So I thought you would like to use the first tip below to either cash-in or recycle all the stuff that is getting in the way of you and your small business growth.

Cash-in or Donate office or business supplies you haven’t used in the last year. Return them to the store for credit or donate them to your favorite charity. You may also know someone who would be happy to pay you for your unused discount ink or toner if you buy a new printer. Recycle other discard if you can, because it is just less clutter in your office and your mind.

Plus, here is my ‘ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure’ tip on using your calendar before that important date.

Make a calendar note, one week before any event or project due. For example: Do you need to review the work done and which recommendations you’ll make before a client meeting date?

Whatever it is, make a note of it in advance so you can stay of top of your tasks. Because you don’t want that calendar date to turn into “Did you need to send flowers last week for Mother’s Day?”

O  For severe infestation contact http://www.41pounds.org/ and sign up for 5 years of protection for just $41.00. They donate more than 1/3 of your fee to environmental or community organizations–you choose.

Junk mail production makes as much pollution every year as 2.6 million cars!

Social Security:

O Review your Earnings and Benefits Statement carefully for errors once a year. Order a free copy by calling (800) 772-1213.

Credit Ratings and Credit Fraud:

O Reduce the number of pre-approved offers you get by requesting these credit bureaus remove your name from their lists:  Experian (800) 353-0809 Equifax (800) 219-1251 TransUnion (800) 241-2858.

O Every quarter carefully check your free credit report from one of the three credit bureaus by contacting the only authorized source at  www.annualcreditreport.com OR by calling (877) 322-8228.

Opt Out of ‘Prescreened’ Credit Offers:

O Go to www.optoutprescreen.com or call (888) 567-8688) to protect yourself, elderly family members and college-aged kids from solicitations of creditors. This improves your credit rating as well!

Government Agencies: Birth, Marriage, Home Purchase, & Death

O Public records of all our major life events are sold to advertisers. Call the largest dealer, Acxiom, at their Consumer Advocate Hotline (877) 774-2094. OR go to www.acxiom.com and hit the ‘Contact Us’ link to request an opt-out form.

Terminate Unwanted Catalogs:

O Contact Abacus at optout@abacus-direct.com or write Abacus, PO Box 1478, Broomfield CO 80093.

Supply your address and the full names of everyone in your household or company.

Prevent Your Internet Browsing Data from being shared:

O Register at www.networkadvertising.org to opt out of advertisers selling your browsing ‘cookies’.

Reporting ID Theft or Credit Fraud: (Hope you never need these resources. But, just in case…)

Equifax (800) 525-6285

Experian (800) 301-7195

Trans Union (800) 680-7289

Social Security Administration fraud line (800) 269-0271

Federal Trade Commission ID Theft Hotline (877) 438-4338

The FTC ID Theft website provides guidelines for  identity theft victims: http://www.consumer.gov/idtheft/recovering_idt.html

SCORE: Service Corps of Retired Executives small business resources and counseling can be found at: http://www.score.org/business_tips.html

There is also a SCORE site just for women business owners and their challenges at: http://www.score.org/women/site.html

There is a complete online library of small business advice available for free. Also, there are many SCORE agencies throughout the U.S. where you can get personalized advice and resource referrals for your exact business situation from a retired executive.

I’ve supplied links to just a few  of the hundreds of articles I think any small business owner can benefit from…

Check out SCORE resources available to help you succeed in business: Business Planning Business Management E-Business Finance & Capital Human Resources Leadership Legal Marketing & Public Relations Sales & Customer Service Tax Training Web Good Luck with using these business success resources to improve your bottom line without breaking the bank!

Eegads !! It’s no wonder we can’t find what we’re looking for. Use my paper retention tips to melt your small business paper blizzard  and for tax-time at home.

Home Tax Audit records retention guideline tip:

Written documentation for each deduction: house improvement receipts, buy/sell/donate/yearly investment statements, 1099s and/or W-2s, credit card/bank statements & checks.

After six years; Put actual tax filing papers and any essentials (W-2s/1099s into a permanent tax records archive. For details see: http://www.organizer-extraordinaire.com/Small-Business-Tax-Records-Guidelines.pdf

Then, dispose of outdated backup documentation and SHRED.

If you turn your personal tax insurance and financial record shredding over to a company — make sure they will let you watch them shred your documents.

For more tips on records retention guidelines for business and personal tax documentation check out: http://www.organizer-extraordinaire.com/Small-Business-Tax-Records-Guidelines.pdf

If you don’t need it, why not dump it?

The computers used to process all filed taxes are set to pick one out of a certain number of certain types of returns to be audited. By waiting to file until April 15^th your return goes in with the largest number of tax returns to be processed.

The numbers have it: if your return is one out of a million your audit risk is higher than when you file your return with 40 million other returns.

Remember the old saying, “the only sure thing in life is death and taxes.” No one can do much about death.  So, give yourself every possible edge you can when it comes to dealing with the tax man.

