4 Tips to Stop Tiny, Recurring Mistakes from Spiraling into Bigger Issues

You likely work with a good number of departments to get the data you need to run Finance. So you’re bound to see some external mistakes that affect your internal processes.

Regardless of the size of your organization or industry, these issues are relatively common:

• A supervisor who occasionally miskeys data
• An employee who forgets to submit hours to Payroll
• A salesperson who doesn’t have the documents to support the expense, or
• A manager who doesn’t always forward supporting documents to A/P.

Unfortunately, each of these “little mistakes” adds up to more work and hassle for your people in Finance. Plus, these mistakes come with costs – in dollars or labor hours – that negatively impact the company.

Taking a Proactive Approach to Mistakes

Most finance teams don’t want to give up when other employees make mistakes.

That’s why your team wants to step in and try to change their ways. To do that, check out these four ways you can get employees who make regular, common mistakes on the right track and in compliance with your protocols:

1. Have Them Find the Solution

It’s one thing for your A/P manager to tell an employee, “You didn’t get that invoice back on time.” It’s another thing for them to say, “This is the third deadline you missed this month. How are we going to stop this from happening again in the future?”

Make sure you and your fellow leaders put the ball in the repeat offender’s court and give them autonomy to find a fix. When people find their own solutions to mistakes, they’re more likely to stick to them.

2. Show the Fallout

Employees may not realize how big a deal their mistakes are if they don’t feel the fallout. Are they getting the angry phone call or having to explain why a payment amount was wrong? Are they in the conference room hearing about the penalties or consequences of their mistakes?

Whenever possible, let the employees at fault see and experience the repercussions of their actions firsthand, which will make them more careful next time. Be aware that you might have to help them connect the dots, too. One miskey may not be the obvious root to a day’s worth of rework for a finance employee.

3. Add Extra Coaching 

People don’t mess up on purpose. Generally, they want to succeed but fall short for one reason or another.

If any of your finance managers deal with these types of employees, offer some additional attention. They could schedule some hands-on training or one-on-one coaching. To bring in another perspective and peer-based guidance, they could enlist a top staffer or a model employee to step in, too.

4. Simplify Where You Can

Fact is, some financial processes aren’t so easy to grasp. There are multiple steps, various calculations, compliance checkpoints …

Any time you’re able, try to simplify things for others. Have your finance team provide checklists for reference, FAQs, an outline of the basic steps, etc. And if there’s a process that lots of people frequently get wrong, that may be a sign your department should reassess it in full.