order.

Discounts

For those interested Xero now has an easy way of dealing with Discounts check out this video of the new features.

Search Improvements

When searching in the Invoices section you can now search on the line item descriptions as well. You can also seach by Phone Number in the contacts section now as well.

Xero Community

One of the exciting things this morning is the release of the Xero Community. This is a community forum where you can put forward improvements, have a look at other suggested improvements for Xero, search questions that other users have asked from a help perspective and generally get a feel for what’s happening. I suggest you all go and have a look at the community and utilise this to put forward your suggestions http://community.xero.com

As always look out for another Xero update in a few weeks.

Another reason we love the cloud!

For those of you who have not been following our updates on Twitter and Facebook we were flooded on Friday afternoon (and again yesterday!) I know many of you are thinking “but how you are on the 1st floor!” Well the roof collapsed along the side of our building and water poured in to all of our intervew rooms as well as all over reception! Now for some business owners this may spell tragedy. Afterall not only could you stand to loose everything on your computers but also all the physical files in your office! And then how do you work for the next few weeks until the Insurance assessors decide to approve your claim and your IT guys setup the new equipment for you?

But for us other than the issue of not being able to actually use our office its business as usual. Why? Our documents are all stored electronically and we use Cloud based services to run our business.

If we didn’t use Cloud based software what could have happened?

Let’s paint the picture. The office is flooding and we just have to leave. Our server is flooded with water which had all of our software, client files & records. Our physical files are also flooded and now can’t be used. Let’s also assume we have been diligent in backing up our systems to external drives or online. Firstly we would need to have a disaster recovery plan in place for our IT provider to use spare servers or something. We would have to wait until they could be fired up and ALL of our software and information were restored. We would then also need to setup our office somewhere that had access to these servers. Then we would need to get all of the quotes and hope the Insurance Assessor approved everything and that our Insurance Policies covered all of the loss. Then we would need to go through the whole process again when we could move back into the office.

What ACTUALLY happened for us!

We picked up our laptops on Friday afternoon and went out the door with them. Because we can work from anywhere we had not one hour of downtime and have enjoyed working from the coffee shop and our lovely park across the road just to name a few. We didn’t have to worry about ensuring everything had backed up correctly. We didnt have to worry about disks to re-install software on computers. Other than where to see our clients we didn’t have to worry about anything at all.

Lucky for us!

So what are the programs that made this all possible?

Xero (www.xero.com)
Workflow Max (www.workflowmax.com)
Yammer (www.yammer.com)
Spotlight Reporting (www.spotlightreporting.com)
Dropbox (www.dropbox.com)
Google Apps (www.google.com)

What would happen to you if your office flooded today? Would you be as lucky as us?

P.S if any of your are starting to get scared about what would ACTUALLY happen in your business let us know…..we can help implement solutions for your business just like we have for ours

With the wonderful world of technology moving so fast we like to keep up to date with cool tools that not only help our own business but can certainly assist clients businesses as well. And thanks to our awesome friends at Xero we have yet another of those Cool Tools to share with you.

Introducing RightSignature.

How many times do you wish you had a signature on a quote document rather than just a verbal agreement. If you are good and ensure everything is signed for before you start work for a customer how many times do you wish that piece of paper was easily accesible. Ever been on site with a customer and not had all the detail available at your finger tips. Imagine just bringing your iPad or iPhone along and being able to bring up all the signed documents for the job in an instant! Well that’s just one advantage of RightSignature.

In a nutshell you can create any document at all that needs a signature. You can also include boxes that clients need to complete such as the date, name or any other information you are requesting. An email is then sent to the client notifying them they have something to sign. Then you just sign online. This is done by either moving your mouse if you are at your computer, using one of those funky little pens on the iPad or iPhone or just using your finger on a touch screen for example. Which means anyone can sign from anywhere. For those of you who may have old school clients they can even sign with pen and paper and fax back to RightSignature. Once signed both parties receive a PDF copy of the actual document. Then to top it all off RightSignature will even archive the signed documents for you meaning you can come back and search for anything later! Of course you can still save in your files for cusotmers as well.

And not just to leave it at that but RightSignature even integrates with your other favourite tools such as Evernote, Dropbox, Box, Capsule, Highrise and of course Xero.

