Less is More

Everything wants to be efficient. It is a law of nature and a law of business. The path to efficiency is to eliminate waste. And waste comes in two main forms - Steps and Stuff. This post is about Stuff and the virtuousness of getting rid of as much stuff as possible. We will talk about getting rid of Steps in another post.

We all are comforted, in some part, by our stuff. It has a way of making us feel safe, or well off, or not alone, or something. Americans in particular have a love affair with stuff. Witness the $20+ billion self-storage industry. But Stuff is not free. Stuff needs space, it deteriorates, it gets stolen, it rusts, molds, gets eaten, needs to be insured, hides other stuff, occupies our mind and requires our attention. Stuff sits and a lot of it is waste. Stuff needs to go.

One of the untold stories of the last century of enterprise and technology is the dramatic reduction in use of stuff. You heard that right - dramatic reduction. Before I explain that, remember that efficiency is a law of nature - "Over the long haul, the most efficient wins". Let me rephrase that by saying "Over the long haul, she who uses the least amount of stuff to accomplish the same end, wins".

So how can I say that less stuff is used today? Think about the most obvious example of media. Digital media has almost completely replaced the hard material, space consuming CDs and DVDs (which by the way replaced previously even more Stuff). Kindles and eReaders are dramatically reducing the number of bookshelf hogging, dust collecting paper books. In fact, all of my music, movies and books can now fit in my (Relax Fit) front pocket. Smaller house anyone?

And what about those smaller houses? Houses, and skyscrapers for that matter, now require considerably less building materials than they did 100 years ago (on a square foot basis). Material engineering and innovative design have allow us to building much trimmer, graceful structures that would have been impossible previously. All with less stuff. The list of industries goes on and on: the computer industry, agriculture, transportation, energy - all do more, create better products, deliver more value - using less stuff.

So how does this relate to the administration of your personnel function? I thought you'd never ask. The inevitable march toward Less Stuff includes your department as well. Your department - payroll, HR, benefits admin - wants to use less stuff. It needs to use less stuff. (It wants to do less Steps as well, but as I said, we'll get to that at another time).

Here is a list of stuff that you can, and should reduce:

1. Computer (IT) Stuff. Managing payroll and HR requires big, beefy computer systems, right? Not anymore. Systems to manage your personnel function are moving to the cloud meaning less stuff in your business and office. Less computers, less cabling, less backup devices, etc. By moving your systems to the cloud, you reduce your IT footprint in your business significantly. Your business just got more efficient.
2. Paper Stuff. Yes, you need a document retention policy, so don't take this to mean you don't. But by intelligently digitizing documents and records (converting paper to electrons) and sharing them, you dramatically reduce the cost of storing files, protecting files, shipping files, copying files, and looking for files. All of these actions cost you real money. By reducing paper waste, you dramatically reduce your costs, gain office space and clarity of mind.
3. People . Yeah, I had to say it. But you already knew it because the people you had were probably already reduced anyways, leaving you to do everything. But the reality is, you need to do your job and you're probably are not going to be given a ton of people resources to get it done. That is were technology is your friend. Today's workforce management systems allow considerably leaner personnel departments to get more done than before by automating tasks, pushing responsibilities back out to employees and their managers, and delivering more consolidated information back to you. All with less people. You know what? I bet you never liked having to manage all those clerks anyways! Less people is more efficient.

Less is More. Make a vow to do something nice for yourself and good for your business - get rid of stuff. You may find you never want it back.

Proving my previous point

Just to prove me point re the post below, I am now posting this via my smartphone!

What do your employees and Angry Birds have in common?

One of the big story lines in the last five years in technology has been the rise of the importance of the consumer. For nearly two decades it was the Enterprise (business) that dictated how and where technology progressed. This was the heyday of Microsoft - consumers were allowed to participate, but it was business that drove how technology developed. That all changed with a little device called the iPhone. People clamored for them, fell in love, and then demanded that their employers figure out a way to accommodate and incorporate their use "at the the Enterprise level". In technology, the consumer now reigns supreme.

With accounting and payroll systems, typically technology laggards even in the old Enterprise world, the question is, how deep into corporate systems will consumers and their smart phones go? Hard to imagine stodgy old personnel management systems, with their big databases, high transaction volumes, need for airtight security all administered by back office staff tasked with grinding out reports, checks and ledgers going the way of Angry Birds and Google Maps, right? Think again. It's happening and it is happening fast.

