{"id":2812,"date":"2017-09-20T09:57:48","date_gmt":"2017-09-20T09:57:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-gb\/blog\/how-collaborative-working-can-help-small-businesses\/"},"modified":"2026-01-29T10:47:36","modified_gmt":"2026-01-29T10:47:36","slug":"how-collaborative-working-can-help-small-businesses","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-gb\/blog\/how-collaborative-working-can-help-small-businesses\/","title":{"rendered":"How collaborative working can help small businesses"},"content":{"rendered":"<header class=\"entry-header has-dark-background-color entry-header--has-illustration entry-header--has-illustration--generic\">\n\t<div class=\"container\">\n\t\t<div class=\"entry-header__row row align-center\">\n\t\t\t<div class=\"col col-lg-7 col-xlg-6 entry-header__content\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<div class=\"component component-single-header\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<div class=\"entry-header__misc text--subtitle text--uppercase text--small\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<a href=\"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-gb\/blog\/category\/strategy-legal-operations\/\" class=\"entry-header__link\">Strategy, Legal &amp; Operations<\/a>\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t<div class=\"entry-title-wrapper\">\n\t\t\t\t\t<h1 class=\"entry-title\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\tHow collaborative working can help small businesses\t\t\t\t\t<\/h1>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<p class=\"entry-header__description\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t<\/div>\n\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t<\/div>\n\t<div class=\"single-post-details container\">\n\t\t<div class=\"col\">\n\t\t\t<span class=\"posted-on \"><time class=\"entry-date published\" datetime=\"2017-09-20T09:57:48+01:00\">20 September, 2017<\/time><\/span><span class=\"reading-time\"> min read<\/span>\n\t\t<button\n\t\t\ttype=\"button\"\n\t\t\tclass=\"social-share-button button button--icon button--secondary js-social-share-button\"\n\t\t\tdata-share-title=\"How collaborative working can help small businesses\"\n\t\t\tdata-share-url=\"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-gb\/blog\/how-collaborative-working-can-help-small-businesses\/\"\n\t\t\tdata-share-text=\"Please read this interesting article\"\n\t\t>\n\t\t\t<span class=\"social-share-button__share-label\">Share<\/span>\n\t\t\t<span class=\"social-share-button__copy-label\" hidden>Copy Link<\/span>\n\t\t\t<span class=\"social-share-button__copy-tooltip\" aria-hidden=\"true\" hidden>Copied<\/span>\n\t\t<\/button>\n\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t<\/div>\n<\/header>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-post-author\">\n\t\t\t<div class=\"co-authors\">\n\t\t\t\n\t\t<div class=\"entry-author-wrapper\">\n\t\t\t<a class=\"entry-author\" href=\"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-gb\/blog\/author\/ashleyhindsmansage\/\">\n\t\t\t\t<img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"40\" height=\"40\" src=\"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-gb\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/10\/2025\/02\/Ashley-Thompson-350x350.jpg\" class=\"entry-author__image\" alt=\"Ashley Thompson\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-gb\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/10\/2025\/02\/Ashley-Thompson-350x350.jpg 350w, https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-gb\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/10\/2025\/02\/Ashley-Thompson.jpg 600w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 40px) 100vw, 40px\" \/>\t\t\t\t<span class=\"entry-author__name\">Ashley Thompson<\/span>\n\t\t\t<\/a>\n\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\n\n\n<p>It can be scary opening up your system to multiple people within your business. So what&#8217;s the best way to do it?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-what-is-collaborative-working\">What is collaborative working?<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p>By sharing your business information and having a single source of data for your sales and accounting functions, you can save time and make it easier to keep customer information up-to-date.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h4 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-what-s-in-it-for-your-accounts-team\">What&#8217;s in it for your accounts team?<\/h4>\n\n\n\n<p>For the accounts team, they need to reduce the amount of time it takes getting information for other teams. By sharing data through your <a href=\"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-gb\/size\/small-business\/\">small business software<\/a>, you can minimise requests, allowing you to focus on the more in-depth parts of the job. If sales teams can create orders and invoices in the system, this also means less admin work for the accounts team.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Sales teams can also be a help in ensuring customers pay on time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h4 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-what-s-in-it-for-your-sales-team\">What&#8217;s in it for your sales team?<\/h4>\n\n\n\n<p>For the sales team, having real-time access to information makes their job easier. They can access information about customers, products or prices themselves on the go, instead of bothering others. With the right <a href=\"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-gb\/accounting-software\/\">accounting software<\/a> you can manage your own sales pipeline, from quotations to invoices, ensure data is up to date, making it less likely to use another system.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-a-collaborative-approach\">A collaborative approach<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>Clarify what your employees want and need <\/strong>It&#8217;s important to share ideas upfront about what you&#8217;d like to get out of joint working.