This Podcast Is Episode Number 451, And It's About What Is Your Contractor Superpower? As a Construction Contractor, much of your world is Outside The Box. You make what seems impossible and turn it into a finished product; the whole house remodel, kitchen or bath remodel, new roof, install an attic fan, replace windows, deck, patio, hot tub, swimming pool, children's backyard playhouse.    The Handyman Contractor fixes "Things," which are very important to the clients who need them—fixing a door, hanging a closet rod, moving something, removing something. Compared to a Whole House Remodel, it may seem like you are not doing anything. The reality is that to the person who needed the work done that a few simple little things may change their whole world for the better. Your Work as a Handyman Contractor brings joy to their life. Be Proud of it. No job is insignificant, and no construction business is too small for us.   I want to be the person who says Merry Christmas! You have earned it.    It's the holiday season which means everyone is busy thinking of everyone else. Wrapping up the end of the year, getting one more thing done that makes sense. Many Holiday movies are variations of "Scrooge" based on "This Is Good" and "That Is Bad." Anyone who has not had any challenges in life has been either extremely lucky or in a very protected bubble.  Life Happens. Challenges Happen - some good, some bad depending on the perception of the event. We can all look back and see what we might have done differently. The question is: Did we make a decision? Did that decision seem to be the best decision to make based on the information on hand at that time? If you and I make a thoughtful decision (not a knee-jerk reaction), then it is a good decision. Sometimes we think - I should have, could have, if and only, but, because and [fill in the blank]. These are negative thoughts that are not useful. All negative thoughts drag you down into a wrong mental place. I offer  As A Beacon Of Truth:  God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change; courage to change the things I can; and wisdom to know the difference. Between religions, the name of God may change; however, from my viewpoint, the message of the prayer is the same all over the world, no matter the religion. The key is that you have a choice to believe, what you want to believe, and how to practice your faith. The sun rises and sets for each one of us every day. Embrace Life Enjoy The Day – Moment By Moment. Do Something Fun. Watch The Sunset. Listen To The Birds Sing. Hear A Train Whistle. Rejoice in the laughter of children, for they are embracing their world with complete abandonment at that moment. Smile. Think happy thoughts. The simplest things are free. Every day, everyone can find a reason to be frustrated if they are looking from that particular view. The other driver is driving too slow, too fast, recklessly, music is too loud, passing out hand gestures, honking their horn, on their cell phone, texting, car issues of smoke from the tailpipe, car smells, bad tires, no headlights. The list of things to be annoyed about is endless; no one is exempt. While we are annoyed, there is nothing more dangerous than someone crossing the middle of the street, at night, wearing all dark clothes, either being clueless of the danger or playing chicken with cars. Drivers, everywhere at some point during the day or nighttime hours, will see it happen repeatedly. It used to be when we heard someone who appeared to be talking to themselves that they were (to put it politely) a little troubled in the head (an old-fashioned saying). Now with cell phones and wireless headsets or earpieces, it is a little harder to pick out the people who appear to be talking to invisible friends. What is your Contractor Superpower? The power of choice.  Increase your pricing Which projects do you say YES to Collect job deposits Ask the...

