Freedom From BigBrother Now!

Peer out of your office door, what’s your secretary doing right now? If you answered surfing the internet, taking a nap, or reading a magazine, it’s time to rethink where your money is going. In an ideal situation, a secretary would be paid for the work they accomplish and not for watching the clock. If is my theory that small businesses can save money by hiring a secretary part time to manage office business and utilizing an answering service to manage the phones.

Let’s analyze this theory from purely a mathematical point of view using 6 variables A, B, C, D, E, & F.

1. Variable A: Secretary gets paid $12.00 per hour.
2. Variable B: Secretary works 8 hours per day.

3. Variable C: Secretary spends 40% of work day managing office work.

4. Variable D: Secretary spends 30% of work day managing inbound phone calls.
5. Variable E: Secretary spends 12% of work day on lunch.
6. Variable F: Secretary spends 18% of work day remaining unproductive.

Based on these variables, your secretary gets paid $96.00 a day. With this figure broken down, they get paid $38.40 per day managing office work, $28.80 per day managing inbound phone calls, $12.00 for eating lunch (provided lunch is paid), and $17.28 per day for doing nothing. For the purposes of proving this theory, lets analyze the variables based on a 1 month block (22 business days), secretaries will earn $844.80 for managing office work, $633.60 for managing inbound phone calls, $264 for lunch, and $380.16 for remaining unproductive.

So, if only 3.2 hours per day are spent managing office business, it doesn’t make sense for business owners to hire a secretary for an entire day when most of their duties can be outsourced to a call center. Accounting for “free time” (i.e. coffee breaks, cigarette breaks, bathroom time, etc.) lets round up the 3.2 hour figure to 4 hours ($48.00 per day - $1056 per month). Also, lets take $250.00 as an average market price for utilizing an answering service for a one month period. Also, take into account that with a part time employee (i.e. less than 4 hours per day), a lunch break is not required.

It’s time for the grand totals you have been waiting for.

- Case A: Using a secretary for every office duty costs a business owner $2112 per month.

- Case B: Utilizing a secretary part time while outsourcing phone management duties to an answering service costs a business owner $1306.00 per month.

Based on these figures, utilizing an answering service can save a business owner $816.00 per month ($9792.00 per year). Keep in mind that this figure does not include the increase in business by having an after hours, 24/7 live operator presence managing your calls. A live operator will strengthen customer relationships and project the image of a larger, more secure & dependable business to your customers (& potential customers). I suppose the title of this article should have been “Don’t Fire Your Secretary, Just Cut Their Hours”.

Todd Cardin is the eastern regional sales manager for Specialty Answering Service (http://www.specialtyansweringservice.net). For more information on Specialty Answering Service, please e-mail us at info@specialtyansweringservice.net”>info@specialtyansweringservice.net or log on to http://www.specialtyansweringservice.net.

Does it feel at times as if you can’t achieve the goals you are setting for yourself no matter what you do? Do you feel as if all your efforts are a waste of time because nothing seems to get any better for you? Maybe it’s not the effort you’re putting forth that’s the problem. Maybe it’s the goals that you have set for yourself.

We humans have the habit at times of seeing the big picture as the issue we need to deal with at the moment. Then when the big issue hasn’t been dealt with in the time frame we envision, we get discouraged and decide that it’s not worth the effort.

Let me share a couple examples with you to show what I mean. Let’s say you’ve decided you need to lose fifty pounds to get to the weight you want to be at. That’s great. But what is your plan to lose the fifty pounds?

What changes in your diet and exercise regimen are you going to implement in order to achieve your goal? And more importantly. what is a safe and realistic average for you to lose each week and how many weeks will that plan take you to lose the fifty pounds?

Let’s look at another example. You have an internet business and you have set a goal for yourself to quit your job and work full-time on the internet within a year.

Once again, that is a great plan. But how much will you need to make in your on-line business on a monthly basis in order to achieve your goal in a year? And how much will you need to make each day in order to hit that mark each month? What markrting plans do you have in place and will thay make it possible for you to make that much each day?

You see, it’s not always your efforts that are the problem. Sometimes it’s simply a matter of not having a well thought out plan, and confusing goals with dreams. The big picture is the dream. That’s what you eventually hope to accomplish, whether it’s losing fifty pounds, working full-time on the internet, or whatever the case may be.

Your goals are the short term plans you have that link together to get you to your dream. If you try to achieve the big dream all at once without a viable plan made up of short term goals, you will soon get discouraged and give up without ever realizing your dreams.

So, if you’re expectations outweigh your achievments, then maybe you’re trying to reach the top of the ladder without climbing from rung to rung.

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Much has been written about writing down goals and regularly reviewing and updating them as a major party of self improvement and success. Likewise, it is considered that a plan for the achievement of any goal, and breaking major goals into manageable steps are essential. If you are thinking of stating a new business or any major undertaking, thorough research is certainly required. It is also unlikely that any new businesses will get far without a well written and researched business plan, and the chances of raising money from a bank without one are probably zero.

However, it is possible to spend too much time in preparation, writing and rewriting, researching and exploring, or waiting for everything to be just right. This can even be a form of procrastination, or perhaps a fear of taking the first steps. One thing that you can rely on - conditions will never be just right!!

There’s great deal of invaluable self improvement advice available to help with all the steps necessary for achievement and success. But you can be certain that little will ever be achieved without action - sustained, determined and committed action. Many highly successful people and companies started out with little in the way of written plans, and almost certainly without having just the right conditions in place. But one thing you can be sure of - they took action, and probably massive action, in the direction of their clearly held visions.

Self Improvement Quote of the Day:

“You will never stub your toe by standing still, but the faster you go, the more chance you have of getting somewhere!” - Charles Kettering

Garry Zancanaro is the founder of Self Improvement Directory, a website dedicated to Self Improvement and Personal Development, and to helping people live more successful and fulfilling lives by providing a directory of the highest quality Self Growth resources available. Includes many FREE eBooks and much more. Visit http://www.selfimprovementdirectory.com/index.html