The best way to get your financial statements is to let someone else do them for you and present you with the results. There are several important reasons why I am making that statement and only one of them has to do with the fact that this is what I do.

The most important reason to have someone else do your books is that it is not what you do. You do your business. It is what makes you your money. Your time and energy should go towards managing and growing your business.

If you have someone else do your books, you have another set of eyes on your books looking for opportunities and anomalies. When you pass it off to someone who does books for several different companies, in different industries, you get a wealth of experience on your side. You get someone who knows and can share the best practices available.

Bookkeeping and small business tax can be tricky. It is important to have someone who is keeping up with the latest information doing your books. Make sure your bookkeeper has access to several good, reliable sources of information.

Your focus should be on making your business work better. Use your strengths and delegate the rest. If you find bookkeeping, or any task, saps your energy, pass it on. I tell people, “We can do your books faster than you can worry about it”.

The value of the information is in your financial statements not in the entering of the receipts. When you transact your business, when you sell things and buy things, you know what you are doing. Taking your time to sit down and enter each one of those receipts will not give you any more information. It is not until they are compiled and presented to you in a standard format like a profit and loss statement that you can start to look at your information and see how you are doing.

This advice applies to all tasks that sap your energy. It may seem like it doesn’t make sense to pay someone to do work that you can do, but if you can spend that time increasing your profit by more than it costs you, you will be farther ahead. Save your energy for the work that is important and that gives you pleasure.

Do what you love and you’ll never work a day in your life!