This Podcast Is Episode Number 450, And It's About Four Practical Reasons To Switch To Cloud-Based Accounting If you've been considering making a move to a cloud-based accounting system, you're not alone. Cloud technology has impacted many business functions, including efficiently managing your business's financial aspects.   Cloud-based accounting moves your accounting from being hosted on your computer's hard drive to an online platform. Cloud-based platforms like QuickBooks and Xero offer important features that save you time and money, freeing you to focus on other essential construction business activities.     Here are four reasons to switch to a cloud-based accounting system.  1. Efficient invoicing If your business relies heavily on invoicing, an online accounting system like QuickBooks or Xero makes invoicing incredibly efficient. You can email invoices to clients directly through your software and track how long it's been since the invoice went out.  Clients pay you through a link attached to the invoice, making the payment process easier for them, which increases the likelihood they'll pay you sooner. If they pay through the system, your platform will automatically mark the invoice as paid. If their payment is late, the system alerts you.  Further, you can set up your software to send automatic reminders about late payments. Taxes are automatically calculated for you, and you can set up recurring invoices and retainers to further automate your invoicing.   2. Paperless accounting Managing your accounting through a cloud-based system enables you to move away from paper accounting. You don't have to worry about where or how to store years of paperwork and files because everything is securely stored in the cloud. Likewise, you don't have to go through boxes of files to find a receipt from two years ago; you can simply access the information through your computer.  It's easy for you to share your records with your accountant, bookkeeper, or anyone else who may need to collaborate on your finances. You don't have to mail them physical copies of your financial transactions and statements; you can email them the information or give them access to your software.   3. Accessibility With a cloud-based accounting system like QuickBooks or Xero, you don't have to be in the office in front of your computer to access your financial information. You can see your ledgers and reports from anywhere, on any device. If you want to work from home one day or at your job site the next, you can log in to your software from your smartphone to send invoices, check your reports, or manage expenses.  4. Accurate reporting A critical component of running your construction business is reporting. Accurate reporting enables you to manage your finances better and understand your profitability. It's vital for making informed decisions about your business. Cloud accounting provides you with accurate reporting at the click of a button. Using systems like QuickBooks or Xero, you can easily access profitability reports, income and expense reports, and year-end reports.  The information is available to you automatically--you don't have to spend hours in front of a calculator going through every invoice to see your numbers. Simply by keeping your records in a cloud-based system, you can quickly generate accurate reports.  Which QuickBooks remote access option is best for contractors like you? We recommend QuickBooks online when your company is run like a hobby you do not need full QuickBooks your sole focus is saving money basic simple reports are all you need you have three employees or less you enjoy doing everything yourself you have a lot of time to learn a software We recommend QuickBooks Desktop Version Cloud Computing when you want to earn a profit you need Job Costing Reports and solid Financial Reports you need the power of the full QuickBooks Desktop version...

Hiring Vs. Outsourcing   Are you thinking of hiring a bookkeeper? After reading this, you may think it is not as good an idea as it seems. In addition to the costs of advertising, reading many fiction stories (resumes), interviewing candidates (like a brand new car on the showroom floor), job-seekers are the best they will ever be during the interview. After that, it is all downhill, and the only question is how fast.   We interviewed hundreds of candidates for Construction Bookkeeping positions, and 90% of them said they could do the job - if we trained them.   What does it cost to have a bookkeeper on your payroll?   Fully Burdened Bookkeeper cost means what it will cost you to hire someone, including the company portion of the payroll taxes and all those little costs that only an accountant like me would think about.   Unlike hiring employees, when outsourcing your bookkeeping (to us), you don't pay for any 'down time' or office chatter, excessively long breaks, cell phone calls, surfing the web. You are charged only for our professional bookkeepers' time doing your construction bookkeeping work. Our people have the knowledge, skill and we have systems in place to work fast, saving you time and money. We pride ourselves on employing the most competent construction bookkeeping professionals and ProAdvisors in the business. Our employees have passed our extensive test, a thorough background check, and a personality screening process. Most of our employees have over 10,000 hours of bookkeeping experience. This level of expertise is tough to find when seeking a part-time employee.  Having said that, competent bookkeepers can be highly beneficial for businesses of any size. They offer expertise and insight into areas you may not have experience in. They can also take some tasks off your to-do list, freeing up your time and energy to focus on other matters.  Here are four benefits to outsourcing bookkeepers to help you manage your construction business. Expertise A bookkeeper is an expert at managing, sorting, and recording your business's financial transactions. They've spent time developing their skills and experience. They've also seen and resolved bookkeeping-related issues that you may come up against during that time. Their expertise makes them more efficient at managing those issues.  Beyond that, they understand business trends and challenges others in your industry face and can help you move through those as well. They also know what questions to ask to help you make important decisions and share best practices with you.  Guidance Your bookkeeper not only helps you maintain accurate records, they understand your financial circumstances. They allow you to assess how to make critical business decisions, such as whether now is an excellent time to grow or when you should hold back. They can also identify trends in your industry and help you take advantage of those opportunities. Finally, they can assist you with budgeting and sticking to your budget. They'll help you develop a realistic financial plan that enables your business to grow while achieving short- and long-term goals.    Time savings As a construction business owner, you likely have many activities to focus on. In bookkeeping alone, there are numerous tasks to be responsible for, such as: Collecting and recording transaction data Sorting receipts Classifying expenses Invoicing customers Paying vendors Managing payroll Bookkeepers take on those tasks, so you don't have to. It's not just about the energy you put into them; it's about the fact that unless you're a construction bookkeeping expert, it'll likely take you longer to complete these activities than it would take a bookkeeper.  Think of the time you spend during an average week managing your books, then think of the time you spend during a high-pressure week, such as during tax season. That can add up to a lot of extra hours. ...

