RBizz Corporate Accountants - Resources #Workforce Development

Protecting you and your business: taking out insurance

Fri, 13 Feb 2026 16:43:37 +1100

Protecting you and your business: taking out insurance

We all hope that our pathway along the business journey will be smooth and uncomplicated.

But the reality is that accidents can happen, along with unplanned injuries, damaging weather events and legal suits from disgruntled clients.

So, what can you do to protect your business from these potential negative consequences? The answer is to take out the relevant business insurance for your company.

Five common kinds of business insurance policies and how they protect you

1. Public liability insurance

Public liability insurance covers your legal costs and compensation claims if a third party – such as a customer or passer-by – suffers an injury or property damage because of your business activities. It’s an essential policy to take out if you interact with customers in a physical space.

2. Product liability insurance

If a product you design, manufacture or supply causes injury or damage to a consumer, product liability insurance protects you. It handles legal defense fees and settlement costs and is a vital policy for all retailers, wholesalers and manufacturers that produce or sell physical products.

3. Business contents insurance and tools insurance

Business contents insurance covers the cost of replacing or repairing your internal assets – items like computers, furniture and stock – if they’re damaged or stolen from your premises.

Tools insurance covers the cost of repairing or replacing your vital portable gear – things like your laptop, specialist machinery or hand tools – if they’re stolen, lost or damaged.

Having contents and tools insurance in place to cover the expense of repairs or buying new equipment means you can get back up and running without major out-of-pocket costs.

4. Employers’ liability insurance

Employers’ liability insurance covers your compensation costs if an employee falls ill or is injured while working for your business. The specific legal requirements vary from country to country, but it’s often mandatory for employers to take out protection against workplace-related health and safety claims.

5. Professional indemnity insurance

Professional indemnity insurance protects you against legal costs and damages if a client suffers a financial loss because of your professional advice or services. It’s a crucial policy for consultants and experts, shielding your business from client claims of negligence, errors or omissions in your work.

Working with you to understand your insurance needs

Whatever stage you’re at in the business journey, it’s important to think about the insurance needs of your business and the specific areas where you may need protection.

We’re not insurance experts, but we can work with you to define the basic policies you’ll need. We can also connect you with the best insurance brokers and agents for your business type, industry or niche sector – so you get tailored advice on your insurance requirements.

How to accept payments online – and why it’s smart

Fri, 13 Feb 2026 16:43:12 +1100

How to accept payments online – and why it’s smart

One of the best things about online shopping is instant, hassle-free payment. Enter your details, click, and you’re done. If your customers can make an instant online payment, they’re likely to pay you more quickly – and they’ll appreciate the simplicity too.

The details

Online payment methods include credit and debit cards, ACH (Automated Clearing House) services like Paypal, and repeat payments through direct debit. Payments are managed by merchant service providers – specialist companies that process transactions on your behalf. Some focus on credit and debit cards, while others stick to ACH or direct debit.

Choose a provider that can integrate with your accounting software, and you can add a super-simple payment button to future invoices.

The costs

While your merchant service provider shouldn’t charge any set-up fees, they will charge transaction fees. These range from 2-4% of the invoice for debit or credit cards, and under $2 a transaction for direct debit. These fees are an added expense, so they need to be included in your profit calculation – smart accounting software will do this automatically.

Because credit and debit fees can add up, many businesses don’t offer online payment for invoices over a certain amount.

The benefits

Businesses using online payments get paid faster. Of course, not every client will pay instantly just because they have the option, but it should speed up your average payment time.

A bonus benefit? Customers appreciate the ability to pay online, so offering it as an option can be a big point in your favour.

Ready to reap the benefits of online payments? Get expert advice and set-up support from our accounting team.

Talk to Us About Accepting Payments Online

If you’re ready to speed up payments and simplify your invoicing, come and talk to us. We can help you choose the right payment provider, integrate it with your accounting software, and set up an efficient online payment process for your business.

Why flexible working is the new normal

Fri, 13 Feb 2026 16:42:56 +1100

Why flexible working is the new normal

"Gone are the days when flexible work was a perk. Whether it’s hybrid roles, remote options, or custom hours, flexibility has become a baseline expectation." - Recruitment Trends for SMEs by Onside.

