The holidays have a way of turning everything into a sugar-fueled special occasion. Businesses sparkle, and customers are bustling, swiping and dipping. (Can we bring back the cash register ring for December?) All this makes for an exciting and exhausting month, and business owners look forward to a long winter’s nap.

When they all wake up in January, a little bleary and thinking seriously about Hawaii, many businesses find themselves with a little less to do. And all they have to look forward to is tax season. It can be a relatively slow month.

Instead of leaving January to the doldrums, take this opportunity to work on your business.

You will spend December working on your business, and planning ahead for a January project can prevent the post-holiday slump.

Working on your business means taking time to implement a lasting change or improvement that will make a difference in your day-to-day activities and the long-term viability of your business.

Here are some ideas:

Update Your Cybersecurity Plan

I recently attended a cybersecurity roundtable, and one of the experts said, “It’s no longer ‘not if but when’; it’s now ‘not when but how bad.’” Sobering. Your business needs to go through a cybersecurity checklist and implement some basic, easy, low-cost changes to make sure your money and customer information is as safe as possible. This takes just a few hours, and one of our SBDC consultants will be with you to help.

Visualize Your Customer Service Flow

Customer service goes way beyond please, thank you and getting the order right. Taking time to understand who your customers are (hint: it isn’t everyone) and how they engage with you before, during and after the sale clarifies new opportunities and helps you and your staff ensure your customers are having an on-brand, stellar experience. The SBDC has a flowchart tool that can help with this process. We can create this customer service map in a few short visits.

An Employee Hiring and Retention System

Finding and keeping employees has been, and will continue to be, a challenge. It is possible to create a system that works to find and keep your workers. Getting tasks out of the way such as updating job descriptions, creating training materials and scheduling retention interviews will help you be ready when someone leaves during the next busy season.

These projects are easy to complete in hours (not days). Maybe you’ll have time for two!

The Small Business Development Center can help you with resources and guidance for all the above. If you have other needs, let us know. In four weeks, a business owner could easily accomplish one or more of these efforts. Working with the SBDC is free, and many of our clients like to view us as an accountability partner.

To make an appointment or request our guides, contact me at the Small Business Development Center in Idaho State University's College of Business: 208-282-4402 or swanann@isu.edu. The SBDC provides no-cost consulting and low-cost training to any small business. Services are taxpayer funded and free to our community.

Please shop local!

Ann Swanson is the director of the Southeast Idaho Small Business Development Center at Idaho State University’s College of Business.