KNOWING WHATS NOT HAPPENING IS IMPORTANT TO

By Mark Porter

Information is obviously very valuable because it identifies what is happening in your business.

For example how many estimates did you do last month. What did it cost you to run that job. How much revenue was generated by different job types. etc.

But Information can also provide tremendous value by telling you what is not happening in your business.

We often call these Exception Reports. They identify things that didn't or aren't happening in your company and this can be invaluable information.

Lets look at some examples.

What if every Friday afternoon you could get a list of all jobs shipped last week but not billed. This information can be determined very quickly and avoids the potential situation of losing revenue or the embarassement of billing a customer much later when the mistake is evetually discovered.

You can also avoid the even more embarrassing situation of Jobs Billed but Not Shipped.

Another example of identifying things that are not happening in your business can be in the area of No Recent Estimates or No Recent jobs.

You can identify when a customer is starting to move his business to another supplier. The sooner your company can identify this trend the greater your chance of correcting the situation and gaining back the customer's confidence and revenue.

It is great to know what jobs were shipped today but it is just as important to know which jobs were scheduled to be shipped to day and weren't.

Won/Loss Estimate Reports not only tell you the customers and job types you are doing well with but also identify customers and job types that are fading and again allowing you to identify that trend as soon as possible so that you can take corrective action.

It is always good to know what goods you received today but it is tremendous value to know as soon as possible which goods didn't show up. Goods that didn't arrive on time threaten delivery times and throw off production schedules.

Knowing which employees on the first shift clocked in can be useful but the real value is identifying how many and which employees didn't clock in so that you can adjust the production schedule accordingly or call in more help.

It is great to know which dies were used but it is also good to know which dies have not been used in the last 2 years so that they can be destroyed or sent back to the customer.

So we can see that Information can bring tremendous benefits by telling you what is happening in your business but it can also bring tremendous benefit by telling you what is not happening in your business