This blog is for Alan and John (and YOU) to express their opinions, biases, prejudices and thoughts on topics pertinent to small business! Click the headlines at the top of the article to open the full text.
Please join the conversation and add your opinions, biases, prejudices and thoughts to make this a really valuable resource for learning!
A deadline is approaching – don’t miss out! If your business has a ‘trading name’ and the goodwill of your business associated with it – IT WILL DISAPPEAR FROM 1 NOVEMBER THIS YEAR! That’s right! Trading names will no longer be recognised and will be removed from the National Business Names Register from the end… [Read more…]
Is there an “indispensable person” in your business? Worse still, as the business owner are you the indispensable person? An indispensable person in a business can be a major risk and also a bottleneck! They are the kind of person who has some expertise / knowledge / experience in a particular aspect of the business…. [Read more…]
Business owners, are you guilty of being a rescuer? Do you try to pump life into your staff, clients, peers and friends? James (Jim) Rohn was a favourite motivational speaker of ours and I had the good fortune to meet him on a number of occasions. He gave us all some great life and business… [Read more…]
If your only goal is to have a bigger business, because you think bigger is better – think again. This is a great little story about a Mexican villager to get you thinking about “What is the purpose of my business? Do I have a plan?” The American investment banker was at the pier of… [Read more…]
In their book “Great By Choice” Jim Collins and Morten Hansen dispel a number of entrenched myths about what makes companies great in tough times. What do you think about them? Please add your comment below! Entrenched myth #1: Successful leaders in a turbulent world are bold, risk-seeking visionaries. Contrary finding: The best leaders we studied… [Read more…]
As business owners, how do we learn anything? What happens in the brain? The four stages of learning, initially described as “Four Stages for Learning Any New Skill”, was apparently developed at Gordon Training International by Noel Burch in the 1970s. (Wikipedia) It’s a great theory for business owners to understand because often we “don’t… [Read more…]
“No-one on their death bed ever wished they had spent more time at the office / in the business.” This is a fairly well known quote by the late Stephen Covey, author of “The 7 Habits Of Highly Effective People” and many other great personal development books. If you have never read this book, we… [Read more…]
It’s easy to get lulled in to a false sense of security when a business is doing a good turnover and turnover figures are going up. The problem is though that it is NOT about the turnover, it’s all about the LEFTOVER! In other words the profit and growing the profit dollars. So often we… [Read more…]
Business owners: where is your hungry crowd? The crowd of people who are beating a track to your business to get what it is you are selling them. Often the answer when we ask this question is something like “All small and medium sized businesses.” Worse still is the answer “Everybody!” These answers mean the… [Read more…]
Business owners: As a leader, where is your mindset at? A number of years ago a business I was running had one critical safety incident after another. After the third, both the organisation and myself were not managing it well. I was taking action, but was uncertain as to whether it was the right action…. [Read more…]
