Stepcase Lifehack » Management

On “The Substance of Style”

Art Carden — Wed, 03 Mar 2010 13:00:14 +0000

Review of Virginia Postrel, The Substance of Style (2004, Harper Perennial, Paperback)

Virginia Postrel’s The Substance of Style is a book I’ve been meaning to read for a long time. Postrel has a rare combination of talents: her writing is fluid, vivid, and memorable, her writing is informed by careful economic reasoning, and despite her expertise she doesn’t assume that her aesthetic and cultural choices are self-evidently better than anyone else’s. In a quote from a review in The Guardian in the inside cover of the paperback edition, Steven Pinker writes: “In this delightful book, Virginia Postrel invents a new kind of social criticism, one that is economically literate, brimming with psychological insight, and deeply resepctful of ordinary people.” Pinker’s assessment is accurate. For people interested in design, aesthetics, and social change very broadly, The Substance of Style takes its place next to her earlier The Future and Its Enemies as a must-read.

Postrel makes several contributions. First, her discussion of what she calls “the aesthetic imperative” attacks aesthetic and cultural elitism on every margin. She engages both those who think that style and fashion are superficial and unnecessary, and she engages those who think that the unwashed masses are making incorrect aesthetic decisions. Second, she argues that even though they are increasing in importance, aesthetic values are not reflected in conventional measures of living standards. Finally, she shows that there isn’t really a tradeoff between substance and style. If you’re familiar with a cliche about selling “the sizzle, not the steak,” as aesthetics get progressively more important the sizzle becomes an integrally important part of the steak-eating experience.

Postrel hooks the reader almost immediately with a discussion of the sudden change that occurred in Afghanistan after the Taliban fell:

Afghan men lined up at barbershops to have their beards shaved off. Women painted their nails with once-forbidden polish. Formerly clandestine beatuy salons opened in prominent locations. Men traded postcards of beautiful Indian movie stars, and thronged to buy imported TVs, VCRs, and videotapes. Even burka merchants diversified their wares, adding colors like brown, peach, and green to the blue and off-white dictated by the Taliban’s whip-wielding virtue police. Freed to travel to city markets, village women demanded better fabric, finer embroidery, and more variety in their traditional garments. (p. ix)

Throughout the book, Postrel revisits this theme and argues that, contrary to the claim that style is a ruse cooked up by manipulative advertisers, it actually touches a deep and fundamental human appreciation for beauty. Simply put, people value pleasant aesthetic experiences as such. If you need a cosmic justification, consider what it says about our ability to cooperate for the production of truly beautiful things. The writer of Proverbs asked the sluggard to consider the ant. I ask the elitist to consider the iPod, which combines incredible functionality with beauty that is difficult to articulate. The iPod is the product of countless hours of effort among countless people. They cooperated to produce something that is visually stunning and that allows you to carry the great artistic achievements of humankind in your pocket.

There are important takeaway points for critics, entrepreneurs, and managers. For critics, Postrel’s book draws on classical liberal and libertarian respect for people with self-evident and inalienable rights rather than as members of a churning mass waiting to be managed by moral, intellectual, and aesthetic elites (see the quote from Steven Pinker, above). She disputes the claim that fashion and style are only about status. Through a number of examples, she argues that while people try to keep up with the Joneses on some margins, a more plausible explanation is that people actually value aesthetic pleasures.

The Viking Range, for example, which some critics denigrate as a wasteful status symbol, is considered by some to be an aesthetic addition to the kitchen. Some buy them for the same reason they buy artwork (p. 76). Is it to my taste? Not really, but the fact that I’m an economist should tell you everything you need to know about my fashion sense. My disagreement with and puzzlement about others’ aesthetic choices is an invitation for me to practice a little humility and maybe see if I can learn something. My confusion isn’t a license to exercise veto power over others’ choices.

Postrel emphasizes again and again that “People are different” (cf. pp. 150-152, emphasis in original). In a recent episode of The Simpsons, Marge criticized the new “ultimate punching” MMA fad by saying “call me a killjoy, but I think that because this is not to my taste, no one else should be able to enjoy it.” Unfortunately, this is exactly the sentiment a lot of critics express when the call for design restrictions that (for example) prevent people from building houses certain ways.

The takeaway point for entrepreneurs and managers is that they ignore the aesthetic imperative at their peril. Style and beauty aren’t superficial. They are yet another margin on which people create meaningful value. You can serve great food, but the quality of the food itself is only one aspect of what people want when they go to restaurants. Businesspeople who forget that the aesthetic imperative matters can manage their businesses into bankruptcy (pp. 164-165).

And so we return to Steven Pinker’s assessment. The Substance of Style helps us think about individual decisions and social problems in new ways. This is a book that is seven years old but that has aged well: if anything, it is more relevant now than it was then.

