It's a Team's Life

Happy New Year!

Happy New Year!

Last week I wrote about how I wrap up our business at the end of a year. This week I will talk about processes to hit the ground running in the new year.

First, let me just say that I hope you are having a wonderful holiday season. Whether you decided to keep working or went home for some much needed family time or enjoyed down time to recharge physically, emotionally and mentally I hope that you are spending the holidays in a way that makes you happy.

Now, let's get ready for an amazing 2025! How do you prepare yourself, your equipment and your business? For us, we each have responsibilities in our business. Dave takes care of the truck to make sure that it is ready to roll. I take care of the analytical part of the business.

We prepare ourselves by making sure that we are well rested and ready to begin the new year strong. We go through the truck and remove the things we have not used in a while and add the things that we find most necessary.

As far as the truck is concerned, Dave makes sure that all lights are working and that belts and hoses are not showing any wear. He also makes sure that all mileage milestones reached are addressed with the necessary preventative maintenance performed before we begin working again.

I take care of getting ready to run our business by looking at the previous year, analyzing what we did right and what could have been done better. Because we are partners in our business we discuss our thoughts on how we can improve in the new year. Once we decide how we want to run our business I have an idea of how I will select the work that we do throughout the year. If our plan does not seem to be working as the year progresses, I will be able to see that as the year moves forward and we can change coarse at that point.

I have a spiral bound book that I created to record all the loads we do. Each page is set up to record one load with all the details including pick up and delivery locations, contact information and revenue earned. I set up files on my laptop to organize everything that I save including, business bills, settlements, receipts, emails and any other correspondence that the business receives. I also make sure that my spreadsheets are set up for the new year too.

This about sums it up for our business. Are there things that you do that I did not mention? I am always interested in learning from business owners who have so much more experience than we have.

Here’s to millions of safe and profitable miles in the new year!

Kelly Plumb