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One of the easiest ways to make big improvements in your business or life is to follow the Japanese theory of constant never-ending improvement.

This means making small changes everyday which eventually produce big changes over time.

For example, in your personal life, this could mean taking your office stairs instead of your elevator everyday. This may not seem like a big change to your daily life, but after a year of climbing stairs everyday, this would greatly affect your body.

In the same way, if you want to make cumulative changes in your business over time, check out these 4 ways to save money in your small business in 30 minutes or less:

1. Stand in your meetings

Researchers at Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri, reported that groups working together on a project while standing are measurably more engaged than while seated. Studies have also shown that standing in meetings decreases the amount of time spent in meetings, and increases the productivity in meetings. Standing in meetings will mean that less time and employees salaries are lost on meetings.

2. Use team building software

Team engagement software such as TinyPulse asks employees once a week to write anonymous feedback for management or write a note recognizing someone at work. The process only takes about 5 minutes a week, however according to the Harvard Business Review, studies have shown that if employees feel more engaged at work, the company itself is more likely to be successful. The small act of asking what employees feel and taking action on these items will help employees be more engaged at work, and will also lower turn over, reducing company costs.

3. Use cloud accounting software

Signing up with cloud accounting software such as Xero can take under 30 minutes to setup but can save you hours of work down the line. Xero allows you to connect your business accounts to a real time software so you can see the real status of your accounts and how much money you have and owe in present time. It can also help you to send out electronic invoices so that people can pay faster via online methods and helps you to not forget invoices that haven’t been paid – saving you money.

4. Green your office

Make one small change a month to green your office, help the environment, and cut down on office energy costs. This can include changing lighting to CFL light bulbs, using timed auto shut off power outlets that have timers that force items to switch off after a certain amount of time and eliminating the use of screen savers and setting computers to sleep when a computer is not in use to reduce energy use.

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If you are looking for more ways to reduce costs in your small business, give us a call today for a free consult.