The Cleaning Biz Blog

Clean Communication Skills for Clients and their Cleaners

A few weeks back, our Director, Judith Morgan, was interviewed by fellow coach Barbara Bradbury for her podcast.  Barbara is a relationship coach; relationships with your colleagues, your family, your friends, your spouse - you name it, and she advocates clean communication as a way of improving relationships. 

Barbara asked Judith about how we use good communications within The Cleaning Biz, and then recorded an interesting chat for about 10-15 minutes all around the topic.  If you are a human being, there's something to learn here.   If you are a business person, it's vital.   If you are a client or a cleaner or an existing or potential licensee of The Cleaning Biz, it's essential listening.

The recording is entitled Honest Conversations and you can listen to it here:

Eight time saving cooking tips Part 2

Here is some more time saving cooking tips to help you shave some time off the time you spend in the kitchen.

If you take a packed lunch to work or your children take one to school then get the children to help when it comes to wrapping sandwiches and cookies in cling film. If you have some time on your hands one day but know you are going to be stuck for time the next, then prepare double the amount of snacks and store them in the refrigerator.

Organise your cookbooks and recipes where you can easily get to them, this way when you want to cook that something special or need a brush up on a recipe you won’t have to waste time searching for them.

Keep a wipe dry board handy around the kitchen and keep an eye on the items you run out of in your cupboards. When you use the last of something jot it down on the board and this way it will save you time when you come to make out your shopping list.

When it comes to preparing such drinks as ice tea, coffee or soft drinks make them in huge jugs and store them in the fridge. This way you will save time making up just 1 cup and the beverage will be icy cold when you need it.

8 time saving cooking tips Part 1

Even the smallest of time saving factors can help in the busy family life and can end up shaving hours off the time you spend working to keep your family happy. When it comes to meal times, preparing and cooking food to fill the hungry mouths of your family can seem endless, here are some tips to help you get the most out of your time.

You can save yourself a lot of time and money when it comes to planning meals for the week. By thinking ahead and planning what you will have for each meal every day you can make use of left over. For example if you have a roast on a Sunday and there are slices left over then you can have these cold with a salad the day after or use the left over to make sandwiches for school and work.

If you know that you are going to be too busy to cook one or two nights in the week then prepare and cook two meals when you have times and freeze one for when you are busy, all you have to do then is take it out of the freezer and reheat.

If you are preparing a meal that requires you to chop onions or grate cheese for example then while you are doing this do twice as much and put some in a container in the fridge for using with another meal.

While you are working in the kitchen make sure that you clean up after yourself, this way when you have finished preparing and cooking there won’t be as much cleaning left to do.

Cards and Presents

Get into the habit of buying all of your greetings cards on a yearly basis.  At the end of every year take your calendar down and write out a list of all the birthdays and occasions that you bought cards for this year.  Then buy up a stock of different cards, for men, women, children, anniversaries, good luck etc. etc. Whenever these events come around in the forthcoming year you’ll always be ready and prepared, buy with specific people in mind if you like but just make sure you have a good stock.

Taking this one step further you could also build up a present store with generic presents for boys, girls, uncles and aunts.  If you really enjoy shopping you may want to save those presents for the most special people in your life, but still shop all year round.  That way when you come across something just right for your mum you can get it in April even though her birthday isn’t until September knowing that you’ve got something that she’ll love rather than rushing around at the last moment and just getting any old thing.  This way you’ll also avoid having to run out for those last minute children’s presents for those parties they’ve been invited too or when you meet up with an old friend who hadn’t told you it was her birthday today!