Businesses are always looking to make a profit from the products or services they offer. To do this, the products and services have to go through several stages, which heavily rely on the proper management of resources. Also referred to as resource planning, resource management involves scheduling, planning, and allocation of resources to get the best value. Here are some business management resources you can use to save money.
1. Intangible Resources
In contrast to tangible assets such as land, vehicles, office equipment, and financial assets such as stocks and bonds, intangible resources refer to any business asset that isn’t physical in nature. This includes goodwill from other players in the business environment, the organizational brand, and intellectual property such as patents, trademarks, trade secrets, and copyrights.
Additionally, there are other resources that exist among the employees, including technical knowledge, creativity, relationships, and social networks. When utilized effectively, intangible resources can be cost-effective business management resources. Intangible resources can be either definite – with a limited shelf life, or indefinite, that is, not confined within a certain time frame. Intangible resources take time to build and can give your business a competitive advantage.
2. Product Resource
These are tangible resources within the business, which could either be a product or service-based business. They may include buildings, machinery, supplies, equipment, and so on. Depending on the type of business you are running, having efficient and effective equipment is critical. However, this equipment may be expensive to buy. Luckily, you have the option of leasing it from an equipment rental company.
Additionally, ensuring the equipment is well-maintained and in optimum condition cuts down on unnecessary costs. For example, if the office printer is slow, you can contact a printer repair technician to identify and solve the problem. If your building needs maintenance, you should start by checking for foundation repairs that may be required. If you have faulty windows, consider hiring commercial glass services.
Business insurance is yet another factor to consider. Business owners should make sure their equipment, machinery, and the building itself are insured. Insuring these tangible resources will cover liability claims or damaged property costs. Businesses that aren’t insured often require the owners to pay out of their pockets in case of damages. Attending to all these issues is among the business management resources that can help your business avoid unwanted costs. Ignoring them will soon land you and your business in financial ruin.
3. Time Resource
Time is one of the business management resources often abused by employees and managers. It’s important to devise strategies that ensure this resource is put to optimum use. As a manager, you should aim for ways of getting the most done within the shortest time. Time is money; so, if you want to increase your profit margins, ensure effective time management.
4. Knowledge Resource
Knowledge is among the most important business management resources that can help you plan better and improve the overall running of your business. It can be captured in the form of text or documented and shared in audio, visual, or other formats. This will ease information retrieval, preserve institutional memory and ensure the posterity of information for future reference.
5. Waste Resource
Also referred to as commercial waste, industrial waste, or trade waste, business waste refers to any type of waste product resulting from business activities. This includes general waste, such as lamination papers, used tissue paper, cardboard, plastic bottles, and packaging materials; food waste; glass waste; hazardous waste that includes either toxic, poisonous, reactive, or corrosive materials; and clinical waste, among others.
To effectively manage your business waste without breaking the bank, start by conducting a waste audit to determine how and what type of waste you produce, the quantity of the waste, and how much of it you produce at a particular time. The waste can also be classified as either biodegradable or non-biodegradable. Next, separate your waste to ensure it’s discarded in the appropriate bins. Where there are insufficient garbage bins, utilize dumpster rentals to safely dispose of the waste.
Reuse materials such as cardboard boxes and recycle waste such as iron and steel scrap, aluminum cans, glass bottles, and plastics to make new profitable products and reduce the waste produced by your business. Managing waste is among the business management resources that can be used to save money.
6. Human Resources
Human resources are among the most important business management resources and are crucial to the success of any business. It’s important to ensure employees aren’t overworked so they can deliver optimum results. The goal for most companies is to have a lean but efficient human resource team to execute their plans. This is one of the ways they could save money on a project.
The benefit of Resource Management
Resource management presents a number of benefits for businesses. These include:
- Avoiding Unforeseen Challenges: By developing and utilizing the available resources, managers can pinpoint potential problems before they take effect. This can help a business save money.
- Improving Overall Efficiency: Managing resources is about ensuring all resources are put to good use and that there are no resources lying idle. Should there be resources that aren’t being used at a particular time, they could be reassigned to alternative projects or set aside for later use.
- Identifying Resource Gaps: Resource management helps in the timely identification of situations that may call for additional manpower or new equipment to successfully complete a project.
- Optimizing Costs: Wastage of money, effort, and time can be eliminated through effective resource management. When proper management of resources is lacking, your business may incur extra costs through the under or overbooking of resources. A bookkeeping service can be helpful in this case.
Techniques Used in Resource Management
There are several techniques that companies use to manage resources. These include:
- Resource Forecasting: Any business manager knows that one can never be too prepared. Resource forecasting is a technique used as part of business management resources to prepare for future resource requirements. To accurately make predictions on potential risks and constraints, managers need to equip themselves with a holistic understanding of all the resources within the business.
