Free resource

The Admin Time Leak Checklist

Most small business owners know they are spending too much time on admin. Fewer know exactly where it is going.

Work through each section below. A yes answer to any question in an area means time is leaking there. The areas with the most yes answers are usually where an hour or two a week can be recovered quickly and without significant cost.

Inbox and messages

  • Do you re-read the same email more than once before acting on it?
  • Do you manually chase outstanding replies each week?
  • Do customer enquiries sit unanswered for more than a few hours during working hours?

Invoicing and payments

  • Do you manually create invoices by copying from a previous one?
  • Do you chase late payments by hand: email, call, or message each time?
  • Do you reconcile payments against invoices at the end of the month yourself?

Scheduling and bookings

  • Do clients book by sending you times and waiting for you to confirm?
  • Do you manually send reminders the day before a meeting or appointment?
  • Do you re-enter the same meeting details into more than one place (calendar, CRM, notes)?

Reporting and records

  • Do you produce weekly or monthly summaries by pulling data from more than two places?
  • Do you maintain a spreadsheet that only you understand or update?
  • Do you answer the same factual questions from staff or clients repeatedly?

Onboarding and handover

  • Do you personally walk every new client or staff member through the same steps?
  • Do you have more than one version of a process document and are unsure which is current?
  • Would something important be lost if you were unavailable for a week?

Communication and updates

  • Do you send project or job updates manually rather than from a system?
  • Do you copy information from one tool into another (e.g. email into a spreadsheet)?
  • Do you spend time at the end of the week searching for status information you need?

What to do with your results

A pattern of yes answers usually points to one or two root causes

A disconnected inbox and a manual invoicing process often produce yes answers across three or four areas simultaneously. The fix rarely requires bespoke software.

If you want a second opinion on what your results mean, a Cortel audit reviews your whole operation and produces a short written report with specific, prioritised recommendations. It takes three working days and does not require any technical knowledge from you.

See how the audit works