Streamline Organizational Services' main goals are to help small business owners:
Simplify - avoid redundancies and unnecessary tasks; finish jobs completely.
Accelerate - achieve more to increase profits.
Maintain - stop losing ground.
Ruth is continuing to offer Office Management Consulting Services on a limited basis. For 10 years, she has been helping savvy business owners realize the potential in their offices. An efficient office should serve as a foundation to support valuable resources like:
* Money
* Time
* Effort
* Talent
* Brainpower
Imagine what could be achieved if office chaos were converted into productivity. Imagine what your employees could achieve if they were happy and motivated. Imagine what could happen if the burden of administrative overload was relieved.
An investment in organization significantly reduces consumption of resources and will quickly pay for itself through the resulting time and money saved. A few examples are listed below.
Organizational Impact Case Studies
Case Study 1: Complete Office Evaluation & Database Improvements/Non-profit
An executive director was experiencing low morale, low productivity, and was finding too many inaccuracies in the work of highly regarded employees. Streamline evaluated the office by sitting with all employees to learn more about how they performed their jobs. Suggestions for improvements were formulated and then discussed at a planning meeting with everyone in attendance. Simple improvements were implemented by both the Executive Director and staff. Streamline was contracted to make necessary improvements to the Microsoft Access database.
The current database contained 12 valuable tables. However, the tables were not tied together, underutilizing the power of Access. Streamline determined the best design for relating the tables and discussed the design at a planning meeting. After tweaks were made to the design, the changes were implemented.
Return on Investment
Total Cost: $3,540.
Savings: When five employees each saved just 10 minutes per day, the resulting savings equaled $60/week. Service paid for itself in just over one year.
Benefits
Database:
* Data integrity improved because identical information was no longer being stored in multiple places.
* Updating was simplified.
* Data became more useful. Questions could now be answered easily without manually creating reports from data in multiple tables. Queries were designed to answer common questions with a touch of a button. Better reporting to the board resulted in more-informed decision making.
* Common day-to-day tasks were automated vs. manually creating in Excel. Accuracy improved.
* Previously wasted time was redirected to productive tasks.
Overall Office Evaluation
* Morale increased because simple communication issues were resolved. The issues of a truly unhappy employee were resolved in a congenial and positive fashion.
* Employees were recognized for their past positive achievements. The root causes of negative issues were corrected and no longer taken personally.
* Staff was back to working as a team.
Case Study 2: Simple Mailing List Update Project
A marketing firm produced a high-end direct mail campaign to doctors consisting of multiple dimensional mailings per year. The mailing list, however, was not regularly updated. This resulted in a large number of pieces being returned undeliverable. Streamline's price to update the list beat the competitive bid from the client's direct mail house. Streamline received and disassembled 2,000 pieces and returned salvageable contents to marketing firm. All remaining materials were recycled. Addresses without forwarding information were deleted from the mailing list while those with forwarding information were updated.
Return on Investment
Total Cost: $1,200
Savings: The entire box/kit cost $9.19 to produce and mail. 2,000 addresses of the 37,000 mailed were deleted or updated resulting in a savings of $18,380 on the next mailing.
Benefits
* Higher sales potential since message is now reaching intended audience.
* Increased integrity of marketing firm.
* Significant environmental benefits due to less waste.
Case Study 3: Workspace Revamping
Employees were tripping over each other in the messy back office. Streamline broke out the tape measure and started with the layout of big furniture first. The room was adjusted according to the necessary workflow. Under-utilized shelving was put to use. All items required by each worker were placed within arm's reach. Shelves were labeled to ensure continued organization. Tripping over each other was eliminated. Tools required by employees were easy to find. No purchases were required.
Return on Investment
Total Cost: $290
Savings: Service pays for itself in just fourteen weeks after 2-$10/hr employees each save just 13 minutes/day.
Benefits
Less frustration. Higher morale because employer cared enough to improve employees' working conditions. Accuracy improves because tools are more-easily updated since they are not scattered throughout the room. Risk of injury is reduced. Employees can now take ownership of their space in the neat environment.