The pandemic may have introduced us to the idea of working from home, but the ability to flex where we work from is now a core expectation for many employees.

Why should your business embrace flexible working?

According to a recent survey by Robert Walters, 54% of employees prefer a combination of in-office and remote work.

We’ve learned about the efficiency benefits of working from home, making the most of the reduced travel time and the ability to work non-conventional office hours to get the job done.

But we’ve also come to realise the advantages of spending time with our team in the office, and how this can build team spirit, aid collaboration and get us working as a unit again.

The ideal scenario is hybrid working, where time is split between mandated office days and the flexibility to work from home when that makes employees’ lives easier.

How to embrace flexible, hybrid working

Flexible working will be different from company to company and sector to sector. But there are some key ways you can embrace hybrid working in your business:

Have a clear hybrid policy: Define which roles are eligible for hybrid work and set core collaboration days so you can work on team connections at the office.
Invest in cloud tech and online ways of working: Make sure your remote employees have the necessary tools and technology to work from home.
Put your focus on output, not presence: Employee performance should be based on what each employee delivers and achieves, rather than hours spent in the office.

Talk to Us About Flexible Working

If you’re reviewing your people strategy or adapting to hybrid working, come and talk to us. We can help you design flexible working arrangements, align policies with business goals, and build a productive, engaged team.

The benefits of having a diverse workforce

Sun, 05 Oct 2025 20:37:01 +1100

The benefits of having a diverse workforce

Having a diverse and inclusive workforce isn’t just about displaying the best values as a business – it also makes good business sense for your company to be diverse.

Let’s look at the positive benefits of having a diverse team, and the action you can take as a business to bring a real mix of talent into the company.

What does diversity and inclusivity mean?

Let’s start by defining diversity and inclusivity.

Diversity is about having a wide range of people, races and human differences represented within your team.

Inclusivity is the practice of creating a culture where all your employees feel valued, respected and have equal opportunities to contribute and succeed.

Having a workforce that’s diverse, varied and inclusive ensures that all groups in your local community are represented. But it also helps you to stay competitive, productive and able to outperform your close competitors.

Here are four major benefits that diversity and inclusion can bring to your business

Better performance: Diverse companies outperform less diverse companies. According to a 2023 report from McKinsey & Company, top-quartile companies had a 39% greater likelihood of financial outperformance compared with their bottom-quartile peers.Superior decision-making: Diverse teams are better at analysing a situation, looking at all available options and making the best decisions. Research by Cloverpop found that diverse teams are 87% better at making decisions in a business situation.
Improved revenue: When your company is diverse it leads to better revenue generation. A study by Boston Consulting Group showed that companies that reported above-average diversity on their management teams also reported innovation revenue that was 19 percentage points higher than that of companies with below-average leadership diversity.
Greater innovation and skill-sharing: Inclusive teams are more creative and drive better innovation, by listening to everyone’s voices and ideas. According to Australia’s Inclusion@Work Index, inclusive teams are 9.5 times more likely to be innovative than non-inclusive teams.
It’s clear that having a diverse and inclusive workforce can give your business a genuine boost. But what can you do to improve the diversity of your core talent and culture?

Think about:

Having more inclusive hiring practices, such as blind CV/resume reviews and diverse interview panels, so you can attract and hire a more diverse range of talent.
Building up a culture of inclusivity and respect, where everyone from within the business feels valued and empowered to contribute.
Think about setting up Employee Resource Groups (ERGs) to provide support and networking opportunities for employees from underrepresented groups.
Provide regular diversity and inclusion training for your employees to help promote a broader understanding and awareness.
Set up mentorship programs to help employees from underrepresented groups advance their careers and achieve their full potential.

Talk to us about updating your people strategy

If you want to maximise the impact of having a diverse and inclusive workforce, that means updating your people strategy to attract and support a better cross-section of society.

Gen Z in a Boomer workplace?

Wed, 27 Aug 2025 15:59:36 +1000

Gen Z in a Boomer workplace?

Gen Z workers may not be able to slide seamlessly into a workplace that was designed for Baby Boomers.

Managing Gen Z – those workers born between the late 90s and the early 2010s – is proving to be a challenge for even the most hardened people managers and supervisors. Some managers view Gen Z employees as ‘unprofessional and immature’, but is that a fair assessment?

