Boring things matter

"Do what you love and never work a day in your life."

We have all heard that saying or something near it.

Every business person's ultimate goal is to love what they do, impact their community, make enough money to be comfortable, and have a successful life.

Wouldn't it be great if all we needed was passion, creativity, and a positive mindset to build a successful business? These things are essential to a business person or leader. Without these personal qualities, it would be hard to build a successful business.

Now, I'm not here to burst your bubble. But I have to break it to you:

The boring bits are important, too.

Like it or not, some business owners consider boring or tedious tasks can make or break your success. Let's outline some tasks.

• Accounting - Many small business owners or nonprofits start with a small staff. This means you probably don't have a bookkeeper or accountant. So, you have to learn to do this on your own. Keeping your account books in order will allow you to realize a profit, make reasonable investments in your business, and pay your employees and bills.

A few free resources:

1. Waveapps.com - free accounting website

2. Excel - if you are good with spreadsheets, this is an option

3. Quickbooks.com - fee, good if your business is more complex

Read more from NerdWallet.

• Policies - Even if you don't have employees, you need some policies in place for your business or nonprofit. Policies can protect you, your employees, and your customers. If you run a nonprofit, you should work with your Board of Trustees. Some policies may be required by state or federal law.

Some examples include:

1. Privacy policy - you'll see many of these on websites to declare how you will handle your customer's personal information.

2. Harassment policies - These policies might cover sexual harassment, a hostile work environment, and bullying. Check your state employment laws to see if these are required.

3. Equal Opportunity Policy - This policy addresses discrimination. Check out the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) for complete information.

Read more from Indeed.com and the U.S. Department of Labor.

• Document retention - Any business or nonprofit will generate some paperwork necessary to save for many years. Whether you plan on using paper filing or digital filing, or a combination of the two, have a plan to make your documents easy to find (or store) when you need them.

Several digital options include Google Drive, OneDrive, or other paid document management services. Here are a few tips for any filing process:

1. Be selective on what you save - is it legal, financial, employment, or health-related? You may need to save it.

2. Save your documents in a dedicated space (digital or paper) and not in a personal area.

3. Create a file naming convention - creating a model of how to name or file documents. Have clients? Perhaps use LastName-FirstInitial-ServiceCode.

Read more at the Fool.com.

These are the boring tasks to get you started in creating a successful business or nonprofit. I'll cover other topics in future posts.

Have other tips? Please leave them in the comments.

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Madrina Consulting provides management consulting and coaching services to small businesses and nonprofits to help create and improve their path to success. Book a free discovery call to discuss how we might help you.

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