Growing a business from scratch is tough. Worth it. But tough.
It takes guts, resilience and the ability to lead and inspire the team around you.
We started out in 2011 with zero working capital, and today we have 5 full-time talented employees, established clients from around the world and we’re not planning on slowing down anytime soon.
I strongly believe that building smart business processes has been an integral part in getting to where we are today because it takes a while to figure out what works and what doesn’t when it comes to managing files, workflow, communication, documentation, teamwork… pretty much everything you need to run a successful creative agency (or any small business for that matter).
The truth be known, I’m always a little resistant to changing the way we do things, but that’s natural right? I’m a person after all, and people tend to dislike change. I think this is because change usually means: time, hassle, cost and a general distraction from the million other things we’re trying to juggle on a daily basis.
But change, I’ve discovered, when you make smart and educated choices will be the driver behind increased productivity and job satisfaction (it even feels strangely invigorating!).
Before Chaptr decided to make significant changes by introducing new software tools, we used email to manage project communication and word documents (saved on local drives) to keep track of processes and documents. Not ideal.
So if you run a small business and are looking for ways to reduce stress and increase productivity on a daily basis, I urge you to checkout these six products we couldn’t live without at Chaptr:
DropBox
“Reinventing teamwork.”
Primary use: Storing and sharing design assets for client projects.
Why we love it: Everything is in the cloud, everything is accessible. Using DropBox is a cardinal rule for the team at Chaptr, it means we can still access an InDesign file to make the client’s ‘final changes’ when the project designer is enjoying a cold one on a sunny beach somewhere with his phone turned off (speaking from experience).
Basecamp
“It’s the saner, calmer, organized way to manage projects and communicate company-wide.”
Why we love it: With Basecamp key team members have complete visibility over communication and we split project phases into new discussions which keeps things tidy, provides a complete audit trail and helps avoid the ‘he said, she said’ scenario (without spending hours trawling through email chains).
Trello
“Trello keeps track of everything, from the big picture to the minute details.”
Primary use: Lightweight task management for the whole team.
Why we love it: Each team member has a Trello board to manage their tasks on a daily basis, it’s a simple as “To Do”, “Review”, “With Client” and “Complete” (these make up the lists).
Slack
“Where work* happens.”
Primary use: Day-to-day team communication.
Why we love it: Slack is a really fast and easy and quick way to communicate with team members. You can easily mute conversations and disable alerts for a set time period when you don’t want to be distracted. Plus the integrations are awesome; we link it to Trello and Basecamp which means team communication and workflow management are seamlessly linked. The built-in voice call feature works immaculately and makes virtual meetings a doddle.
Xero
“Xero helps you stay on top of your cash flow and get paid on time, all in just a few clicks.”
Primary use: Issuing customer invoices and managing costs/expenses.
Why we love it: The ability to link your bank account to Xero means you won’t miss any outgoings, which are ‘reconciled’ into the system. It’s affordable, easy to manage with powerful reporting features. We started off with a really basic invoicing system which was free which meant moving to Xero was a bit of a pain because of the legacy data; well worth it in the end though.
Confluence
Primary use: Team collaboration.
Why we love it: Confluence allows us to keep all our process documents ‘live’. We can make changes, collaborate on ideas and everyone has access to the most recent document version. It’s also a great way to discuss company updates and marketing ideas etc.