Happy New Year!  If you’re running a small business, this is a stressful time of the year.  You just got through the crunch of year end, and you’d like to take a deep breath, but you can’t.  Now it’s time to start the company rolling towards its 2008 goals.  You’ve got to close out 2007 – tax filings, financial statements, file changeovers and more – while getting a good start to the New Year.

Need to do more with less in 2008?  Of course you do.  Here are a few suggestions that might help you focus more time on your business and less time on “busy-ness” in 2008:

• Keep separate a/p and a/r records by year.  It might seem tempting to save the time of creating a new set of files, but you’ll get that time back ten-fold if you just invest a few hours now to start the year out right.
• Don’t skip your tax filing dates.  W-2’s are due at the end of this month, and 1099’s are due to recipients at the end of this month and the end of February to the IRS.  Make the time to get these done; it will save countless headaches later.
• Get everyone on the same page with calendars and organizers.  Publish a schedule of important dates now – sales meetings, company picnics, the boss’ vacation – to reduce problems and surprises later. 

The days are short, the work is hard and there’s a normal post-holiday letdown.  Cookies always help!