So lets paint this picture…..You want to ensure that all of your quotes are approved in Invoices. You would normally prepare a Draft Invoice in Xero anyway and have a template setup as a Quote. Instead of having to email that and then request someone print it out and sign it all you do is log into RightSignature, click on the approriate quote you would like to send and start to type in the clients name. As all the data is pulled from Xero the clients email address will automatically be generated. You can even type in an optional message at this step. You press send for signature and the client is sent an email. They sign straight away and the document is then sent back to you with a signature. Its really that easy.

Check it out www.rightsignature.com

Motivating your business is a very simple thing to do. It starts with YOU. It starts with actually deciding what you want out of your business. What are some of your targets for the business? And when do you want to reach them by? Once you have worked the hard part out then it’s just a case of firstly conveying that to the team and secondly setting smaller targets for everyone to reach along the way.

As always I like to look at other Businesses, and learn from them. The motivated ones all have fantastic leaders who are very focused on what they want to achieve….but they also have a team that is just as motivated and dedicated to the cause.

So here are some tips to Motivate your team:

1. Make sure you lead by example
2. Listen to the team
3. Ask them for feedback
4. Ask them what they would change in the business to reach the targets
5. Train them! Be specific here and set a training program for your employees
6. Try a profit sharing plan. Ie have a staff bonus pool of 5% of the Company profits. This then gets divided amongst the team
7. Encourage the team to look for constant improvements. I.e Introduce a weekly or monthly award for the best improvement suggestion – let it be voted for by the team
8. Give Feedback. Both positive and 1 thing to work on for the next month. This is best done over a simple cup of coffee one on one.
9. Try some team building activities. Treasure hunts with clues pointing to an end destination are always fun & help build teamwork.
10. Communicate. Let the team know how they are tracking & how the business is tracking
11. Celebrate. Make sure you actually celebrate the wins

So there are some quick examples of ways you can help motivate your team to in turn motivate your business. Have any other examples of what has worked for you?

Still struggling to decide what it is you actually want to achieve? Struggling with some motivation yourself? Let us know and we can kick-start your thinking.

I suggest that you head over to Video – What’s Changed to watch the funky little video paycycle have put together of exactly what has changed. Alternatively Paycycle are running webinars to cover the changes. You can register here Webinar schedule. If you get stuck though just give us a bell and we can walk you through.

I for one am motivated by data (yes its true I am an accountant!) I have recently starting riding my bike again and although it hurts like hell I still get out of bed every morning and ride to work. I map my route and time everything thanks to the lovely runkeeper app. it tracks my distance, elevation, time, km splits, fastest pace etc etc. So each day there is a new challenge. Beat the last time up the hill, take another minute off the total ride time, get to the 20km mark quicker, go faster down the big hill. Each day when the rest of the Growthwise team get to work I happily share my great news about this mornings personal best. I show them the graphs and can then track my results by week, by month etc etc. Yes I am a competitive person so this works brilliantly for me. But i cant help to notice the amount of other people who use apps like runkeeper & cyclemeter to also track progress. If you jump on twitter or facebook I’m sure you will see someone even sharing their results.

Now granted not EVERY day of the week do I beat yesterdays total time or distance….but I can analyse where I can look to improve or where I slipped up compared to yesterday. I can then set new mini goals for the ride home or tomorrow. But the thing is I’m always focused. Why? Because the data is in front of me. Its visiible. Its real. And if you start sharing your results people start naturally asking you how you are tracking. You automatically become accountable to others. And the motivation circle continues. So I not only get my data from the little lady that talks to me all the way along my ride as well as when I finish but I’m also getting the added benefits of the encouragement and accountability from others.

My end goal is certainly not just merely to ride to work each day. Its a much larger fitness target….but my action to get to that target is simply riding each day. The data helps with that motivation.

So how does this apply to your business?

Businesses also require motivation. Well they certainly do if you want to kick-arse! Which means not only do you as business owners require motivation but so does your entire team. Imagine if your whole team was motivated to go that little bit faster every single day. What do you think the difference to your results would be? Do you think you would have a team that were all striving for the same target? Do you think the chances of meeting your targets would be greater.

Business goals and motivation are no different than your personal goals and motivation. First you need to set them! Then you need to break them down into manageable smaller targets & share these with the team. Better still make the team accountable for hitting the targets. And just like you would for yourself reward them.

So this weeks homework is to have a think about what targets you want to set for your business. Start small and work on some targets for the next 6 months. Next week I will touch on how to motivate your employees to reach these targets.

Happy Planning