Art Carden is Assistant Professor of Economics and Business at Rhodes College in Memphis, Tennessee and an Adjunct Fellow with the Oakland, California-based Independent Institute and the Auburn, Alabama-based Ludwig von Mises Institute. His research papers are available on his SSRN Author Page and at ArtCarden.com. His commentaries appear regularly at Mises.org and Forbes.com, and he is a regular contributor to Division of Labour. His wife Shannon blogs about healthy eating for a young family at No More Nuggets. Their son Jacob is a source of constant joy, and they look forward to the birth of their daughter Taylor Grace in July.

Share This

Are You Authentic In Your Small Business?

Susan Baroncini-Moe — Tue, 23 Feb 2010 13:00:43 +0000

Being authentic can be surprisingly difficult, especially in business. I often work with people who have no problem being genuine in real life, but who really struggle with authenticity in business. I hear from clients that, in business, they have to appear to be mega-successful — not just sort of successful, and not “hey, I’m growing a business here,” but really successful, in order to be taken seriously. There’s so much posturing and pretending, because people believe that you can’t become successful unless you appear to already be successful. But that’s just not true! In fact, it’s just the opposite.

We’re all works in progress.

I’ve seen “behind the scenes” of a lot of the people who many of us think of as mega-successful, and things aren’t always how they seem. A well-known wealth coach I know spends most of his time talking about the power of mindset, but I know that he struggles with exactly the same issues everyone else does: doubt, uncertainty, insecurity. We’re all works in progress. Every single one of us. We all have questions and insecurities and fears. It’s how you deal with those internal struggles that matters.

The truth has a way of seeping out anyway.

We think we’re so good at hiding our secrets from the rest of the world. But whether it’s a financial crisis, marital problems, personal demons, or something else, even if you think you’re keeping your skeletons hidden, you’re probably not. Truth has a way of sneaking out there and betraying our lies. Truth may show up in an uncertain look in your eye or in the way you keep your secrets, but know this: it’s almost impossible to keep things totally hidden.

It’s not all about appearances. It’s about truth.

Far too many folks out there seem to think that if you appear to be super-successful, you’ll achieve legitimacy. But it’s not about how you seem, it’s about how you are. If who you really are matches up with who you say you are, then you’ll appear credible, because you are credible. On the other hand, pretend you’re something that you’re not and you’ll come off as shady.

The real secret to gaining legitimacy is authenticity.

We’re all after legitimacy, in the end. So take the time to build your expertise and knowledge, offer your services at a discounted rate while you gain experience, and build in the right systems to support your products and services so you can offer unparalleled good service. You’ll build credibility by doing things right, and with credibility and legitimacy comes real success.

Susan Baroncini-Moe is the CEO of Business in Blue Jeans and the person that small biz owners call when they're ready for hands-on help creating a meaningful business that creates more freedom and flexibility in their lives. Learn more at BusinessInBlueJeans.com. Other links: The Experts Series and Susan's No Suits Allowed! E-zine.

Share This

So Someone Said No… How to Handle Rejection In Small Business

Susan Baroncini-Moe — Mon, 15 Feb 2010 13:00:38 +0000

So someone said no. You asked someone to participate in a joint venture, tried to close a sale, invited someone to be your social media friend, and they said no. And you felt that uncomfortable feeling of having put yourself “out there” on a limb, only to look over and see that someone’s sawing the limb out from under you. It’s a weird, stomach-turning feeling, isn’t it? But it doesn’t have to be.

Someone will always say no. Someone else will say yes.
Previous results are no indicator of future success. So if you’ve gotten a bunch of nos, so what? You might get a yes tomorrow. And if one person says no, that has no bearing on what the next person will say.
If you get a no, you’re no worse off than before you asked.
Before you ask, you definitely have a no. If you don’t ask, the result is the same as if you get a no. If you ask and get a no, you’re in exactly the same boat. If you ask and get a yes, though, you’re off and running. If you put your ego out there, though, that’s when you get a little damaged. That’s why you have to move to #3.
When you ask, don’t attach yourself to the answer.
When you ask for the sale or whatever else it is, you can’t be attached to the answer or you will get hurt. The “no” rarely has anything to do with you. If you’ve invited a big name to be a part of a joint venture or a conference, they might say no because they’re overwhelmed with time commitments. If you’ve asked someone to hire you, they might say no because they can’t afford you. Don’t attach yourself to the answer, and you’ll handle those nos with grace.
Handling a no with grace can mean future business.
If someone says no now, they may be willing to say yes later. Handling a no with grace means you’ll have no hesitation about going back to them next month or next year to bring something else to the table.

It’s not exactly rejection when someone says no. It’s more than likely that the no has nothing to do with you anyway. If you stay detached from the results and stay engaged in your business relationships regardless of the outcome, you’ll have no problem continuing to go out on that limb over and over.

Share This

How to Kill a Radical Idea

Paul Sloane — Tue, 09 Feb 2010 13:00:51 +0000

Einstein said that all great original ideas at first appear absurd. This is why it is so easy to dismiss radical suggestions when they surface. We point out that they are absurd and so miss great opportunities. How would you react if an unorthodox business idea was presented to you and you could immediately see problems with it? Imagine that you are the boss in each of these situations:

1. Spectacles manufacturer in the 1960s

Employee: I think we should investigate a new idea I have heard about called contact lenses.