And if you have a large Gen Z workforce, what are the key ways to encourage their talents, while managing them in a way that suits the needs of both the worker and the business?

A recent survey by Resume Templates spoke to 1,000 US people managers to gauge their opinions on managing a Gen Z workforce. Worryingly, the survey found that 7 in 10 managers liken supervising Gen Z to babysitting or parenting.

On the whole, the study shows that some Gen Z workers lack what people managers see as the fundamental skills and behaviours of a professional worker.

Why does Gen Z act so differently to previous generations?

Gen Z workers grew up as digital natives and are used to instant access to information and constant online communication. This can make the traditional, hierarchical communication methods we’re used to in the workplace feel slow, inefficient and…well, kinda boring.

The COVID-19 pandemic also profoundly impacted Gen Z’s entry into the workforce, often delaying the development of critical in-person ‘soft skills’ like professional etiquette and non-verbal communication.

Gen Z workers have different values to preceding generations. They have a far greater focus on work-life balance, their own mental health, and their personal values and morals.

They want work that has a purpose and a transparent, flexible working environment, often prioritising these factors over a traditional career ladder.

As a result, they may challenge established norms in the workplace, which can be perceived as immaturity or unprofessionalism by older generations.

4 ways to get the best from your Gen Z workers

If you’re used to a certain way of working, and an immovable way of managing younger employees, you’re unlikely to get the best work from your Gen Z workers.

As a good people manager, your responsibility is not just to enforce a static way of working. It’s also to look for ways to refine, update and improve your processes, so they work well with all generations in the workplace.

To inspire your Gen Z workers:

Provide frequent and and highly specific feedback

Gen Z thrives on real-time feedback, not annual reviews. Be direct, specific and consistent in your praise and constructive criticism. This helps to guide your younger workers’ development and show them that their work is valued – a key driver for Gen Z workers.

Embrace technology and modern AI tools

As digital natives, Gen Z workers expect to use modern technology in the workplace. Give them user-friendly digital tools, collaborative online platforms and AI apps to help them work more efficiently and feel like they work in a supportive, tech-savvy environment.

Connect work to a larger purpose

Gen Z wants to feel that their work matters. Be clear how their tasks contribute to the company's mission and its positive social impact. Get your workers involved in community projects and charitable work. This gives their work meaning beyond just a pay check, increasing motivation.

Offer Clear Growth and Development Paths

This generation is ambitious about career progression and skill development – they want to hit their career goals fast. Provide a clear career path, mentorship opportunities and access to skills training. This gives Gen Z a tangible path to growth within the company.

Your management style has to be both agile and flexible, and that means keeping up to date with the latest in people management and HR thinking.

The Right to Work From Home: What It Means for You

Wed, 27 Aug 2025 15:45:32 +1000

The Right to Work From Home: What It Means for You

Having the option to work from home (WFH), without the commute and the cost, has proved to be a very popular benefit for many time-strapped employees.

But until now, this ability to do your job from home has never been enshrined in law. This may be about to change, with Jacinta Allan’s Labor government proposing new legislation that would give employees the right to work from home two days per week.

This is great news for the flexible working arrangements of many hard-working Victorian workers. But what would this legislation mean for your business?

What does the proposed legislation suggest?

Under the legislation proposed by the Victorian State Government, the right to work from home would be made a legal right, available to employees that can work from home.

The Government proposes that:

All employees have the right to work from home at least two days per week
Employees would have this right if they can ‘reasonably do your job from home’
It would apply to both public sector and private sector workers.

What are the advantages of working from home?

The Allan Government believes there are plenty of advantages to encouraging the move to hybrid working, where workers work both from the workplace and their own home.

The Government’s recent media release states that:

WFH is a more flexible way to work. More than a third of Australian workers – including 60% of professionals – regularly work from home.
WFH saves families money. It saves Australians on average $110 a week or $5,308 every year, helping families make their dollars go further.
WFH cuts congestion. Victorians are now spending less time commuting, saving more than three hours in their week on average.
WFH gets more people working. Work from home supports women with children, carers and people with a disability to work.
WFH is good for business. Those who work from home work nearly 20% more hours than those who are working in the office full time.