- Sharpening Your Resource Management Techniques: There are software and techniques that can help improve your resource management skills. For example, Tempus Resource by ProSymmetry is a critical tool that’s especially useful in resource forecasting and modeling.
- Resource Allocation: This is the process of optimum utilization of all available resources such as people, budget, and materials. When resources are allocated in the right manner, overspending and schedule delays are avoided.
- Resource Scheduling: This involves a three-step process of allocation, aggregation, and scheduling. The allocation has to do with the identification of consumable and reusable resources that are necessary to complete a given project. In aggregation, the second step in this process, the above-identified resources are spread across the entire project until completion. Lastly, the scheduling stage accounts for the limited resources throughout the project since no resources are without limitations.
Skills of an Effective Resource Manager
Even with the most robust business management resources, you still need the right skills for them to be effective for your business. Consider outsourcing a resource manager or getting one from within the business. This person should possess a certain set of skills.
First, they should have the ability to prioritize. Often, people struggle with deciding what tasks need to be completed first, especially when time is limited. Not only is it hard to prioritize individual tasks, but when managing a big team or company, this skill will be put to the test.
It’s therefore important that managers have a clear view of what needs to be accomplished in each project to effectively prioritize tasks to be completed in the initial stages of the project. Resources such as human resources are often simultaneously involved in different projects. Therefore, an effective resource manager should consider how the employees use their time and assign them tasks that are more urgent than others.
Planning
They should also have robust skills in planning and preparation. One could rightfully state that resource management heavily relies on planning and preparation. When deciding on how resources are to be utilized, managers need to consider the availability of resources, costs, and deadlines that need to be met. In doing so, resource managers can effectively and efficiently deploy resources throughout the entire project.
They should also have great communication skills. Imagine working in an environment where there is a breakdown in communication. Regardless of the industry or the role you play in an organization, communication is an important skill to have, especially for resource managers. These have the authority to get work done and must communicate effectively with their teams to keep a business running smoothly.
The choices a resource manager makes directly or indirectly affect a business. It’s important that resource managers communicate clearly to the people and offer clarification whenever needed. Effective communication helps to avoid conflicts that may require business litigation, a process that usually results in wasted time, money, and other resources.
They should be able to handle complex situations. Resource managers need to understand that if, for example, they move an employee from one project to another due to insufficient resources, this may affect a project’s deliverables. Deadlines may be missed and the work might not get done according to set standards. What this means is that resource managers should be very keen on how they allocate resources and projects. They should match the right skills for projects. Failure to do so will affect the quality of products and services offered by a company.
Flexibility
They should be flexible. Resource managers should not strictly work by the book. They should have a creative outlook on things so as to adopt alternative and more effective ways of achieving the company’s goals. For example, if a current marketing strategy is not working, they should consider outsourcing a marketing consultant for help on how to reach their target market. If you were previously using online platforms, an effective resource manager may recommend getting a sign service to help you set up billboards and signage to reach local markets.
They should also have negotiating skills. Resource managers encounter several challenges when allocating resources. In the planning process, they may realize there’s a gap in skills. What this means is that more resources will be required to fill these gaps. Since getting resources can be expensive, managers need to possess negotiating skills so they can get the necessary resources at an affordable price and still get the work done as per the required standards and on schedule.
There are several situations that could disrupt a project. For example, an employee may abruptly take leave, disrupting, and sometimes halting, a project. A savvy resource manager should have the foresight to plan for all unforeseen events and ensure that all work continues regardless. Such a manager works on the premise that everything that could go wrong will go wrong. Then, they plan for such an eventuality.
Effects of poor resource management
Ineffective management of resources results in a decline in employee performance. When the allocation of resources is done without the consideration of employee interests and skills, the employee’s motivation levels go down, and consequently, productivity declines. When choosing resources for various projects, going for expensive skilled resources over cost-effective skilled labor will ultimately increase a project’s budget.
When resources are not properly managed, the resource allocation process becomes faulty. What this means is that deadlines are likely to be missed, resulting in dissatisfied customers. When a customer is unhappy with the services or products they’re getting from you, they may pull out and look for better services elsewhere. You may also be exposed to high employee turnover, and when an employee’s skills aren’t utilized to the maximum, they feel demotivated and, if you overwork them, they could end up suffering from burnout. Therefore, it’s important to ensure that all these factors are considered when conducting resource allocation.
Resource management is a critical component of a business. How a business manages the different types of resources has a great bearing on its success or lack of it. If you’re looking to pursue a career in resource management, the above business management resources should provide you with a good starting point.