Whether you have an in-house bookkeeper or deal with your payroll solutions yourself, handling your business’ financial situation is integral to the success of your enterprise. It is perhaps because of this that it is also incredibly stressful – and it could be damaging your business.
The true costs of stress
According to research from Safe Work Australia, the loss of productivity and absenteeism that is caused by stress could be costing Australian enterprises $10 billion a year.
“The personal impact of mental stress on workers is a serious and detrimental issue the worker and their families and also employers,” said Safe Work Australia Chair Ann Sherry.
Furthermore, it is people such as your bookkeeper, rather than blue-collar workers, that suffer the most from stress. Most mental health claims were made by professionals, and a third of these were due to overbearing work pressure.
As a business owner, it is in your own best interests to take this pressure off yourself and your workers. By eliminating the causes of stress, you will make your small business accounting faster, easier, and ultimately less expensive. So how can you go about doing that?
Sit back and relax
Firstly, identify the stressors. Robert A. Karasek, author of Healthy Work: Stress, Productivity, and the Reconstruction of Working Life, describes how decreasing the demanding nature of the workload is not necessarily the key to eliminating stress: rather, high strain comes as a result of high demand combined with low control. As soon as you give yourself or your employees more control, the strain disappears and instead becomes active – difficult work, but successful.
The key to control is to have the right systems in place. If you have all of your data scattered across various files, folders and spreadsheets, there is no control. Instead, consider implementing a one-touch, integrated automated payroll system to draw all your financial data together.
Simple to use accounting software, with integrated automated payroll system and document storage apps, will allow everything to be organised and available in one place. Just imagine how much this one simple system could reduce your stress levels.
You can find out more about these payroll systems and services from us here at DBS Accountants.