Boss: How does it work?

Employee: We make prescription lenses that people attach to their eyeballs so that they can see well without spectacles.

Boss: You mean I stick a piece of glass onto my eyeball?

Employee: It could be glass or plastic.

Boss: That is ridiculous. What if it slipped behind the eye? What if it damaged the eye? We could be sued for millions. No-one is going to want something so dangerous and inconvenient. Spectacles are safe, cheap and popular. Let’s focus on doing what we know.

2. Radio manufacturer in the 1980s

Employee: I read about this guy Trevor Bayliss who has invented a clockwork radio. It is an interesting idea – do you think we should look at this?

Boss: Don’t be silly. I heard about this too. It will never catch on.

Employee: Really?

Boss: Sure. Let me give you three reasons. First radios need electricity and the easiest way to get that is through the mains or batteries – that is what consumers and the trade want. Secondly the radio will have to be really big to contain the winding mechanism. Third, the radio will suddenly stop in the middle of a programme waiting to be wound up – how annoying will that be? Customers want convenience – not the bother of stopping to wind up a radio every 10 minutes.

Employee: I guess you are right.

3. Website entrepreneur in 2000s

Programmer: I have this idea for a new social media site.

Boss: Great. How does it work?

Programmer: People can make short broadcasts of up to 140 characters.

Boss: 140 characters! Why restrict them? Can they add pictures, music and videos?

Programmer: No – it is just a box for 140 characters of text.

Boss: Don’t be silly. Facebook and Myspace already offer far more than that. We need something more exciting than a text box. How about we copy Facebook and add more features?

See how easy it is? Every day in every organisation bosses are rejecting interesting ideas because the ideas look silly. How can you overcome this problem? You train people to ask questions rather than be judgmental. When somebody comes to you with a bizarre idea do not find fault with it; instead ask questions. How could we make it work? What are the benefits for customers if this happened? Is there a better way to do this?

If you want innovation in your organisation then you must encourage people at all levels to welcome, entertain and explore crazy ideas – they are the ones that can lead to breakthroughs.

Paul Sloane is an author and speaker on leadership, innovation and lateral thinking. His most recent book is The Innovative Leader. He helps organizations improve innovation, creativity and leadership. He is the founder of Destination Innovation. He has written 15 books of lateral thinking puzzles and hosts the lateral puzzles forum.Follow him on Twitter at twitter.com/PaulSloane.

Share This

10 Questions to Ask Yourself About Your Job

Paul Sloane — Wed, 23 Dec 2009 13:00:47 +0000

Take a moment for a reality check. Ask yourself these questions – how many positive answers do you get?

1. Is what I do really worthwhile? In other words: Does my work make a difference to people? Does it help people? Am I adding something of value to the world? Doing something worthwhile makes us feel worthwhile and can compensate for other shortcomings in the position.

2. Do I enjoy my job? Do you you get a buzz from what you do?

3. Am I learning? If you are still developing and learning in the job then it is an investment of your time. If you have stopped learning and are repeating experiences then it may be time for a change.

4. Does this job lead to somewhere I want to go? Is this experience useful in preparing you for something else you might want to do?

5. Am I well paid? On an objective assessment are you fairly compensated for what you contribute?

6. Do I get on with my boss? A difficult boss can make your time at work miserable. If you answer this question “no”, then see the article ‘What to do if you do not get on with your boss.’

7. Do I get on with my colleagues? A good social environment and friendly workmates can make up for many other problems at work.

8. Am I empowered to be creative and do things my way? This is more important for some people than others. Does it matter for you?

9. Is my work/life balance acceptable? Most people would like more time with their families but work is demanding so they accept some kind of balance. Are you getting at least the minimum free time you need to live your life?

10. Is my job title prestigious? This really matters to some people but is irrelevant to others. Do you feel proud when you tell people where you work and what you do?

The more yes answers the better. How many did you get? Now rank the questions in importance for you. For some people doing something really worthwhile is most important while others place greater value on working with friends in a sociable atmosphere. Compare the yes answers and the no answers. Do the positive answers outweigh the negatives in number and importance? For example it might be fine to work in a low paid job if it is important to you that you gain the right experience.

If you have few positive answers and they are not in your top priorities then you should do some soul-searching about what you really want out of life and whether it is time to look for a better job.

Share This

Have You Started Planning for a Successful 2010? Here’s How!

Susan Baroncini-Moe — Thu, 10 Dec 2009 13:00:02 +0000

The New Year is fast approaching. Do you have a plan for your business? Do you know what you’re going to do for 2010 to make your business grow and see your income dreams realized? If not, use these guidelines to plan ahead, so you can make 2010 your year of success!

1. Look back and analyze.
First, take some time to look back on 2009 and analyze your business activities. What worked? What didn’t work? Look back and only take the activities that generated the top 20% of your income into 2010 with you. That way you’ll put the bulk of your efforts in the next year into the most profitable activities and make the most of your time and energy.