This Podcast Is Episode Number 448, And It's About Invoicing Construction Clients The Fast And Easy Way Creating invoices and receipts is vital to successfully running a business. You need receipts to track your purchases and expenses. Your clients need invoices for their tax purposes and to manage their finances. Paper receipts and invoices have been around a long time, so many people are used to them and may even resist moving away from them.  Thanks to technology, paper receipts and invoices are becoming more a thing of the past. There are environmental reasons for the move. Paper invoices require millions of trees and billions of gallons of water to produce, and they emit carbon dioxide (CO2), so going paperless can be a good thing for the environment. The Old Way Contractors Invoiced the jobs was sometimes just as much or more work than doing the job itself. In the past, you needed to make notes, collect customer information, go to your office, open QuickBooks or whatever construction accounting software you were using, wait for everything to load up, and then try to find the paperwork, open the invoice screen, and fill it out and if you were lucky, you could email it from QuickBooks to your customer. Then you waited for the check in the mail to arrive to get paid. Our contractor clients, or perhaps some of you are already implementing this, now have two choices depending on what you are most comfortable with, QuickBooks Desktop Version In The Cloud or Xero Accounting Online. You can directly invoice your clients on Jobsite with your smartphone linked to your Quickbooks or Xero account. QuickBooks or Xero Accounting Online for construction depends on how you get paid, the type of work your company does, and if you need Job Costing. QuickBooks Desktop Version Online Works Best If You: Take Job Deposits Have Change Orders Issues Multiple Invoices Need Work-In-Progress Need Job Costing Reports Need Payment Applications Need Periodic Invoices For Bank draws Need Complex Construction Accounting Reports At the price point, Intuit offers all versions of QuickBooks, including QuickBooks Pro, QuickBooks For Contractors, and QuickBooks For Contractors Enterprise. No other construction accounting software comes close to providing the robust Job Costing Reports, Work-In-Progress Reports And Tracking (WIP), and hundreds of other combined reports and features medium and large contractors need to operate and grow their construction company. Xero Accounting Online Works Best If You: Need To Get Paid Faster And Easier Have Simple Jobs You Invoice Individually Need To Invoice Customers At The Jobsite Need Key Performance Indicator Financial Reports Want Professional Construction Accounting At Lower Costs Xero Accounting Online saves us time in data entry, which means we can offer Xero Accounting Online outsourced contractors bookkeeping services at substantial savings over QuickBooks outsourced contractors bookkeeping services and provide more in-depth financial reporting with some of the reports being updated within seconds of when the transactions are received. Here are all the more reasons why your construction business should consider eliminating paper receipts and invoices. 1. Decreased costs Receipts eat into your profits. It costs money to buy the paper and the ink--more than it costs to have an email receipt emailed to clients. Your business saves money by having the receipts emailed instead of printing invoices and receipts for every client. On a per-unit basis, invoices might not seem like a considerable cost, but over a year or a few years, they can add up to thousands of dollars.   2. Increased efficiency It takes time to print it out, change the printer paper and otherwise ensure that everything is working correctly. Meanwhile, your customers and clients wait for their documents to be printed out and handed or mailed to them. Beyond that, how often does a client contact you because they've lost...