Prepare early but, file on April 15^th to be part of the largest group of returns filed at the same time.

Mike at TPE has a great idea–he asks for input from other small business owners and then shares their best practices in his blog.

1. No
Humans hate to hear ‘no’ (brain MRIs shift to stress patterns). Humans love to hear ‘yes’ (brain MRIs light up in an instant).  So, if you are about to say no to someone: Stop. Think what it would take to say yes to their request. Especially if you both can work together for a win-win outcome!

2. Don’t
The human brain always processes a negative in language by defaulting to the positive. When you say, “Don’t judge a product by brand alone,” what they really hear after not processing the negative is, “Judge a product by brand alone.” Communicate positively, by telling everyone what you want them to do, not what you don’t want them to do.

3. Can’t
Speaking of ‘don’t’, ‘can’t’ is another word that can frustrate or maybe anger anyone from your customers to your spouse. When people process “I can’t”, they hear, “I choose not to.” Instead of focusing on what you can’t do, focus on what you can do.

4. But
As soon as you say the word ‘but’ the listener deletes the previous words spoken. For example, “You did good work, but…”) Now they are waiting to hear what you are really going to tell them. Replace but with either the word ‘and’ or start a new sentence. For example:

“You did good work and I wish your bonus was bigger.”

“You did good work. Unfortunately, this year’s bonus pool was less than before.”

5. Honestly
When your listener hears you say, ‘honestly,’ you imply to them that some (or all!) of everything else you’ve said has not been honest. Delete these next two words from your vocabulary for the same reason: frankly, truthfully. I use the words, In fact but only when I have a relevant fact or new information to share.

6. If
If always implies the opposite, “if not” as your brain processes language. When is a more definite word for the brain; it knows how to use when easily. For example:

“If you want to grow your business, here are six words you will be more successful by not using.”

When you want to grow your business, here are six words you will be more successful by not using.”

Changing these words is guaranteed to get you better results in your small business and life!

Excerpted: “How to Do Space Age Work with a Stone Age Brain: Using your brain for small business success with less stress.” Copyright 2010 Eve Abbott All rights reserved.

With software applications taking up increasing amounts of hard drive space and people using multiple applications simultaneously, it is easier than ever to run out of space or just have your work crawling along slowly.

BACKUP BACKUP BACKUP: Backing up your work on a regular basis gives you the security of knowing that even if you do toss something before its time – you can retrieve it.

This makes computer clutter maintenance a worry free activity. You may be amazed at how much you never refer to again.

Remember, 80 percent of what we e-file never gets referred to again!

7 Organizing Computer Clutter Tips:

1. Put an underscore (_) in front of any folder and an exclamation point (!) in front of any file name that you use most frequently.
2. Review temporary (.tmp) files before deleting.
3. Back up large unused files (or when finishing a project) onto media of choice (Memory stick, CD, DVD, External hard drive).
4. Make an Archive folder in each major directory and/or in each major folder for outdated files and compress these folders.
5. Empty the recycle bin.
6. In Explore, Windows, Delete all files in Temp folder.
7. At Start Pearl, select Explore, Search (magnifying glass icon), Files or Folders. Do a FIND ALL, key in .tmp and  delete.

Your computer will thank you and run faster. Your small business will thank you and run smoother. Any business owner will thank themselves for being so smart as to use my easy brain-based organizing tips!

Excerpts from: “How to Do Space Age Work with a Stone Age Brain: Using your brain for small business success with less stress” Copyright 2010 Eve Abbott All rights reserved.

When you are in pain your brain shrinks and cortisol levels rise making it harder for your brain to make any decision at all!

I recommend Chris Sorrells OTR, CHT, CEAS who has developed a fabulous resource site to help you improve your work area which means improving your productivity!

www.ErgonomicsSimplified.com has a free personalized ergonomic evaluation to teach people how to set up their work area to reduce risks for repetitive strain injuries (neck strain, carpal tunnel syndrome, low back pain, etc).

There are ErgoTips for laptops, PDAs, driving, & more and pages on specific high risk jobs such as lawyers, etc.

Check it out because if you don’t take care of you first, your business will struggle to prosper in the long run.

For more common sense tips on keeping small business owners ergonomically on top see my current article “Ergonomic Dynamos”

The amount of useless information and “offers” that we get is phenomenal. No where else in the world are people subjected to the corporate and non-profit barrage of stuff we do not want or need, much less did not ask for!

You can streamline your information processing as well as lowering your ID Theft Probability Profile by taking simple free steps like:

Opt Out of ‘Prescreened’ Credit Offers:

Go to www.optoutprescreen.com or call (888) 567-8688) to protect yourself, elderly family members and college-aged kids from solicitations of creditors.

This improves your credit rating as well!

For the complete checklist see: http://www.organizer-extraordinaire.com/Simplify-Your%20Life-Checklist.pdf

Just put the list in with your “bills to pay” and check off one or two every time you take care of business!