Analyze how you spent your time. Did you use your time as efficiently as possible? If not, consider outsourcing and put plans in place now to get your outsourcing team in place.

Look at how you spent your money. Did you spend thousands on expensive products and workshops that didn’t give you a personally effective return on your investment or did you invest in things with a solid ROI, where you actually saw your business grow as a result? Did you find yourself choosing several inexpensive options or a few more expensive items that might have been higher in quality? Start looking at how and where you spent and look at the return you saw on everything you spent.

2. Do a “now” check.
Take some time to think about how you feel about your business now. Are you frustrated? Excited? Discouraged? Encouraged? Gauge how you feel and think about where those feelings are coming from. Has your enthusiasm waned? If so, why?

Sometimes when people start businesses, the initial stages are so exciting and they’re thrilled with any results. But when time passes and the business doesn’t grow the way they thought, or they realize how much effort a successful business takes, enthusiasm can decrease. If that’s happened to you, don’t despair! What you really need is a solid plan, the tools to implement that plan, and the support to help you get there. That brings me to….

3. Look ahead and get your plan in place.
Now that you know where you’ve been and where you are now, it’s time to get a plan in place for the future. You’ve analyzed how you spent your time and money in the previous year, and you have a clear picture of where you are now.

Before you can create a solid plan, you need to figure out where you want to be at the end of this coming year. This is a lot like travel: once you know where you’re going, you can figure out how to get there. Once you know what your goals are, you can determine the best strategies for getting there. If you’re struggling with your goals and your roadmap, find a pro who can help you get things clarified and cleared up so you can make your business a success in 2010, without hesitation!

Share This

What to Do if You Don’t Get Along with Your Boss

Paul Sloane — Fri, 04 Dec 2009 13:00:37 +0000

What should you do if you really cannot get on with your boss at work? Maybe there has been a breakdown in trust, in communication or in respect. In any event it is ruining your time at work and making you frustrated and unhappy. Let’s call your manager “John” and see how we can approach the situation. (The advice here works equally well whether your boss is a man or a woman).

1. How do other people find him? Does everyone have a hard time with John or is it just you? Check out how other people get on with him by asking subtle questions – do not rant about how awful he is and see if others agree. If everyone has a problem with him then you have some common ground on which to work. If only you have difficulties with him then you need to examine yourself and your relationship with him.

2. Ask yourself why. List all the reasons why you think things are not working between you. There are probably some big assumptions on your list so you will need to validate them carefully.

3. Have a heart to heart meeting. Schedule a time to meet John when he is not under pressure. Tell him that you want to discuss some important issues. At the meeting explain very calmly and rationally that you do not feel the relationship is working well and that you would like to explore why and how to improve it. Do not go into a long list of complaints and sores. Take a factual example if you can and start from there. Let him do most of the talking. Try to see the situation from his point of view and understand exactly what he sees as the issues. See how many of the problems you listed at point 2 above are real.

4. Agree an action plan. If you can agree a plan for outcomes that you both want then it really helps. What is it that he wants you to achieve? If you deliver it will he be happy with your performance? Even if you disagree on all sorts of other things try to agree on what your key job objectives are. Ideally you should agree actions that each of you will take to improve the working relationship.

5. Try to understand his objectives and motivation. Even if John is lazy, dishonest and spiteful you can still find out what he is keen to achieve and work with him towards his goals. If you can find a way to help him with his objectives then maybe you can work around his faults. A good rule at work is to help your boss to succeed – whether you like him or not. Other people will see you do this and it works to your credit – especially if they know that your boss is difficult.

6. Go over his head. This is a risky option but sometimes it is necessary – especially if most other people share the same problems with John. Have a quiet word with your boss’s boss and say that you feel that the department is not achieving all that it could. Make some broad suggestions about how things could be improved without making direct accusations against John. Let the senior manager read between the lines; he or she probably knows already.

7. Move sideways in the organization. If you cannot move up then move across for a while. Get some experience in another department. Eventually John will move on, be fired or quit. If you are seen as a positive contributor then you may get your chance to do John’s job better than he did.

8. Quit. Life is too short to spend it in a job that makes you miserable. If you have tried all of the routes above and are still blocked and frustrated then find a job elsewhere. There are plenty of good bosses who want enthusiastic and diligent people to work for them.

Sooner or later most of us will get a difficult boss to deal with. Do not become sullen or aggressive. The trick is to figure out a way to get on with the boss in a manner that helps both of you. It can nearly always be done.

Share This

Could You Raise Your Rates?

Susan Baroncini-Moe — Wed, 25 Nov 2009 13:00:46 +0000

Let’s get real: when you work on an hourly basis, there are two ways to increase income: raise your rates or increase the number of working hours. I’m assuming you don’t really want to spend more time working, so let’s talk about something that a lot of people don’t like talking about: raising your rates. Raising your rates is a way to increase your business income that is often difficult for people to face, and there are many reasons why.

