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Accounting is monotonous. It’s tedious. It requires a lot of attention to detail. If you’re a small business owner who loves the overall aspect of running a business, you probably dread the detailed accounting required to maintain the business. Landing a contract is fun and rewarding. Opening a software program, creating invoices and entering payments received are miserable if you don’t care for the details.

But business owners cannot afford to be bored by accounting and more specifically, bookkeeping. Bookkeeping is a necessary evil that all business owners must face in properly managing their business. What exactly does that mean? To simplify, it’s the activity of recording business transactions. OK, fine, so what’s the big deal? Well, the first and most obvious answer is taxes. If you don’t keep good financial records, how will you submit proper returns when the IRS comes calling at tax time? I know, your CPA handles your taxes, that’s his job. Well, CPA’s don’t work cheap. At rates often upwards of $100/hr, the cost of properly setting your books up and maintaining them is far more cost-effective than having your CPA fix and correct them at year-end. Do you really want to pay that much to have him sort though stacks of paper?

There are other benefits as well. Let’s say you’re a construction contractor. If you don’t keep track of the cost of the materials and labor for each job, how do you know if the project was profitable? Also, how do you know when your bills need to be paid if no one is recording them? Not paying a bill is one of those mundane tasks that can result in major consequences. Another one is bank reconciliations. You can’t rely on your bank statements to provide an accurate picture of your cash picture. Cash inflows and outflows need to be recorded on a regular basis so you know on an ongoing basis what your true balance is. You won’t make the mistake of writing a check for more than you have available, which can result in expensive overdraft fees, late fees from your suppliers, or additional interest on outstanding debt.

So the benefits of regular bookkeeping are many, and this only scratches the surface. But you’re already spending your time running your operations and then any extra hours are spent growing the business and marketing your product. So hire a bookkeeper, right? Then you have an employee to manage, and taxes and benefits to pay. Why not consider outsourcing your bookkeeping needs? There are multiple advantages to this approach. You decide how often to use the service. Bookkeeping rates are significantly less than licensed CPA firms. And you’ll be working with an experienced professional whose only job is to keep your records straight and provide reporting as you need it.

Don’t neglect the consistent record keeping that is at the heart of successful bookkeeping. Accounting and bookkeeping may seem boring, but it’s essential to tracking the health of your business.