This Podcast Is Episode Number 447, And It's About Why Getting The Leads And Doing The Work Are Still Not Good Enough There was a time when a contractor put a simple ad in the paper or a line listing in the Yellow Pages, and they would have more leads than they could handle. It was the only way to go, and the contractors who insist on that and "Word of Mouth" do not survive.   Could those contractors have avoided failure?   I believe they could have. This article explores the top reasons construction businesses fail and the three key questions that every contractor like you needs to ask to prevent failure. It would be best to answer these questions to provide a clear path to your continued and future growth and success.    Contractors who did not move from simple ads that had always worked, and evolved a Marketing Plan made the same mistake other failed companies and brands made. They were unable to Innovate, Reinvent, and Evolve by having a deep understanding of what business they were in, who and what they were competing with, and by challenging themselves to understand their actual expertise.   It's important to plan to give your construction business the best chances for success. Planning means anticipating challenges and developing ways to successfully address them, so they don't upend your construction company.  Here are the top reasons why your construction company could still fail: Lack of market demand  You need to have a market to make money. That means there needs to be enough people who need your service and are willing to pay money to hire you. Without that, you won't be able to cover your costs or earn enough to survive. Before you spend your time, money, and energy starting a business, make sure there's a need for it.  Some ways you can identify needs: Look for competition. If no one else is offering the service, there's a chance there's no market for it. That might not initially stop you from moving forward, but if no one already offers your product or service—or anything close to it—you'll have to do more to prove there's a market. Conduct market research. Studies and interviews help determine whether people in your target market agree with you that there is a need for your offering and that they would pay for it.  Lack of expertise Contractors like you might be tempted to partner with or hire their friends or family—people they genuinely like and would work well with. That doesn't always translate to success, however. For your business to be successful, you need specific expertise, and you need people whose skills complement yours.  You also need people who are willing to discuss your decisions with you and make sure there's a business case to be made for each decision you make. Someone with a differing perspective provides a vital way to double-check whether your choices are best in the long-term for your business or whether other options are available.  Ensure you hire people with balanced competencies. If your roofing business involves installing solar panels, you might need a technical expert to ensure the technology runs smoothly. You'll likely also need a financial expert to help you with bookkeeping and possibly a manager to oversee employees. It's OK to hire people you like, but make sure your team also has the skills to attend your business successfully.  Lack of finances You need money to produce your services and ensure all employees are paid. It's not enough to know how much money you need month-to-month; you need to forecast your development cycle, how inventory moves through your supply chain and variations in seasonal income.  If your construction business doesn't earn as much in the first few months as you predicted, you'll need to bring in more money quickly to save your business.  Ask Yourself: What are you offering? New construction, remodeling, or service and repair? Who is your competition? DIY,...

This Podcast Is Episode Number 446, And It's About Practical Tips For Encouraging Repeat High-Profit Clients Many data support the idea that it's less costly, easier, and more efficient to encourage repeat customers than bring in new ones. Among the are: that a 5% increase in customer retention is responsible for more than 25% increase in profit; repeat customers are nine times more likely to convert than first-time visitors, and a 2% increase in customer retention has a similar impact to your bottom line as reducing costs by 10%. Understand The High-Profit Client - Most of them have personality traits commonly known as drivers - folks who are accustomed to getting things done quickly and efficiently. They do not mind paying professionals to service, repair, or build new construction projects related to their houses and commercial buildings. Design and develop your internal customized systems and processes when and where it makes sense. As much as possible, when it is cheaper to buy something ready-made for a fraction of what it costs you to do-it-yourself then buy it.  Systems, Systems, Systems - You need systems (a system is simply a collection of processes built upon an understanding of what works and each method has been tried and tested). Without systems or a desire to "wing it" and see what happens will bring out the animal in these people, and they have been known to cause construction business a great deal of harm and financial pain. First, Design External Systems For the money trail () For project milestones and projected completion dates (when change orders occur, update the completion date) Cause the least amount of grief and interruptions to their lives Ensure they make the fewest possible decisions (they make decisions all day long) To make sure nobody ever tries to "educate" them about construction (they don't care, that's why they hired you!) Then, follow along these four practical tips to encourage your high-profit clients to keep coming back.  1. Build relationships with clients Take time to learn more about your customers. Do they mention family members? Ask about their loved ones. Do they have particular concerns? For instance - too many cable cords around the house and they have small children. Keep track of their issues and be attentive to their needs. Recommend solutions that address their specific problems. Go the extra mile to show your customers they're important to you.  Ask for their input, as well. They'll get to know your products and services and offer insights into what's working and what could be improved. If you engage them--and make changes based on their feedback--you'll develop a loyal customer base. The more special your clients feel, the more likely they are to hire you again. They'll appreciate your thoughtfulness and value your service.  2. Make it personal Your loyal clients deserve communications that are more personal and less formal. Using impersonal emails for your more extensive email list is fine, but use more personal touches with your best customers.  Phone them or suggest an in-person meeting if you want to let them know about an essential business-related matter. Keep track of important dates, as well. You can send gifts or cards to mark important occasions or to reach out.  Make your best customers feel they stand out from the rest by being more personal with them.  3. Share relevant information Still, if you get to know your customers well, you can pass along articles, books, or other information that might interest them, even if it isn't related to your business. Newsletters are a great way to stay in touch with your customers and let them know what you're up to. It shows them you understand and you care.  4. Remember your loyal clients Businesses sometimes focus their attentions exclusively on new customers, forgetting about loyal and repeat customers. You need new customers to keep your business thriving;...

