Corey Bray — December 22, 2016 Follow @legalnatureAs the year begins to wind down, businesses need to start preparing all of their necessary documents and reports for tax season and investor presentations.
This same data is going to help guide owners in a positive corporate direction to ensure profitability in the year to follow.
Failing to take any of these much needed steps can result in legal troubles, damaged investor relations, or organizational efficiency problems in the near future.
Here are the details regarding what documents and tasks you should be completing before the year’s end.
Financial Statements
This is where the majority of your time will likely be spent. While financial records should be maintained throughout the year, in December this becomes increasingly vital.
The purpose of these statements is to equip business insiders and associates with a concise depiction of a company’s financial standings.
Assemble a comprehensive financial report consisting of balance sheets that include assists, liabilities, and corporate capital along with profit and loss statements and cash flow reports.
These three elements will help to determine your organization’s annual financial outcome, asset management, and what the company owes and owns.
At the same time, ensure that your organization settles any outstanding accounts, whether it be money that is owed to your brand or money that is owed by your brand.
Be sure to resolve as many outstanding balances as possible to help mitigate any unnecessary tax-related stresses.
Business Plan Overhaul
Business plans are living things in that they should constantly be updated and adjusted as a company grows.
With the year coming to a close, your company’s financial status is fully established, and heaps of digital performance data is at your disposal. It is time to analyze the stats and begin revising your business plan.
Review the original plan and compare that with insights gained since the company’s initial conception. Another focal point is to scrutinize sales figures to determine where your brand is excelling, where pivots must be made, and what needs to be scrapped. Every business has successes and failures; the key is to correctly identify both.
Policy Updates
Most companies have policy and procedural guidelines for employees to follow. Not many organizations update these protocols on a regular basis, which makes them susceptible in various areas regarding human resource issues.
Review your company’s current guidelines and cross reference those with any technological updates that have occurred, overall goals of the institution, performance changes, and any other alterations in how business is handled that have taken place since it was first written.
It is also wise to include or amend any necessary employee information, like benefits, disciplinary actions, compensation, and other areas of interest. This inspires transparency and helps to highlight any staff changes you may need in the coming year as well.
Maintaining these documents and reports as the year progresses is ideal over trying to tackle everything at the 11th hour, but these are all tasks that need yearly maintenance at a minimum in order to ensure an organization runs smoothly, remains cost-effective, and maintains profitability.
If you have not handled all of these tasks with due diligence this year, take heart—that’s what New Year’s resolutions are all about. It is never too late to take a highly organized approach to running your business.
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