Spring is upon us and after a year of uncertainty, confusion and restrictions it’s time to get the duster out and look at how you as a company can embrace the new normal and work on the business instead of in it.

We all have repetitive tasks we need to accomplish every day, week, month or year but how efficient you can make those tasks can make all the difference between staff burnout and a great working atmosphere. Identify anything you do in the company repeatably and look at ways to automate it or minimise the manual entry side. The one thing computers are great at is repetitive tasks so make the most of your internal systems, investigate new software or look into bespoke solutions that are tailored to your needs.

Documentation is a clear win, there is now a huge number of software products out there that you can access in the cloud that will reduce manual entry, eliminate human error and get you working more efficiently. Cloud based software cuts down on costs, has very little downtime if any and is constantly being updated and refined with new features. Try and find companies that understand your industry rather than generic solutions to cut down on the learning curve. Talk to your peers, what software are they using and would recommend. Look for online reviews from reputable companies, pay attention to negative reviews but take them with a pinch of salt. No software is ever completely bug free it’s more important that software maintenance is fast without too much downtime.

don’t stay with a product just because you think it would be hard to leave.

Don’t forget to look at your current software processes as well. Are you guilty of using only a small portion of the features on your current software? You’re not alone. According to a recent Standish research 20 percent of software features are often used, while 50 percent of features are hardly ever or never used. That leaves 30 percent of features that are used infrequently. Make it your goal this year to make your software work for you and go through those tutorials or help files to really get the most out of your investment. If you find that your software isn’t addressing your core needs? Then maybe it’s time to rethink, don’t stay with a product just because you think it would be hard to leave.

Make a plan – list out the process areas you would like to look into, an outcome you would like to achieve and give it a date so that you can work towards it.  Whatever you decide to do take your time, there’s no rush and there are definitely no perfect solutions just work in progress. If you’re ready to improve your process for creating handover documents then get in touch for an informal chat about how Dokkit can help. Need more information about O&Ms? Check out our guide here.