Ion of the Month: Administration
Your business is a busy place. There’s always such a lot to see into, so many plates to keep spinning, and sometimes it’s all too easy to push the apparently non-profitable paperwork to one side. Dangerous thoughts are easy to let in. All that paperwork is fairly straightforward, isn’t it? It won’t take long to catch up on, will it? Let’s face it, you don’t need to put that supplier’s catalogue back where you found it, do you? Nobody will need it again, right? Wrong. Paperwork - even the simplest, most menial forms and letters - mounts up so quickly.
Administration (or, as he prefers to be called, Admin) works behind the scenes to look after the in-between work after the specialists have done their bit. He gets involved in all departments and makes sure that they’re all ticking over nicely. In fact, he’s the glue that holds your business together: every department might be working wonderfully and achieving great things in isolation, but without successful administration they won’t be able to work as a cohesive whole.
Just think for a moment about the many roles Administration plays in your business. When the salespeople have worked their magic and brought in the all-important order forms, Administration is the one who processes those forms and passes them through to the production department. While a job’s being worked on, Administration makes sure procedures are followed and everything is done by the book. And when a job’s finished, Administration is the one who files all the paperwork correctly. All those little tasks, all those forms you might need to fill in and records to keep… they’re his domain.
But don’t underestimate him! Agenda will show you why taking the administrative tasks within your business seriously can make all the difference. You’ll look at the simplest of things, and work on ways to make them run more efficiently. It’s not just about paper-pushing; putting the right administrative framework in place can have a noticeable impact on your bottom line. Procedures and systems can take just a few minutes to set up, but over the course of a year they can save you hours of worry. A humble telephone message pad, for example, keeps track of who’s called (never again will a client have to call you repeatedly before they can get hold of you) and makes sure valuable contact numbers don’t go astray - so crucial sales leads won’t be snapped up by your competitors!
In many ways, looking after the administration within your business is a way of showing respect for it. Administration really is the background work that helps things go smoothly behind the scenes: if it goes well, you take it for granted, but when it’s not done correctly, things fall apart pretty quickly and your customers will soon notice the difference. Every business is organised differently, but effective administration is essential if you want to make a success of things.
