Protecting your small business as the COVID-19 outbreak spreads necessitates having a plan. Take advantage of these seven business planning recommendations to keep your small business healthy throughout the pandemic and well-positioned for success once it’s done.
1. Put health and safety first
Ask yourself some important questions such as:
● Can your people work remotely?
● Today, many businesses are operating online after the pandemic, such as online bookkeeping services, which virtually provide bookkeeping services to many companies. Put your health first and make it possible to make your business contact-free. Limit your travel and take advantage of the communication and collaboration options available in your home office.
● Have you implemented best practices to keep employees safe?
● Set up protocols for employees to report if they’re sick or fear they’ve been exposed to the coronavirus or have an illness. Consider allowing employees to work from home.
2. Reach out
During a crisis, create a strategy for communicating with your partners and stakeholders; these include:
● Customers
● Employees
● Suppliers
● Investors
Create a clear and simple message, schedule regular updates, and make technology work for you when sending messages. Keep them informed about your company’s policies, new operations, or methods you may service with them during this time.
3. keep in touch with your customers
Online bookkeeping services in Vaughan keeps in touch with its customers while performing services. Customers are an integral part of a business, and to stay in touch with them, and you need to focus on three major aspects:
Keep orders on track.
The first step is to contact your customers. Call your primary clients to confirm that existing and planned orders are still on track for those of you who are still operating.
Inquire about receivables
Second, contact any customers that owe you money. You must determine whether they have the financial means to pay and when payments will be made.
Make suggestions for further services.
Finally, when you contact your customers, be bold and ask if they require any additional services. There is a possibility that another supplier has failed them, and you can fill the void. Consider this an opportunity to look into other choices that could help you earn more money.
4. keep in touch with your suppliers
Focus on the significant points to maintain your relationship with suppliers:
Ensure that supplies are delivered on time
Check with suppliers to see if existing purchase orders will be fulfilled on time because supply delays may cause your manufacturing to stall. It’s important to know this ahead of time so you can manage your operations effectively.
Discuss deferred payments
Discuss deferred payment terms for payables and monitor this on a regular basis. If you agreed to pay a supplier in two weeks and can’t, let them know ahead of time.
Ask them about their health
Your suppliers are your stakeholders, and their health and safety are important to you. Also, it is a good courtesy to ask about the health and safety of someone.
5. Determine your capacity and resources.
Now for the things you’ll need to perform in addition to managing clients and suppliers.
Change the way you do things when it comes to health and safety.
You’ll have to alter your health and safety procedures. For example, customers are being told how to pack and handle products in light of COVID-19 by industry experts. You share the same level of accountability. There will be a financial expense associated with this. Calculate the impact and incorporate it into your strategy.
Align your staff with demand forecasts.
As demand falls, the next problem will be aligning your employees with output. Some of you have dealt with this already, while others will have to do so shortly.
Employers will benefit from the new Temporary Wage Subsidy, which will help them retain as much of their workers as possible.
6. Prepare an emergency plan and evaluate your finances
With the pandemic, you never know the future. We may face a new variant or maybe another wave of the virus. To protect your business from the dark consequences of the pandemic, you need to have an emergency plan to keep your cash flows running.
Financial risk and consequences should be factored into any emergency or contingency plan. Update your cash flow on a regular basis and seek ways to cut non-essential spending.