This Podcast Is Episode Number 445, And It's About How To Get Your Life Back In A Seven-Day-A-Week Construction Business Construction business owners already have a time-consuming and challenging job running their business. If their business is open five days a week, they usually need the weekend to catch up on paperwork, pay bills and manage any tasks they didn't get to during the week.    For those with a seven-day-a-week business, there's even less time off. They often feel the need to be onsite whenever the company is open to deal with unanticipated issues, help the staff out, and ensure all tasks are completed.    Being onsite seven days a week isn't healthy or productive, however. It can cause burnout and result in errors being made. It affects the construction owner's personal life and quality of life, not to mention their overall well-being.    Here are three tips for getting your life back when you operate a seven-day-a-week business.  1. Hire a trusted manager The next best thing to having you onsite all the time is to have a manager with authority similar to yours who can be onsite when you aren't. Invest money in hiring a manager to deal with operations so you can take days off. Train that person to deal with any issues you anticipate and make sure they know and understand the business inside and out. Give them the authority to make decisions in your absence. It might take a little time to build up trust with that manager, but they will be invaluable to you when you have them.   2. Delegate tasks you don't need to do As a small business owner, you have regular duties that need to be done but could be better done by an expert. Doing them yourself takes up a ton of your time and forces you to be on the job site more. Look at your tasks and determine which ones are eating up your valuable time. Could you hire a bookkeeper? An accountant?  Virtual assistants can now be hired to deal with invoicing, collecting payments, and making phone calls on your behalf. That frees you up to deal with other tasks at your job site, which means you may get your other duties done and find you have free time.  These outside service providers cost money, but they are worth the expense when you consider the time and energy you'll save by not taking on those tedious tasks. Especially when you factor in the extra personal time, you'll have. 3. Start slowly The worst thing you can do is wait until you feel you're about to have a nervous breakdown before you think about taking days off. That increases the chances that you'll need a day off at precisely the wrong time—during the busy season or when there's a work-related crisis emerging.  To get yourself comfortable with taking days off and get staff used to you being away: Start slowly. Maybe take an afternoon off during the weekday; that's typically the slowest. When you're comfortable with that, start taking an entire day off here and there. After a while, you'll be fine taking two days off, even during busier periods. You may not always have a five-day-a-week job, but at least you'll be okay taking days off for yourself.  Final thoughts As contractors, you wear too many hats that you end up wearing yourself out from the weight of it all or from the time it takes for you to wear all of it. You don't have enough energy nor time. It would be best if you had time away from your business to maintain your sanity and stop yourself from burning out. Having trusted staff and expert service providers in place will help you take a break from your worksite and get yourself some personal time.  About The Author: is the co-founder of Business Consulting And Accounting in Lynnwood, Washington. She is the leading expert in managing outsourced construction bookkeeping and accounting services companies and cash management accounting for small construction companies across the USA. She encourages Contractors and...

