Month: March 2013

Build Your Business the EY Way

Post author By Pamela Swift
Post date March 20, 2013

As is always the case in business, connections are everything. As a small business owner, getting advice and inspiration from established, successful entrepreneurs is essential.

Business owners nearly always say, “invest, invest, invest.” They mean it.

In order to build your business properly, you have to have one eye on the future at all times. This doesn’t mean getting so far-fetched in your faith of what you can accomplish with your business (which is likely more than you think anyways) that you let daily operations run amuck, but that you are able to focus on expansion and the betterment of your enterprise.

As a boss, you can’t get bogged down by the little daily issues which will be innumerable and ceaseless.

John Ferraro EY is an example of someone who knew how to invest wisely and from that was able to earn his title of Global Chief Operating Officer of Ernst and Young. Ferraro’s strategy is like that of McDonald’s, but on a globally less threatening scale–get everywhere and make good business connections.

When you think about it, it’s the type of approach you might take in your own life with personal relationships. The more diverse and numerable the connections, the more well-rounded and flexible you’ll be in your trajectory.

You don’t just want friends who like Jack London, hiking trips, and microbrews, but ones who find astrology a little too accurate, are addicted to frozen yogurt, and can write epic poems at a moment’s notice. All about the diversity.

Diversity is what helps you grow and expand your notions of what’s available, what’s possible, and what’s needed in the world.

Since I was a senior in high school and first learned of the Stock Market in economics, I’ve learned to diversify investments. It’s good to have your hand in multiple honey pots because, as well all know, things are shifty when it comes to financial markets.

It’s really a matter of being smart and thinking not only about the future, but what may go right in the market or terribly wrong if you don’t have rainy day funds at your disposal.

You have to be open to changes and willing to grow as the world does. Nothing is the same from one day to the next and looking to someone who holds that same approach, as Ferraro does, will only make you more resilient to the inevitable declines and rough spots of running a business.

Revitalize your plans every once in a while by reaching out in ways you didn’t plan on doing before. As wonderful and brilliant as you are, you’re limited to your specific experiences without an infusion of creativity and external stimulation.

Seek out that stimulation instead of waiting for blockages in growth. Invest time and energy in people, businesses, and methods that speak to you, challenge you, make you better just for having been in their vicinity. Make it your mission to spark your own interest in what you’re doing rather than waiting for others to find you to be a guide.

What does this mean, exactly?

Well, if you’re an insurance company, try your hand at investments for the rapidly developing field of wireless health. If you’re a marketing company, add a social media little to your portfolio.

Read up on what others are doing and use it as an impetus for new projects and projections. Go to conferences, watch TED talks, follow trends on CNN’s financial page. Get out there and seek the wealth of information that’s available to help you see how you can improve.

Article contributed by Jenna Smith

Success Attitude

Taking Your Power Back From Worry And Fear

Post author By
Post date March 14, 2013

Worrying about something that may or may never happen costs sleepless nights and peace of mind.

Do you expect the best or the worst to happen?

Life can feel challenging, unpredictable, and sometimes scary. You may be dealing with some situations that feel uncomfortable and staying positive and trusting is not so easy. I know the feeling!

Struggle and suffering is self-inflicted. When you are feeling fear, your attention is focused on the future or rehashing the past. Energy goes where you focus the most attention.

Breathe, get present in your body, get grounded, and anchor into the arms of your Divine. Worry, fear, anxiety dissipates when you reconnect with the inner Presence.

Counting physical objects exercise to bring you back into the present

This exercise takes several minutes. While it appears to be very simple, the effect is quite powerfull.

Put your attention (rest your eyes) on an object in your immediate environment. Keep your attention on that object for 3-5 seconds (without thinking about what it is!) and count the number 1 out loud. Repeat this and choose different objects, placing your attention for several seconds on each one as you count up to 20 objects. Notice how you feeling when you are done.

Are you creating sacred space to be still and listen? You have an internal GPS, the voice of God, your IAM Presence that is continually speaking to you; to guide you towards living a more joyfull and prosperous life. You are either following the fears of your ego or the love of your soul. One holds you hostage. The other liberates you.

