Wouldn’t you like more time to focus on financial results and improvements?

Anyone with an Accounting Job can all relate to unproductive meetings, wasted time on IM, never being able to get anything done and only being able to focus when everyone is gone. This continually having to switch gears and spend 15 minutes on this, 10 minutes on that, leads to being unproductive and creates stress.

Think of how much you can get done on a long flight. Now, think through the last week. How many uninterrupted hours did you have? How can you successfully come up with a new strategy or provide a thorough analysis on results in 15-minute chunks of time?

I just finished reading the book “It Doesn’t Have to be Crazy at Work” by Jason Fried and David Heinemeier Hansson. Jason and David walk through the culture they have tried to maintain at their company, Basecamp. It contained so many insights on how to make crazy and stressed environments better, I wanted to share with my accounting peers!

1. Get rid of your instant messaging system. This is an easy out and allows people to ask prior to thinking for themselves. IM steals focus. Schedule “office hours” and unless it is a true “fire” wait until then.
2. Enjoy the “JOMO” instead of “FOMO” (The “joy of missing out” vs. the “fear of missing out”)
3. Get rid of the shared calendar. How many meetings would you be invited to if someone had to ask what your schedule was instead of being able to view it online?

8 hours a day is actually a really long time, even for accounting professionals. Protect your time during the day and go home.

The Calm Starts With You

Implement these ideas and your Accounting Department will experience a state of calm, not stress. Watch the productivity and focus increase and the level of stress and mistakes decrease. Who knows, there may be such a difference that other areas may copy your new look!

Good Luck,

Your Greater Phoenix area executive recruiter specializing in accounting jobs and finance jobs.