First of all, let’s get over the biggest issue business owners face when raising their rates. I’m just going to lay it out there bluntly. The number one reason solo professionals don’t raise their rates is self-worth issues. In all my years of working with clients, I have yet to run across a single entrepreneur who hasn’t balked at raising his or her rates, saying some version of either “I don’t need that much!” or “My clients would never pay that much!”

But when we get down to it, eventually they have all realized that these aren’t the real reasons they aren’t raising their rates. More often than not, keeping your rates “low” or “reasonable” is a function of one thing: fear. And believe me, I get it. I really do. There was a time several years ago when I was scared to raise my rates. I was scared that I would lose clients and that I wouldn’t be able to get new ones. But my fears were unwarranted, and while at the time I firmly believed it wasn’t about self-worth, when I started to get really real and dig deep about what was holding me back, I realized that indeed that’s exactly what was at the heart of it.

So how can you get past that? Well, first of all, you need to do some soul-searching. Dig deep and find out why you think you’re not worth earning more. Hint: If you start saying, “I just love what I do and I’d do it for free if I could afford to,” dig deeper. There’s a lot more going on there than you may initially think.

Second, stop charging by the hour. Instead, create packages with a lot of value built in. Make sure you are really offering something great, something that will produce a high return on your clients’ investment in working with you.

Third, start talking more about that value that your bringing to the table, instead of what people will get from working with you. When I talk with prospective clients, I do cover the features (like how many sessions are in each package, for example), but I focus more on the benefit of working with me. I talk about the value I’m bringing to their business, and show them how working with me will help their businesses grow.

Once you figure out what’s at the heart of how you’ve set your rates and made these slight shifts, you’ll be amazed at how fast your income will grow.

Share This

Does Your Company Support Your Blog?

Dan Schawbel — Mon, 28 Sep 2009 13:00:30 +0000

As much as you think blogging and social networking are mainstream, corporate America has not caught up quite yet. Many companies are fearful that they are losing control of their brand — and they are. Companies are trying to put together social media guidelines as quickly as possible, so that employees know what they can and cannot say online, concerning their brand. You’ve probably seen a blog with a disclaimer and blown it off like it didn’t exist and I don’t blame you. Everything you say and do, whether online of offline, is a reflection of your brand and all brands you’re associated with, such as a nonprofit you are volunteering for, your company and even your friends. Most companies are top-down, which means if executives are fearful of social media, then there’s a good chance that you won’t be able to blog or share information about the company online. This, of course, is an opportunity cost because talent is the most important corporate asset!

The research says a lot

Companies haven’t completely embraced social media and some never will. Executives won’t even accept friend requests on Facebook or LinkedIn and most aren’t ever going to use Twitter. IT departments block many sites, including social networks because there is a security risk associated with them. Also, any company with a lot of classified information, in certain industries like legal, doesn’t permit social networking use at all. A lot of journalists aren’t even allowed to have a blog or a website. As you can see from these statistics, there are a lot of hurdles corporations need to get over for social media to become the basis of how business is run.

20% increase in companies blocking social media sites (ScanSafe, August 2009)
100% of CEOs admit to frequently thinking about their company’s reputation (Weber Shandwick, February 2009)
8% of companies have fired people for their social networking use (Proofpoint, August 2009)
Social networking costs firms 1.5% of productivity (Nucleus Research, July 2009)
71% of IT departments block users from social networking (AMA, July 2009)
80% of executives are fearful of social networking risks (Russell Herder and Ethos Business Law, July 2009)

Should you work for a company that doesn’t let you build your brand?

No! If a company doesn’t let you build your personal brand using social media tools, your career will be sabotaged because you’ll lose your voice (a freedom that everyone should have). Aside from the first amendment, if your voice isn’t heard, then you suffer a competitive disadvantage because there are millions of other voices out there.

Companies are afraid to lose their employees to competition, which is one reason why they are afraid of employees building their own brands. When employees start blogging and gain visibility through search engines and social networks, they become more marketable and may be recruited by another company. Let’s be honest though; if a company doesn’t allow their employees to use social media, and another company does, wouldn’t it be smarter for employees to change companies? Your brand and online network is your insurance against possibly losing your job in the future. It’s all you’ve got. Make sure you work for a company that supports your career, not just their own agenda.

Companies benefit from your brand

Companies need to understand quickly that their employees can actually help their organization, even when not in the office. A single employee now can pass a corporate message (or even a press release) to the outside world, at a fast space, while maintaining consistency. Employees can also safeguard the corporate brand by monitoring brand mentions on social networks and Google. Helpful employees might take it a step further and answer people’s questions about products and services. Companies don’t even have to pay higher salaries right now to have their employee evangelists support their cause. All it takes is empowerment and a little bit of trust!

Dan Schawbel is the leading personal branding expert for Gen-Y. He is the author of Me 2.0: Build a Powerful Brand to Achieve Career Success (Kaplan, 09), as well as the publisher of both the award winning Personal Branding Blog and Personal Branding Magazine.