What part of you are you empowering to lead your life? Your captor or liberator?

Stop listening to your ego/mind! It does not have the answers you seek or the wisdom to lovingly guide you.

Your ego only sees life as full of problems and obstacles to solve.

Your soul sees life as abundantly rich of possibilities and potential. Your soul see the grand vision and design for your life!

One small inner shift can create a ripple of change in your life. Continue to invest in your inner growth and transformation. It is one of the most important investments you can make to live a beautiful present and glorious future.

Today expect the best.

Listen to the whispers of your soul for guidance and direction. Tune your grate-full eyes to see all this is rich, loving, and meaning-full in your life. You are NOT alone. The Presence walks with you. The stronger your bond is with the Divine, the more Grace you will experience. The best is yet to come! ?

As events in our world accelerate, and transformation occurs with more speed and gusto, do you have the kind of help you need to PROCESS through the emotional upheavals and life challenges to create the breakthroughs you are ready to make?

I am still accepting applications for my upcoming Soul Circle group, that will be starting soon. The group is almost half full and with only 4 seats left.

When you have people who:

Feed your heart and support you in building a strong inner foundation to weather any of life’s challenges….

Want what you want for yourself (and more) and celebrate both your victories and failures without judgment…..

Help you expand your perspective of limitation to see exciting possibilities you may have missed.. and who invite you to embrace your brilliance…

Having what you need for the next breakthrough can make the difference between struggling and soaring. Your deepest dreams can move from an idea to a reality, a challenge to a triumph when you have a team of kindred spirit to help you stay the course!

Technology

Can Your Business Survive Without You?

Post author By Pamela Swift
Post date March 13, 2013

Entrepreneurs can be notorious for their unique ways of thinking and working. The fact that they are often different from most people in the business world is what makes them branch out on their own and start up their own companies.

If you are the owner and progenitor of a small business, then it is your vision that drives the company and most likely you that is the heart of the business. Although your personality and unique vision as an entrepreneur is crucial to the success of your venture, it is also incredibly important that everything can run without you.

Business continuity and preparation is not just for big business

I was told by a former editor that all the work I was doing should be annotated and filed in such a way in a shared hard drive that someone else could carry on with my work in the event that I was hit and killed by a bus.

Aside from being slightly concerned that this was a thinly veiled threat and instilling an unhealthy dose of paranoia in me whenever I crossed the road outside the office, this struck me as good advice. If something does happen to you, and it doesn’t necessarily have to be as final as my editor had intimated/threatened, then the work that you were doing does have to carry on and you should be making it as easy as possible for someone else to pick up where you left off.

Whilst this is true for simple worker bees like I was at the time, it is just as important for those higher up the food chain. Imagine the impact that you as an entrepreneur and small business owner can have by going AWOL without instructions left for what to do in your absence?

Business continuity is indeed a whole industry in itself and preparing for the unexpected is something that you can cover to a certain extent with business insurance in general, but here are three other things you can do as a small business owner to make recovering from an unforeseen incident easier.

1. Self documenting

When it comes to computer work, there are some simple steps to make your system decipherable, and I will admit right now that I break every single one of these rules.

a) Don’t hide important mission critical things away on a private computer that no one else has access to.

b) Name things in a sensible and consistent manner.

c) Place files in logical folders and sub-folders.

d) Do not recreate the Labyrinth with your sub-folders – anyone trying to decode your system will expect to encounter a minotaur at the end.

e) Do not append any version of a file with the word “final” because you will inevitably end up iterating that with “final final” or “final final final” or “actually final” or “REALLY FINAL”, which can make finding the actual final version rather complicated for yourself, let alone a third party tying to establish the hierarchy of “actually” and “really”.

Keeping stuff logical is important, but make sure that it’s logical by the standards of everyone else and not just you. As mentioned above, it is likely that your entrepreneurial brain operates vastly different to how most people think. In the nicest possible way, the way that you organise and manage things naturally will probably be a bit special when considered by other people.

