Who’s Watching YOUR Money? 7 Tips for Hiring the Right Bookkeeper

While I’m a strong advocate of hiring virtual assistants, there are two things that no entrepreneur should ever fully delegate: marketing and bookkeeping. The marketing and the bookkeeping of your business can easily make or break you (just think “new” Coke and Enron). That said, if bookkeeping is not your forte, hire someone to do it - you will save so much in frustration - just be sure to keep your fingers in the books.

If you choose to hire a bookkeeper, keep the following in mind:

1. Get QuickBooks.

For ease of use, I highly recommend using QuickBooks and hiring a QuickBooks ProAdvisor. QuickBooks ProAdvisors have taken certification exams to insure that they know the system. I have used QuickBooks both for myself and my clients since 1996 and highly recommend it for its ease of use/understanding.

The online version is great in that you can see the latest version of your books at any time and eliminate the annoyance of emailing files back and forth and wondering who has the latest version.

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The elements of success

By Ray Weikal

Thursday, March 6, 2008 1:19 AM CST

Metropolitan Community College-Maple Woods students recently got to sample some of the ingredients needed to go far with a small business.

A half-dozen local entrepreneurship experts led a panel discussion titled “Six Slices of a Successful Business” on Feb. 26 at the Student Center on the Northland campus. Touching on topics such as legal, bookkeeping, financing, marketing and human resources, the presentation was designed to cover most of the basics for a packed room composed mostly of students in the school’s business program.

The event was held in conjunction with National Entrepreneurship Week, Feb. 23 to March 1, according to business faculty member Jim Moes.

“Our desire is to foster and promote entrepreneurship across this campus and across the nation,” said Moes, who also owns a travel company.

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