Is WFH good or bad for your business?

Once the COVID pandemic was over, many businesses mandated a ‘return to work’ policy that was at odds with their employees’ desire to continue with hybrid working.

The worry among less enlightened business leaders was that your workforce needed to be in the office or place of work 5 days a week – and that this was the only practical way to manage a team and keep employees productive.

However, most research has shown that employees are happier, more motivated and more productive when allowed at least some time working from home.

80% of survey respondents in a recent survey by the Australian HR Institute expect that hybrid working levels will increase or stay the same in the coming two years.

Increasingly, employees feel that a hybrid mix of working from the office and from home is a standard expectation of their role – and one of their hard-won, work-related benefits. So, what can you do to get the best from hybrid working and WFH?

Here are five key ways to achieve WFH productivity:

Build a culture of trust and autonomy: Empower your employees by making it clear that you trust them to manage their own time and workload from home. Don’t micro manage your team. Instead, show respect that will boost their motivation and get good results.
Invest in the right technology and tools: Your team will need access to communication and collaboration tools like video conferencing, and messaging platforms like Teams and Slack. They’ll also need project management software to keep workflow organised and efficient.
Maintain strong, regular communication: Use scheduled check-ins and team-wide video calls to keep everyone aligned and engaged. This stops solo team members feeling isolated and helps to build and reinforce that feeling of being part of a wider team.
Promote a good work-life balance: Encourage all your employees to set boundaries between their work and home life. Respect their non-working hours and make sure everyone has time to rest and recharge, to prevent burnout and poor wellbeing issues.
Focus on outputs, not hours: Make sure you judge your employee’s performance on the quality and completion of their work, not on how many hours they’re visibly online. This really helps to reinforce trust and incentivise the whole team to be as productive as possible.

Whether you’re a fan or an opponent of hybrid working and WFH, the reality is that most employees will expect some kind of flexible working from their employer.

Book some time with our team to talk through more strategies for making WFH both a positive and a productive change for your business.

Five ways to beat the current talent shortage

Wed, 25 Jun 2025 22:49:19 +1000

Five ways to beat the current talent shortage

When you can’t find the talent you need, that can place some severe limitations on the operational capabilities and growth potential of your business.

Difficulties in hiring the right staff was the second biggest concern for business owners in the recent Small Business Conditions Survey 2024 from the Australian Chamber of Commerce & Industry (ACCI). 57% of respondents said that a lack of skills and worker shortages are a significant issue for their business.

So, how do you overcome this talent shortage and find the people you need?

How to find the talent your business needs to grow.

Bringing a stable pipeline of talented people in the business is crucial for your success. But in the current climate that’s not easy. Here are five tips for finding the talent you need and filling the important roles in your company structure:

Upskill your existing employees.

Instead of hiring externally, think about investing in training programs to provide upskilling opportunities for your current employees. Pairing experienced employees with newer team members can help to promote knowledge sharing, skill development and mentorship for your ambitious employees.

Make good use of technology and automation.

Where possible, use technology to automate repetitive, menial tasks. This gets the low-level work done while freeing up your employees' time to concentrate on high-level strategic work. Tech can also allow your team to work remotely, from other locations, opening up your talent pool.

Rethink your hiring strategy.

Focus on skills, not experience, when looking for new talent. Look for candidates with the necessary skill set and think about hiring non-traditional candidates from diverse backgrounds, including recent graduates, retirees, people with disabilities and those that challenge your current demographics.

Offer competitive benefits and salaries.

Employees have high expectations. So, it’s important to offer flexible working arrangements, options for remote/hybrid working and a benefits package that meets their needs. Employee perks like health insurance cover, enhanced contributions to super plans and professional development opportunities make a big difference when potential employees are sizing you up as an employer.

Create an attractive brand as an employer.

Having a positive, ambitious and transparent company culture can help you attract similarly minded talent. Walk it like you talk it and recognise and reward employees for their contributions, hard work and new ideas. A strong online, social media and marketing presence is also vital to showcase why your company is different and the value you offer to staff.

Talk to us about reviewing your talent strategy.

If you’re struggling to source the best talent, it might be time for a review of your talent strategy. Talk to our team about ways to revitalise your hiring strategy and fill those empty roles.

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