To run your team structure more efficiently so it produces the greatest productivity with the minimum effort required, here are some of the most important things that you have to work on:
Team Capacity
The first thing is to work out your team capacity. Otherwise, you will run the risk of putting on another person whenever one of your staff says they are extremely busy.
However, being busy is not the same as being productive.
Have you ever been flat out all day but produced nothing useful by the end of the day? Well, your staff can easily confuse being busy with being productive also.
Accountants enjoy being busy and can find things to do to keep themselves busy but they may not be productive activities.
As the Manager your job is to keep them focussed on productive activities and not get distracted.
Develop your capacity plan by calculating the available hours of each team member (52 weeks – 8 weeks annual/sick/training leave = 44 weeks) x the appropriate chargeable time for their role (60% for minders, 85% for grinders) x the hourly charge out rate for their time. This will allow you to calculate the current capacity of your full team and determine whether you are over / under.
Avoid A Flat Team Structure
You should avoid running a “flat” team structure where you have a very experienced person doing all levels of work such as admin, bookkeeping, accounting, tax planning, and strategy work.
Inform Your Client
Send out a letter now to your clients outlining which months you would like them to bring their work in over the next 12 months, with a monthly follow-up letter 3 months prior to when the month is due.
Not all will comply but a vast majority will and all you need is 60% to 80% to comply and you have effectively smoothed out the peaks and troughs of your workflow for the year.
Prepare Your Team
Make sure that everyone in your team has 2 week’s worth of work planned into their calendars and educate them that if their calendars drop below 2 weeks they are to ask for work. This gives the managers time to get work in.
Provide A Scope Of Works
Provide a scope of work for each client’s job prior to starting the job. This provides a budget of time allowed for each client’s job so your staff knows how much time they can spend on each job and they can then populate their calendars with the time allocated for each job for 2 weeks or more.
It also provides an indicative upfront fixed price for the client.
This manages the clients’ expectations avoids fee complaints and helps you manage the team also.
I hope these suggestions help you leverage your teams and grow your firm in 2020.