This Podcast Is Episode Number 444, And It's About Job Costing - Your Construction Company's Competitive Advantage Every contractor has a Job Costing Library; some keep it in their head, some keep it on paper with names like completed jobs, bids, estimates. Other contractors keep it in their QuickBooks For Contractors' software records. Still, other contractors rely on places like RS Means for comprehensive databases of construction costs. These are similar to the "Flat Rate Books" used by car repair shops for decades.   A tiny fraction of contractors understand the actual value of a customized cost library and invest the time, energy, and resources to build and maintain one. Having done several, I can tell you it is a painful, arduous task. I will tell you a story to make it crystal clear.   The Treasure Box That Saved Four Contractor's Lives! In the mid-1800s, an archeologist left New York City on a journey into the heart of the African jungle in search of a lost civilization. He intended to find and bring back treasures that would make him a wealthy man. He recruited four physically fit and very intelligent contractors, one each from , to assist him with the promise they would be paid a substantial reward when they returned the treasure box to his office in New York City. All went well for the first two weeks, and as luck would have it, they stumbled upon the lost civilization resting undisturbed under a soft blanket of floral and vines. The archeologist and the contractors worked feverishly to find the treasure without success during the next two weeks. Late one afternoon, the archeologist was bitten by a poisonous snake, and before long, he began to get dizzy. He knew he had less than twenty-four hours to live, so he decided to spend his remaining time putting a plan in place to save the lives of the contractors he had brought on the journey. While the contractors slept, he filled the Treasure Box and sealed it with a large, heavy padlock. When the contractors awoke the following day, he described in great detail how he had found not what he came for but something much more valuable, more valuable in fact than gold and jewels. Everyone was very excited until he told why he would not make it out of the jungle alive. This news caused a great deal of sadness because everyone knew the archeologist was the one person who could keep peace and harmony when tempers flared and made sure everyone stayed focused and kept on track. The archeologist struck a bargain with the contractors to be rewarded handsomely if they worked together and delivered the Treasure Box to his office in New York City. He gave them a letter written in Latin to be delivered to his partner along with the Treasure Box with instructions regarding the contents of the Treasure Box. The archeologist made it clear the Treasure Box had to remain sealed until it was delivered, or else they would receive nothing. Now getting four contractors to agree on anything is a miracle in itself, let alone work together. They were fortunate the Treasure Box was so heavy it required all four of them to work together to move it. They fought their way through the jungle for three long terrible weeks, finally arriving at the archeologist's office in New York City and presenting it to his partner with the Treasure Box and the letter. The partner read the letter and smiled knowingly before opening the Treasure Box. It was filled with rocks. The contractors were very angry and upset. When they calmed down, the partner translated the archeologist's letter for them, and it said: "By Making You Work Together, I Saved Your Lives Which Is Worth More Than Gold Or Jewels" Your Treasure Box is your construction company's job costing library.  Building it is like taking that long, challenging journey out of the jungle, which is why so few contractors ever do it even though the results are more valuable than a Treasure Box full of gold and jewels; because a job costing...

This Podcast Is Episode Number 443, And It's About Succession Planning A Will For Your Construction Company You may be getting your construction projects done with sheer willpower, but the lack of processes, business plans, and strategy will eventually wear you down. You can either keep on "Powering Through"- spend your life endlessly chasing details, missing appointments, suffer untold losses in cash flow and profits, or you can start developing a plan and work on your business.   Successful contractors improve processes all year long. Your construction company can benefit from an excellent system that other successful contractors are using now, which means there is no need to "Reinvent The Wheel." As your construction company grows and evolves, your processes can support the controlled and planned expansion.   Along with trying to keep on top of your construction business, the unfortunate reality is that most business owners don't take proper holidays. Usually, this is because their business relies on them, and they don't have the support to keep the business running without them.   As a construction business owner, have you ever considered what would happen to the business if you had to take a six months break because of a severe illness or injury? Would the business survive? How would the bills get paid? And while it might not be nice to think about, if you were to die, are you sure your business partners would give your loved ones a fair deal? For these reasons and many more, all business owners need to have a detailed succession plan. A succession plan is like a will, but for a business. However, there is often a more comprehensive range of scenarios and options to consider. Just like your will, a good business succession plan can vary from one business to the next. But some key areas should always be considered, which you can find below.  