Share This

A 6-Step Guide to Networking for First Year MBA Students

srinivasrao — Thu, 24 Sep 2009 13:00:40 +0000

If you are a first year MBA student, especially if you are at a lesser-known MBA program, networking is going to be an essential component to landing your summer internship.

Start Early

If there’s any piece of advice that I would give first year MBA students it’s that your job search stats the day you start school, and if you are really a go-getter even before you arrive at school. There are several reasons you should start early. First off, the later you start, the less leverage you have when you talk to people. When you start later, people know you need something from them and are less likely to help you in the process. Another reason you should start early is because getting in touch with people can often take time and an early start will save you from scrambling to get things done in a short amount of time. Effective networking as an MBA student is really about planning and an early start will help you formulate a plan.

Informational Interviews/Research

Informational interviews are REALLY important to your networking strategy. First off you may have certain impressions of the industry you want to work in and those impressions could be completely off. For example, when I started business school I was convinced that I wanted to work in the entertainment industry. After about 4 conversations with people in the entertainment industry, I realized I had no desire whatsoever to work in that world. Using informational interviews also enabled me to build a network of contacts at Harrah’s (an organization that didn’t recruit at my school) and get to the final round of interviews for the MBA internship program. Here are a few things that you should keep in mind about informational interviews:

Keep it short and sweet, 15-20 minutes tops.
Have a list of questions about the company/intern program.
Find out what skills you need to develop during your MBA to get hired.
Send a copy of your resume to interviewee prior to the interview.
Don’t ask for a job.
Conduct multiple informational interviews (different perspectives will shed more light on the position and the organization).
Send a follow-up note thanking the interviewee for his or her time.

At this point in your career, it’s highly unlikely that you don’t have a LinkedIn profile, and if you don’t, set one up right away. LinkedIn is an essential asset to networking. If you want to find recent MBA graduates or people who have completed an MBA internship at an organization that you are interested in, LinkedIn is a great way to connect with these people. When I targeted Harrah’s President’s associate summer program, I used LinkedIn to identify all of the current President’s associates at various Harrah’s properties and set up informational interviews with all of them. Thanks to these efforts, when I had my first interview with the recruiter, I was so well-versed about the organization that the first round was a breeze.

Alumni Networks

Depending on where you go to school, an alumni network can be a huge asset. When approaching alumni keep the same tips about informational interviews I offered above in mind. I would recommend you try to reach out to at least one or two alumni a week. If you connect with one alumni every single month that you are in business school (i.e. 2 years) and form a solid relationship, at the end of two years, you’ll have a network of 24 solid contacts who can help you.

Networking Events

With the current state of the economy there are so many networking events going on that it would be foolish not to take advantage of them. If you do a Google search for networking events in your city, you’ll find a list of events that occur on a monthly or even biweekly basis. I recommend trying to fill your calendar with at least one event a week. Try to make at least one solid connection at each event that you go to.

Volunteer Work

In Brian Tracy’s book The Luck Factor, he mentions doing volunteer work as one of the most effective networking strategies ever. While your immediate thought might be soup kitchens and homeless people, there are numerous opportunities to do volunteer work for organizations in your area of professional interest. The most amazing example Brian Tracy gave in this book was how his work as a volunteer for the chamber of commerce eventually led to a committee position, and ultimately connected him to many influential leaders in the community. As a result of doubling his number of contacts, he doubled his income.

Social Life

Your social life can provide another tremendous outlet for networking. Simply turning and saying “hello” to the person next to you at a bar or lounge can connect you to some highly influential people. As a result of doing this, I’ve met other MBA graduates, real estate developers, and other people who could be of tremendous value in my networking efforts.

While each of these strategies is effective at different levels, be smart. Use the 80/20 rule and realize that 80 percent of your results will come from 20 percent of your efforts. So rather than trying to do them all and do them poorly, choose the ones that work for you and do them well.

Srinivas is a volunteer for the Quality of Life Project. The website shares best practices on getting the most out of life from well known types like Richard Branson and Tom Skerritt to lesser known but equally interesting individuals. The mission of the organization is to help people live more enjoyable, purposeful and contented lives. Srinivas also writes at www.theskooloflife.com.