2. Clear appointment of responsibility

Make it clear from the outset whose responsibility it is to take over abandoned business critical tasks if you are taken out of action and make sure it is clear who should perform your roles. This can make it easier for other people to prepare for the unexpected and any unforeseen events become much less of a burden on your staff or partners.

It’s also a good idea to make sure that you have some kind of deputy or second in command that you trust to run things in your absence. Without adequate delegation, your operation will most likely fall apart if you’re not there to see it through. You might be able to give it a nudge in the right direction depending upon how incapacitated you become, but being prepared sooner rather than later is the most sensible option by far. You don’t want to leave people bickering over who does what when there’s no one left running business critical operations.

3. Share your work

Unless you’re working on something that is absolutely top secret, sharing what you’re doing and updating someone on your progress from time to time is useful. This doesn’t have to be a time consuming/time wasting daily briefing, but a quasi-regular update can go a long way to keeping others in the loop.

This might be something you don’t feel you need to do if you’re running a small company and you might feel that your communication is already as good as it needs to be. It might also be that you feel this is something that only your staff need to do and that being at the top you shouldn’t really answer to anyone, but not only will you find it useful in the case that someone has to take over, but you’ll probably also find that it can also keep you to task a little more. Knowing that there is some kind of deadline on your work, even if it’s largely self imposed, can have the added bonus of increasing your productivity.

Your business shouldn’t end with you

The work you’re doing is important and if it’s not important, there’s not a lot of point in you doing it, much less investing your entrepreneurial efforts into it. With this in mind, it is important that anything you do can be finished by others. If you are truly irreplaceable, then you need to take measures to amend that.

About The Author

Written by David Hing for YOUR Insurance, a broker specialising in public liability insurance for small businesses.

Success Attitude

Why Even the Busiest Entrepreneurs Should Take Breaks at Work

Post author By Pamela Swift
Post date March 11, 2013

Article Contributed by Kimberly Crossland

Entrepreneurs are a unique group of people. Their passion for their business, industry and customers is enough to keep them at work for hours on end, often times causing them to sacrifice hobbies, television shows and recreation.

Sitting for long periods of time is not uncommon for many entrepreneurs, but it is unhealthy. A recent study in Finland showed that professionals who did not take time to recover from their work week increased their risk of cardiovascular diseases. Yet many entrepreneurs claim that if they stepped away from their company for even a short period of time, they would fear being out of touch which could leave them more anxious and stressed.

If you are an entrepreneur passionate about your job to the point of fearing being out of touch for too long, there is a solution. Taking short breaks throughout the day is a good way to balance between the love of business and your health. Here are a few reasons why you should embrace the idea of taking short breaks throughout the workday and encourage your employees to do the same.

Productivity increases with more breaks – Working for long hours does not always mean you get more done. When you reach the point of burnout, you could be investing valuable time at the office or behind your desk with little result. Taking breaks can help you clear your mind and focus better making you more productive.
Sitting for too long can hurt your circulation – Blood flow is vital to keeping your mind and body healthy. When you sit for extended periods of time, you do more damage than you may realize. Stand up, stretch and walk around whenever possible. You may even consider investing in an adjustable height desk to help you change postures throughout the day without leaving your computer.
Repetitive stress injuries leave lasting effects – Overuse of certain muscles can lead to injuries, such as carpal tunnel syndrome and eye strain from looking at the computer screen for too long. Take a break and get some natural sunlight, even if it is only for a few minutes. This will rejuvenate your mindset and improve your physical health. To help even more, try using an ergonomic keyboard or task light. This will ensure that your office is well-equipped to keep you healthy.

Taking a break to stand up, walk around and get some natural sunlight for a few minutes is extremely helpful not only to your physical health but also to your mental well-being. For busy entrepreneurs, taking breaks can actually lead to heightened productivity and better balance overall.

Author Bio: Kimberly Crossland is an entrepreneur and small business consultant. To stay healthy at work, her home office is equipped with a treadmill desk, ergonomic keyboard and a task light. To find ergonomic furniture for your office, visit www.thehumansolution.com.