You can only work so many hours in a day. As a business person responsible for ensuring efficient use of resources every day, how you manage your limited bucket of time is critical. Your time well spent can impact the productivity of everyone else in your organization. Increasing your program’s productivity yields several benefits. You can do the same amount of work with fewer hours or employees or you can accomplish more without increasing your labor costs. Depending on your circumstances, either benefit can go straight to your bottom line.
The Right Tool for the Job
Correct tools for the job can make all the difference in the world. We’re in the school menu planning business and we know how much time can be consumed with menu planning–especially if you’re using software that is slow, unfamiliar or cumbersome. Worse, after you’ve spent the time in your planning software, having to enter the same information in other programs can become annoying and even more time consuming. Whether you update your website menu info, program your menu boards, look up all the product details to order/purchase menu items, print out, collect, and review production records, you really don’t want to keep entering the same information again and again! And next month you start over….again.
What If…?
What if you did it once in your menu planning software and the software put it everywhere else? What if you didn’t have to spend so much time doing and re-doing work and chasing down information? What if your customers weren’t calling and complaining about inaccurate or out of date menu information? What if…indeed!
You’d have more time to work on the projects you’ve been letting slide, more time to get out on site and see your people, build better working relationships, more time to do what you’ve been hoping to accomplish.
What’s it Worth?
The time you spend doing redundant work costs, at the very minimum, your hourly rate times the redundant hours. But wait! There’s more! The time not spent doing the other things you want to do means you either have to spend someone else’s man-hours or incur the costs of not getting those tasks done. Streamlining your workflow can improve your time usage AND the hours that others are putting in doing their work. You can begin to see that your time is really expensive when not being leveraged properly. It starts with the visible costs and quickly escalates to the unknown costs. Truth be told, great managers understand that it’s not the cost of the tool that should be their chief concern. Instead, they calculate the cost of the time that is saved throughout their operation.
Do a Self Audit Today
- In what areas of your responsibility are you already using great tools?
- What tasks are you doing repetitively that would relieve the most pressure you’re experiencing on a regular basis?
- Are there tools available that will pay for themselves in saved time?
- Are you looking at tasks only or your overall business?
Today, when you’re operating a school foodservice program, you’re running a business and it pays to think about it in business terms. You need tools that will touch on all aspects of your business and that will enable you to quickly assess and respond to the various demands that cross your desk each day. You’re a Marketing Manager when you post menu information on the web, publish to an app, or an on-site menu board. You’re a Safety Manager when you track food safety and temps. You’re the Compliance Officer when you’re ensuring that your meals and production records can withstand outside scrutiny. You’re a Business and Accounting Manager when you need to know the price of your meal and whether your costs are improving or coming under pressure.
Health-e Pro knows and understands your business and has the tools you need to standout in your business and with your customers. We’re committed to your success.