Typically, the day for an average staff member at a NYC small business looks something like this: At nine o’clock they come in, log in, and walk away to settle in and get coffee. They go back to their desks to open up Outlook and now have up to another five minutes to chat with a neighbor about the latest episode of Game of Thrones. Once email finally comes up they can start catching up on correspondence when suddenly they see a client is asking about a file they urgently need resent. Now the employee has to go get the file off the network, only to find that they are getting an error saying they cannot access that file. Feeling frustrated, they try to get the file a few more times only to resign themselves to the fact that there is a problem with the server.

They then go right to the in-office tech specialist, the receptionist. The receptionist was not only hired for their ability to answer phones and multi-task, but for their youth and presumed expertise with all things tech. Once the receptionist lets the office employee know that the server has been rebooted, they successfully retrieve the file and attach it to the email they have ready to send to the client, who has already has called once about it. Upon hitting the “Send” button, the dreaded, but expected, happens; the internet is down, again. One more trip to the receptionist, and twenty minutes later the internet modem has been rebooted as well, restoring the internet and finally allowing that email to go out to the client. What should have taken seconds, has now taken more than an hour and a portion of the trust the client once had that they would be well taken care of.

The cost of inefficiencies and loss of productivity can be more accurately calculated by not only how many hours you pay your employees to struggle to do their jobs, but by the impact of the heavy cost that is felt in poor customer retention and loyalty. Both of these will show clearly on you bottom line. What are you doing to eliminate inefficiencies? Are there inefficiencies you can identify but are not sure how to address? Can you be doing more to remove costly inefficiencies? Answering these questions can not just improve morale, but customer retention rates as well.