Share This

Break the Rules

Paul Sloane — Tue, 22 Sep 2009 13:00:29 +0000

Many of the rules that apply in businesses were set years ago and have endured by force of habit. A good example is the QWERTY keyboard, which is in use on all desktop computers. The original QWERTY layout of keys on the typewriter keyboard was designed in the 1870s to slow down the speed of typing because fast operators were causing typewriter keys to jam together. By putting the most commonly used letters e, a, i, o away from the index fingers of the hands, speed was reduced and jams were avoided. Those mechanical jams are long gone but we are stuck with a rule for a keyboard layout that is outdated and inappropriate. How many of the rules in your organisation are QWERTY standards – set up for circumstances that no longer apply today?
If you can find a way to rewrite the rules of the game so that it suits you rather than your competitors then you can gain a remarkable advantage. In the late 1970s the Swiss watch industry was suffering from fierce competition from the Japanese. Major brands like Omega, Longines and Tissot were in serious trouble. Nicholas Hayek took dramatic action. He merged two of the largest Swiss watch manufacturers ASUAG and SSIH to form a new company, Swatch. It took a radically different approach to watch design, creating a low-cost, high-tech, artistic, and emotional watch. Within five years the new company was the largest watch-maker in the world. Swatch rewrote the rules of the watch industry. Swiss watches had competed against mass produced brands by focussing on tradition and quality but Swatch changed the parameters by making watches that were fun, fashionable, and collectable.
Every business operates in an environment of written and unwritten rules. Many of these boundaries and restrictions are self-imposed and accepted without questioning. Often it is the newcomer to an industry who can ask the question, ‘What would happen if we broke the rules?’
This is what Richard Branson did when he launched Virgin Atlantic to take on the might of British Airways, American Airlines and Pan Am. They all played by the same rules; first class passengers enjoyed the best service, business passengers received adequate service and economy passengers got very few frills. Branson eliminated first class and instead gave first class service to business passengers. He introduced innovations such as free drinks for economy passengers, videos in headrests and limousine service to the airport.
The law of the land has to be obeyed but most business rules are there to be broken. Anita Roddick, founder of the retail chain The Body Shop, succeeded by deliberately doing the opposite of what the industry experts did. She saw that most pharmacies were stuffy places that sold toiletries, perfumes and medicinal creams in expensive packaging and pretty bottles. She did the opposite by packaging the goods in Body Shop stores in cheap, plastic bottles with plain labels. It saved cost and it made a statement that the contents of the packages were what mattered. The Body Shop was seen as natural, spiritual, and in tune with an environmentally-conscious consumer.
Picasso broke the rules on what a face should look like and Gaudi broke the rules on what a building should look like. To achieve radical innovation you have to challenge all the assumptions that govern how things should look in your environment. Business is not like sport with well-defined rules and referees. It is more like art. It is rife with opportunity for the lateral thinker who can create new ways to provide the goods and services that customers want.
Paul Sloane is an author and speaker on leadership, innovation and lateral thinking. His most recent book is The Innovative Leader. He helps organizations improve innovation, creativity and leadership. He is the founder of Destination Innovation. He has written 15 books of lateral thinking puzzles and hosts the lateral puzzles forum.Follow him on Twitter at twitter.com/PaulSloane.
Share This

Ten Great Ways to Crush Creativity

Paul Sloane — Fri, 28 Aug 2009 13:00:04 +0000

Leaders have more power than they realize. They can patiently create a climate of creativity or they can crush it in a series of subtle comments and gestures. Their actions send powerful signals. Their responses to suggestions and ideas are deciphered by staff as encouragement or rejection. If you want to crush creativity in your organization and eliminate all the unnecessary bother of innovation then here are ten steps that are guaranteed to succeed.
1. Criticize
When you hear a new idea criticize it. Show how smart you are by pointing out some of the weaknesses and flaws which will hold it back. The more experienced you are, the easier it is to find fault with other people’s ideas. Decca Records turned down the Beatles, IBM rejected the photocopying idea which launched Xerox, DEC turned down the spreadsheet and various major publishers turned down the first Harry Potter novel. The same thing is happening in most organizations today. New ideas tend to be partly-formed so it is easy to reject them as ‘bad’. They diverge from the narrow focus that we have for the business so we discard them. Furthermore, every time somebody comes to you with an idea which you criticize, it discourages the person from wasting your time with more suggestions. It sends a message that new ideas are not welcome and that anyone who volunteers them is risking criticism or ridicule. This is a sure fire way to crush the creative spirit in your staff.
2. Ban brainstorms
Treat brainstorming as old-fashioned and passé. All that brainstorms do is throw up lots of new ideas that then have to be rejected. If your organization is not holding frequent brainstorm sessions to find creative solutions then you are not wasting time on new ideas. Instead you are sending a message to staff that their input is not required. If people insist on brainstorm meetings then make them long, rambling and unfocused with lots of criticism of radical ideas.
3. Hoard problems
The CEO and senior team should shoulder the responsibility for solving all the company’s major problems. Strategic issues are too complicated and high-level for the ordinary staff. After all, if people at the grass-roots knew the strategic challenges the organization faces then they would feel insecure and threatened. Don’t involve staff in serious issues, don’t tell them the big picture and above all don’t challenge them to come up with solutions.
4. Focus on efficiency not innovation
Focus solely on making the current business model work better. If we concentrate on making the current system work better then we will not waste time on looking for different systems. The current business model is the one that you helped develop and it is obviously the best one for the business. After all, if the makers of horse drawn carriages had improved quality they could have stopped automobiles taking their markets. The same principle applied with makers of slide rules, LP records, typewriters and gas lights.
5. Overwork
Establish a culture of long hours and hard work. Encourage the belief that hard work alone will solve the problem. We do not need to find a different way of solving a problem – rather we must just work harder at the old way of doing things. Make sure that the working day has no time for learning, fun, lateral thinking, wild ideas or testing of new initiatives.
6. Adhere to the plan
Plan in great detail and then do not deviate from the plan regardless of circumstances. ‘We cannot try that idea because it is not in the plan and we have no budget for it.’ Keep to the vision that was in the plan and ignore fads like market changes and customer fashions – they will pass.
7. Punish mistakes
If someone tries an entrepreneurial idea that fails then blame and retribution must follow. Reward success and punish failure. That way we will reinforce the existing way of doing things and discourage dangerous experiments.
8. Don’t look outside
We understand our business better than outsiders. After all we have been working in it for years. Other industries are fundamentally different and just because something works there does not mean it will work here. Consultants are generally over-priced and tell you things you could have figured out anyway. We need to find the solutions inside the business by working harder.
9. Promote people like you from within
Promoting from within is a good sign. It helps retain people and they can see a reward for loyalty and hard work. It means we don’t get polluted with heretical ideas from outside. Also if the CEO promotes people like him then he can achieve consistency and succession. It is best to find managers who agree with the CEO and praise him for his acumen and foresight.
10. Don’t waste money on training
Talent cannot be taught. It is it a rare thing possessed by a handful of gifted individuals. So why waste money trying to turn ducks into swans? Hire our kind of people and let them learn our system. Work them hard, keep them focused on our business model and do not allow them to fool around with crazy experiments. Workshops, budgets and time allocated to creativity and innovation are all wasteful extravagances. We know what we need to succeed so let’s just get on with it.
Paul Sloane is an author and speaker on leadership, innovation and lateral thinking. His most recent book is The Innovative Leader. He helps organizations improve innovation, creativity and leadership. He is the founder of Destination Innovation. He has written 15 books of lateral thinking puzzles and hosts the lateral puzzles forum.Follow him on Twitter at twitter.com/PaulSloane.
Share This

