In order to grow, businesses must understand what’s working and what’s not working from an organizational perspective, as well as from what their financial metrics reveal. If something’s not working and mission goals are not being achieved, you need to understand why preferably in real-time so you can adapt sooner rather than later. The challenge is you have limited time and resources. It’s important to take a look at your daily activities and take stock of where you are spending your time. What tasks are keeping you from doing the work you most care about and that is most important to driving the financial growth and stability of your organization? What activities can you automate so that precious time can be spent on those tasks that require the human touch?
Tasks you cannot or should not automate:
- Client relations and personalized experiences
- Creative thinking and innovation of your next mission goal
- Employee satisfaction and recognition
Time-consuming tasks you can automate:
- Accounts receivable – Create and manage invoices and collection online so that you get paid faster
- Accounts payable – Start approving and paying your bills electronically via ACH
- Time and expense management – Automate the expense report process, from mobile phone receipt capture to reimbursement
- Payroll Automate and enable payroll data sync to your general ledger
- Project or grant management – Get real-time visibility, tracking, compliance, and reporting in one place
- Inventory – Access current balances and availability across locations and product lines
- Process data with bank feeds – Automatically import transactions from your financial institutions
- Integration of software platforms – Acquire a wide range of integration choices to quickly connect systems
- Manual excel worksheets – Customize reporting around activities by using dimensionality in your chart of accounts and create custom dashboards for a quick view of financial and operational data
Cloud accounting is rapidly becoming a beneficial and efficient solution to solving automation issues. There are providers with solutions designed to help save you time by giving you the information you need right up front. Unlike traditional on-site accounting, cloud accounting enables data to be accessible from any device with an internet connection. In addition, your financial information updates automatically in real-time. Using cloud accounting frees your business from having to install or maintain software on individual desktop computers.
Automation and cloud computing can seem overwhelming as new technology becomes available, but there is no need to be anxious. Access to expert accounting resources, and to a skilled team of trusted advisors, can help remove the fear by providing you trained professionals to call upon with questions and challenges. This access further allows you the opportunity to automate the right tasks using the right software platforms and to review and improve your current accounting processes.
Collaborating with a trusted advisor will give you greater visibility into your organization’s financial performance, improved internal controls and data security. It also connects you with a team of dedicated experts who understand your business and who will provide you with the answers you need to concentrate on what you do best—manage your business. In addition, automation and collaboration will free up valuable time to allow you and your staff to focus on your business mission and on those critical human touch tasks of building relationships and growing your organization.
Questions? Learn how cloud accounting can help your organization.