Business Structure In the event of death or retirement, the ownership and control of the business may need to be transferred to the owner's family or the surviving business partners. How easily this occurs will often depend on how the business operates, such as through a trust, or a company, or without a separate entity at all. Succession Agreements If something happened to one of the business partners, would their spouse or children take over the control of that share of the business? If the answer is no, then a succession agreement can assist the other business partners to continue business operations while allowing for compensation for the former partner's family. Managing Risk Just like personal insurance, business insurance can provide a range of protection, such as temporarily meeting the standard costs of running the business (business expenses cover) or paying for a short-term replacement manager (e.g., trauma or disability cover). A life insurance policy linked to the succession agreement that provides the deceased partner's family with suitable compensation for the transfer of business ownership to the surviving partners may also be a good idea. Power of Attorney Most small businesses struggle to do much without the advice and authority of the figurehead or main key decision-maker. That's why a Power of Attorney is integral to a good succession planning process. It helps the business to physically operate if the owner is incapacitated because of illness or injury. A range of people may need to set up a succession plan, including a financial adviser, lawyer, and accountant. We can help you find the right team for you. Even if you already have a plan in place, it is crucial to review agreements and insurance policies to keep them up to date and reflect the business's current value. Need a succession plan? The last thing I leave you is "Knowledge is Power." There are simple answers to all complex problems, and they are usually wrong. Invest the time, money, and effort to do it right the first time. With the appropriate tools and processes, you can have...

This Podcast Is Episode Number 442, And It's About Four Things To Consider Before Expanding Your Service Offerings Balancing customer experience and setting client expectations against your time and budget is a difficult task. It would be best if you had excellent planning, efficient project managing, and perhaps the right amount of staff working to keep customers happy, but not so many people that workers are standing around looking for things to do.    If your customers have long wait times, that's good news for you initially—it means your business is popular. The bad news is that homeowners won't wait around forever for you to fix your time management issues. If they like your services, they'll be a bit forgiving, but too many long waits will send them to your competition.   For instance, when a homeowner decides to remodel their living space, they dream about how it will look and feel when it is done, but they have no idea what an emotional roller coaster is in store.    Surprises were great when you were a child because you were conditioned to believe that surprises meant you would get something good! As adults, you have been conditioned that surprises are not always pleasant. Highly profitable remodel contractors understand this and have processes in place to deal with it. Fear on both sides Contractors without financial reporting systems they can trust to generate accurate  and  do not know if they are making or losing money from day to day, which leads to doubt, which leads to stress, and the result is they tend to work faster and harder. Their frantic behavior raises everyone's stress level. Contractors in this situation tend to feel like they are driving down the freeway at midnight, wearing a blindfold hoping for the best, and fearing the worst. A Comprehensive Bookkeeping and financial reporting system can reduce or remove the feeling of being out of control. A Simple Easy To Understand -  to keep track of the following: Original Contract Price Change Orders Job Deposits Advance Payments Each Progress Payment Running Balances Showing What Is Done Running Balance For What Is Still Unbilled Percentage Of Completion On Each Major Section Invoicing Residential Remodel System Fast Easy Accounting Sample Pay Application We Prepare For Our Clients Using QuickBooks Reports It needs to be in place before starting any remodeling project. It will save you and your remodel client much grief, and your cash flow and profits will soar. We work with contractors like you to develop strategies to deal with these issues and more. Homeowners expecting their house to be improved suddenly find themselves under siege from a group of cavemen who are ripping and tearing their living quarters apart, and they panic. Some homeowners will tell you they are miserable; some will say nothing, having decided to get even with you once the job is done by withholding final payment! Some consider calling 9-1-1, but they don't because they would be laughed at and perhaps irritate the contractor. Under-promise and over-deliver At some point, your remodeling business will be so busy that customers will be stuck waiting for service. In those cases, under promise and overdeliver. If you know something will take five days, tell the customer it will take a week. Customers are happier if something takes less time than expected than if it takes more. This tactic also buys you time in case of unexpected delays. The worst thing in this situation is that you have to tell customers their wait will be longer repeatedly. That frustrates them and makes them less likely to come back.  Final thoughts Line-ups and wait times are inevitable, but they don't necessarily mean you need to hire more employees. There are solutions available to you that enhance the customer experience without you hiring more people.  It is your responsibility as a contractor to understand the fears and concerns of...