Survival has been on the minds of many leaders recently. But businesses are shifting their focus to resilience. What does it take to build businesses that can survive AND thrive in the longer term? Past methods may not work as well in the ‘new’ environment. Then again, what will really change? In this article, we’ll look at some attributes of resilient businesses.

Old habits may be keeping your business from maximising profitability. Breaking these habits will strengthen the business. Your accountants are well-placed to help you change since we deal with the relevant numbers, can perform the analysis and can make actionable recommendations. Don’t get stuck with old bad habits, especially where there are opportunities to quickly improve the bottom line.

There are many ways to improve business performance but which initiatives will bring the biggest impact? This article identifies some metrics or ‘drivers’ which grow revenue, profit and business value. Establish how you are performing now and measure the impact of any improvement. Focus on the things that matter! 

We outline some of the newest updates happening in the world of Xero that should hopefully brighten up your working day. 

Xero has introduced more granular invoicing options in Projects, allowing users to show time as individual line items on an invoice. Users can now choose to include details such as the staff member, date, task and description from their time entries. This feature is available on both the web and the Projects mobile apps versions of Xero.

From 28 September 2018, the monthly subscription price for Xero will increase as a result of new functionality.

Summer can be a tricky time for cash flow. It doesn’t have to be; the quiet summer period can be incredibly productive. Use Xero's small business advisory panel's practical tips to avoid the summer slump.

Learn why spending time on getting your small business structure right is just as important as the exciting times ahead as a new business startup.

Running a business without a business plan is like rock climbing blindfolded. Your chances of making it successfully to the top are slim. 

A business plan is a step-by-step guide to running your business and creating a product or service that will make it successful in the marketplace.

Here at Alliotts it’s been a good few weeks of everyone working diligently to ensure our clients are all geared up for financial year end. Therefore it might be apt to say this month’s article is a little light given the seriousness of this time of year.

On the countdown to Christmas, use our entertainment deductibility table to make sure you get your business entertainment expenses right this year. Download your free copy.

In essence, providing food and wine gifts are only 50% deductible. Historically there has been ambiguity around this but as of 1 September 2016 it is definitely only 50%. (This is of particular relevance to real estate agents.)

When you have more money going out of the business than is coming in, if you can’t pay your bills, you’re running at a loss. You may have a big order in the pipeline that will cover you but you might need to seek out a loan to cover you until the money comes through.

You can distinguish temporary cash flow issues from larger issues but, either way, you need to act.

For many business owners, racking up charges on behalf of a customer (disbursements) is part of doing business. You can, hopefully, pass on all those disbursements to your customers as billable expenses. The key is to keep track of what charges go with which customer.

We outline exactly how Xero can help you to do that.

Xero’s Business Performance dashboard was released last month and marks the start of a new wave of Xero functionality with new, more powerful insights into the health and performance of your business.