Just as many are rightly embracing the move of corporate systems to the cloud, the smart phone ecosystem (namely Google's Android and Apples iOS) is extending those systems into the hands of the people. Actually, by making the giant leap from on-premise corporate servers to the web and cloud-based applications, moving things to the phone turned into a tiny leap. It's happening and anyone who has employees better be ready to provide tools and information to them via smartphone platforms. And anyone who provides tools and services to employers better be ready to help them with this.

So what are some examples of employer tools delivered via smart phone platforms? How about a manager being able to view which of their employees are clocked in or out at any given moment? How about an employee requesting time off and a manager approving or rejecting that time off, both via their smartphone? What about submitting a simple payroll to your payroll processing partner via your smart phone? What about an employee reviewing, via their smartphone, their PTO balance, the time punches for the week, or their previous pay stub? All of these things are either available today or in development. You can bet that more will come.

What seemed unlikely just a little while ago, is now happening, and happening fast. Employers, and those that serve them, had better stay alert. Because like Angry Birds, their employees want to be on a smartphone as well...

Not blah blah blah

Why Us? is the most important question to be able to answer in business. And Why You? is the most important question to ask when selecting a partner for important business processes relating to your personnel function. Often the answer is sounds something like “blah blah blah”. Here is our answer. You decide for yourself (or give us feedback on what you think of our answer at info@paynorthwest.com !)

Why PayNorthwest?

1.       We think our technology is the best in the market and will make your job easier.

2.       We are small and hungry so we walk over hot coals to serve our customers.

3.       Our ownership is uptight and conservative, so we have taken extreme measures to make sure that every tax return, every dollar and every calculation we touch is right. Every time.

4.       Our “thing” is being an Expert Partner. We acknowledge your expertise, and bring ours to the table. We think by partnering with you, we can help you succeed, look good, and be a better employer.

Sound interesting? Give us a call or contact us at sales@paynorthwest.com. Sound like “blah blah blah”? Let us know at info@paynorthwest.com. We’ll try to get better.

PayNorthwest launches new Employer e-newsletter

So it took a bit of work, but PayNorthwest finally launched it's Employer e-newsletter. Part of our "secret recipe" (okay, not so secret) is Knowledge, as in our mantra: Systems-Knowledge-Service. We usually refer to the Knowledge that our staff has of all things payroll related. But we also believe in our clients knowledge and sharing! That's the power of partnership. So, in an effort to add a little bit of knowledge and to share, we created the Employer e-Newsletter. This monthly tome will hopefully be chock full of helpful tips, updates and information that helps our business community and clients better manage the personnel side of their business.

We hope this adds just a little bit to the conversation. If you would like to check it out, go to: http://www.bizactions.com/n.cfm/page/e116/key/174585615G2701J4667353/  Hope you like it.

Fortune Bank posts nice feature on PayNorthwest

Hey, really nice feature of PayNorthwest by one of our partners - Fortune Bank. Check it out:
https://www.fortunebankwa.com/about/customers/paynorthwest.asp

Payroll companies and banks work closely together and they both handle and move a lot of funds on behalf of their clients. Having a responsive and atuned partner like Fortune Bank really makes a nice difference. And thanks to them for this nice little feature of our growing company.

What it takes to get it right

We understand that we have to be nails when it comes to payroll tax compliance for our clients. For many employers looking a payroll service bureaus, getting the taxes right is job one. Here's what we have done recently to make sure that we can offer the highest level of assurance to our customers: we have just signed a multi-year contract extension with MasterTax - then leading payroll tax platform in the US. MasterTax is used in-house by many Fortune 500 companies such as Starbucks, General Dynamics, Cononco Phillips to name a few. It is also used by us. Why? MasterTax supports over 10,000 Federal, State and Local payroll taxing agencies in the US. That's pretty much all of them.

But that's not all.. Part of the trick is knowing which taxes come in to play and for this, employers need to look at exact address of work and home locations. To solve this problem, PayNorthwest also utilizes a sophisticated tax engine that employs geo-spatial mapping to determine exact locations, to then determine tax jurisdiction.

But that's not all. We then apply the most important ingredient - human intelligence (our people) to make sure it is right. So that's how we nail it for our clients - sophisticated systems combined with human intelligence. Shhhh. Don't tell anyone...