APlease help I am growing and I need help keeping it all straight and communicating with my employees....

I started out doing the decorating for friends and family out of my home this is over five years ago something I have grown and I've had a 400 square-foot shop After Two years I grew out of that location and now i am in a larger location.... For the past five years it's just been me and a few friends and family to help me.... Now I have employees and I'm having trouble communicating what orders need to be done especially when I am not there... I purchased the cake boss software... I have a hard copy of all of my orders... But I need help keeping track of orders when they are due and the bake list that needs to be done.

AIt sounds like you need a real point of sale and order management system, like BakeSmart or FlexiBake. Do some research and look up pricing, features, and demos so you can get a feel for what the software offers.

Another option would be to build a custom system on top of your existing accounting software (e.g. QuickBooks).

AWhat we did at my old job that worked really well was my boss had 14 clipboards (a chart with 14 spaces would work the same). Each one was the orders that would need done each day for a two week time period. They were listed by the time due. So we would come in and start on the list with whatever was due earliest. Then when we were done we would prep whatever we could appropriately make in advance for the next day and depending on how fast we worked we would go into the week.

for instance if its Monday and I go into work, the cake is already made and assembled and the eclairs are already baked and wrapped air tight.  the pastry cream is made in the fridge, I fill them and decorate them ready to go out at their designated time. done with today so I look at the prep lists.

isee tomorrow we have panna cotta, I starton that so it can set up in the fridge overnight. then I make the crème brulee custard and store in the fridge to age overnight. looking further into the list I see that I need dulce de leche mousse. today I will boil my can of sweetened condensed milk to get dulce de leche. most likely I started this earlier in my day so that it would be completed by time I need to leave. after that, I've done all that I can do today, I go home.

Tuesday, unmold panna cotta, bake crème brulee. done with today start prep for tomorrow. make cake, make butter cream, used cooled ducle de leche to make dulce de leche mousse. we need 12 dz signature rolls for tomorrow so I make the poolish today tomature overnight. go home

weds, mix and shape rolls, let proof.

assemble cake. bake off rolls. 

just an example of how we would do our work with this system . after a week or two of getting used to it, we wouldn't even have to talk to our boss about what we have to do unless it was something that had never been ordered before, or special plating instructions ( we were catering) .

I have no experience with what Jason is talking about, but im sure its definitely worth looking into.