Here's my month-end SOP
A fellow reader asked a great question and agreed to let me answer it here for everyone to benefit. Thanks!
I'd like to hear more about your weekly/monthly client schedule, especially how you juggle and prioritize all 10 of your clients on a monthly basis. I was wondering if you go in a client priority order, A-Z, FIFO, or randomly based on what interests you. Also, how do you make sure to keep up with the admin and non-client work?
First off, it makes me so happy to be in a virtual space where you can say FIFO and we all know what you mean :o)
But to answer the question…
My work cadence revolves around when my client meetings are and those are prioritized based on who is paying for my higher tiered packages.
All my client meetings happen on the same day every month (i.e. 2nd Tuesday of the month at 10am). Highest tiered clients meet on the 2nd week of the month, middle tiers are on the 3rd week of the month, lowest tier just gets reporting and no meeting.
My close procedures are then built around meeting those deadlines.
I use this Google sheet tracking spreadsheet to what I need to do for each client.
The different colors tell what I’m responsible for vs what my bookkeeper is responsible for (she’s a non-US based contractor who’s been with me for over 2 years now; we both have access to this file). We each know where we are in the client process based on the “x” indicating completion in the cell.
After each month, I just copy the tab for a new month and delete all of last month’s “x”s and start fresh.
It’s not fancy. I get it. But it works really well for my size and complexity (or lack there of). In fact, I went shopping / demo-ing for a workflow management solution last year and ultimately landed on staying with my spreadsheet. Someone wise (actually can’t remember who) told me: “If it’s not broken and it works for you, don’t change it. Who cares what everyone else is using.”
Wise words for all of life.
And yes, the “Goode” on the far right indicates my own books. I put my own admin work on my client schedule. None of this “cobbler’s kids don’t wear shoes” stuff.
If you’d like a copy of this template, just hit reply and let me know. Happy to share :o)
Talk soon,
Erica
Behind-the-scenes in my business this week:
I was on vacation all last week (family road trip to Rocky Mountain NP and Dinosaur NM) and didn’t check my emails once. I remember how much of the Sunday Scaries I would get in corporate post-vacation. Now when come back from vacation, I’m actually excited to get into the office on Monday. Really.
It probably helps that I have a whole bunch of filters organizing my email for me while I’m gone too :o)
No-Work-Wednesday today looks like a lot of baking (banana bread and cowboy cookies) for our library’s bake sale tomorrow during the 4th. Imagine a cute rural farming community (pop. 3,000) where the parade goes down main street and people still raise money through bake sales like it’s 1992. Yep. That’s where we choose to live.
Money back guarantee, if you get in there and don’t see the value. No questions asked.
More details in the link above.