I know that I’ve spoken of this before and I hate that I am writing about it again, but if I just had this situation chances are that many of my readers are struggling with something similar as well. I have a colleague that I worked with and the relationship crashed and burned. To me it was a part of business, while we did not work well together I didn’t see it as anything … [Read more...]
The Knicks and Your Business
Reorganization is a part of business, it’s as common as copy machines and coffee cups. What else is common? How often they fail at creating anything different in an organization. The Knicks seem to be on to something, so here is what you need to know. Get back to basics The Knicks are bringing back Steve Mills and with over 26 years’ experience, but the genius thing? They are … [Read more...]
Women Catch the Entrepreneurial Spirit and Win
Sponsored by VISA Business: Over the past 15 years, the number of women-owned businesses has grown by 54%. Today, there are over 8 million women-owned businesses, and women are founding businesses at a rate 1.5 times higher than the national average. Those women-owned businesses generate revenues of $1.3 trillion and employ 7.7 million people. That’s 40% more people than … [Read more...]
3 Ways to Increase Your Self-Worth and Your Marketplace Value
Guest Post by Kate Northrup (author bio is available at the end of the article): The key to financial success for women in business is knowing what we’re worth. Money is just a stand in for what we value. As humans we made up money to trade value for value. We start businesses to make money, at least in part. So, if we want to make more money, and I’ve yet to meet a … [Read more...]
Why Consultants Suck
I know what you’re thinking…I’m a consultant so either this is a self-loathing mea culpa or I have a point. Bear with me because I do in fact have a point. The thing about consultants is that we generally are really skilled at something, that’s why we’re consultants. But we are workers, fixers, problem solvers. We aren’t business owners and that is something that I have come up … [Read more...]
The Small Business Owner Blues
In the silence of the night when everyone else has shut down and you are left with your decisions, that’s when you become an entrepreneur. Someone said to me once that to be an entrepreneur you have to have a spouse with a full-time job and while that anecdote is funny it’s also a bit sad. The very essence of an entrepreneur is a risk-taker, however unfair that risk is to the … [Read more...]
Buy and Get Out!
As entrepreneurs sometimes we get so preoccupied with making sales that we forget to take care of the customer. Sadly enough that seems to be the rule rather than the exception the bigger the company. I had one such experience with the vendor Verizon Wireless chose to insure their devices. My company moved to Verizon less than a month ago and as a consultant I get paid by the … [Read more...]
Marketing Your Company, Not You
As I stumble through this minefield of entrepreneurship, I have learned that there has to be a significant switch in your thinking. We start businesses for a variety of reasons, mostly because we are really good at something specific. What happens is that you quickly realize that you cannot be the person that runs the business and the person who does the work. There has to be … [Read more...]
Are you the reason you’re business is failing?
It has taken me 15 years, an MBA, starting my own firm, acquiring and firing partners and staff to understand one infinite business fact. Your gut is always right, no matter what situation no matter who the players. That knot in your stomach that tells you something isn’t right, never lies. So as I come out of a difficult situation I find that I am not doing something that I … [Read more...]
Business Advice for Dummies
As a business owner particularly when you are starting out, ‘constructive criticism’ is something that you get in spades. Some of the criticism is great, it tells you things about yourself and your company that you didn’t know. Other times it can feel like a direct attack, so how do you know the difference and how do you find the silver lining? Consider the source Sometimes … [Read more...]