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Set boundaries <\/strong>It&#8217;s also important to know what information should be ring-fenced and protected. Establishing these boundaries up front will help you to avoid issues later on.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Decide how you will manage data <\/strong>Once you know what you need and what&#8217;s to be avoided, it&#8217;s time to discuss how you&#8217;ll keep the data up to date. You may need to involve the IT team for these discussions. If you have Sage Accounts software, we can also offer advice.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Ensure data is backed up <\/strong>It&#8217;s an important rule regardless of whether you share access. Having data in the cloud often means that back-ups are automatic. For desktop software, talk to the IT team and make sure you have a back-up schedule and there&#8217;s a process in place for retrieving and reinstalling missing information.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong> Meet regularly <\/strong>Because sales teams are on the road, it&#8217;s important to schedule time to catch up regularly. If there&#8217;s an issue, try to address it as soon as possible.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n<div class=\"single-cta\">\n\t<div class=\"single-cta__positioner\">\n\t\t<div class=\"single-cta__wrapper has-dark-background-color\">\n\t\t\t<div class=\"single-cta__content\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<h2 class=\"single-cta__title h3\">Subscribe to the Sage Advice newsletter<\/h2>\n\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<div class=\"single-cta__description\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\t<p>Join more than 500,000 UK readers and get the best business admin strategies and tactics, as well as actionable advice to help your company thrive, in your inbox every month.<\/p>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<a\n\t\t\t\t\t\thref=\"#gate-b1a63862-3fa0-4a5e-bb67-c76b88bbc6b8\"\n\t\t\t\t\t\tclass=\"single-cta__button button button--primary\"\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t>Subscribe now<\/a>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\n\t\t\t\t\t<img decoding=\"async\" width=\"1440\" height=\"810\" src=\"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-gb\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/10\/2022\/04\/GettyImages-1073797282-1-1440x810.jpg\" class=\"single-cta__image\" alt=\"\" loading=\"lazy\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-gb\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/10\/2022\/04\/GettyImages-1073797282-1-1440x810.jpg 1440w\" sizes=\"auto, (min-width: 48em) 33vw, 100vw\" \/>\t\t\t<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>It can be scary opening up your system to multiple people within your business. So what&#8217;s the best way to do it? What is collaborative working? By sharing your business information and having a single source of data for your sales and accounting functions, you can save time and make it easier to keep customer [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":281,"featured_media":2933,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_sage_video":false,"post_featured_image_hide":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[10,9],"tags":[51,47],"business_type":[4],"lilypad":[],"context":[],"industry":[],"persona":[],"imagine_tag":[],"coauthors":[354],"class_list":["post-2812","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-people-leadership","category-strategy-legal-operations","tag-cloud","tag-productivity","business_type-small-business"],"sage_meta":{"region":"en-gb","author_name":"Ashley Thompson","featured_image":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-gb\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/10\/2017\/09\/GettyImages-649659629_super.jpg","imagine_tags":[]},"distributor_meta":false,"distributor_terms":false,"distributor_media":false,"distributor_original_site_name":"Sage Advice UK","distributor_original_site_url":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-gb\/blog","push-errors":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-gb\/blog\/api\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2812","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-gb\/blog\/api\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-gb\/blog\/api\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-gb\/blog\/api\/wp\/v2\/users\/281"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-gb\/blog\/api\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2812"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-gb\/blog\/api\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2812\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-gb\/blog\/api\/wp\/v2\/media\/2933"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-gb\/blog\/api\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2812"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-gb\/blog\/api\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2812"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-gb\/blog\/api\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2812"},{"taxonomy":"business_type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-gb\/blog\/api\/wp\/v2\/business_type?post=2812"},{"taxonomy":"lilypad","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-gb\/blog\/api\/wp\/v2\/lilypad?post=2812"},{"taxonomy":"context","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-gb\/blog\/api\/wp\/v2\/context?post=2812"},{"taxonomy":"industry","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-gb\/blog\/api\/wp\/v2\/industry?post=2812"},{"taxonomy":"persona","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-gb\/blog\/api\/wp\/v2\/persona?post=2812"},{"taxonomy":"imagine_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-gb\/blog\/api\/wp\/v2\/imagine_tag?post=2812"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sage.com\/en-gb\/blog\/api\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=2812"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}