The Era of the Unintentional Entrepreneur: An Interview with Kevin Reeth of Outright.com (Part 3)

Dustin Wax — Mon, 24 Aug 2009 14:00:00 +0000

This is the third and final installment of my interview with Kevin Reeth of Outright.com (See Part 1 and Part 2). In this part of the interview, I talk to Kevin about the new organization he’s helped create, Unintentional Entrepreneur, which is currently holding events around the country to help provide newcomers to the world of entrepreneurship with the tools and skills they need to get started and build a successful business.
Dustin Wax (DW): Where did the idea for Unintentional Entrepreneur come from?
Kevin Reeth (KR): We were doing a promotion with Newtwork Solutions, giving away free websites for businesses, and we thought, there’s gotta be more that we can do than just running this promotion. It could be providing help and guidance ourselves, but also connecting folks with other entrepreneurs.
We learned an awful lot actually watching what Chris Hutchins did at Laid-Off Camp. I was up at the first Laid-Off Camp and it was something that kind of grew organically and went nationwide. Chris organized several of the initial ones and then they started to spring up and other people who were passionate about this picked it up and ran with it.
DW: What kind of support is out there already for beginning entrepreneurs?
KR: There’s a ton of support but it’s all over the place. You can start with local Small Business Administration and SCORE offices around the country. Meetups have also become a very interesting form of support for these folks, where they’ve done a good job of getting people in certain disciplines together. And there are the older, formal networking groups: professional associations, things like that.
But a lot of it, the really good support, tends to be smaller and more organic. We see this a lot with our customers who sell on Etsy and eBay. They’ve got very active communities where people share stories about what they’re trying to do. They like to get together and they share knowledge, and it’s not just the practical tips and tricks but it’s also the motivation and the inspiration and what keeps them going – the emotional connection that’s important as well.
DW: What do you think is missing from these existing sources of support? What is your role here?
KR: With Unintentional Entrepreneur, the focus really is on those folks who may find themselves in this position but they’re not quite prepared. There’s a pretty significant education component, just in terms of what it means to be self-employed. Just the fact that you now have to pay both social security and Medicare is one of those “You’ve got to be kidding me” moments.
We really wanted to be able to get those basic discussions going, and introduce people to other folks who are maybe a few months ahead of them. If you’re a brand new entrepreneur, you don’t necessarily want to get advice from somebody who’s already made 10 million dollars, because they probably don’t remember what it was like when you’re trying to get that first or second customer. You want to talk to someone who is a few months ahead of you, who’s figured a few things out. That’s really the charter of this initiative: get those people who aren’t quite prepared and help them get a little bit more prepared.
DW: I know you’re still sort of feeling out what you’re doing, but what is the short term goal? Are you hoping to produce local user groups, or are you planning to build this around special events, or what?
KR: The immediate goal is just to generate awareness about this. We don’t have a very clear end game for it. If I had to say what I think an awesome ultimate goal would be, would be if these events spawn groups of committed folks or multiple groups that build up their own networks. But honestly the best thing that could come out of this are a bunch of people who feel empowered to go off and make a go of it on their own and start generating successful businesses. And start interacting with each other themselves.
DW: You just had your first event [at the end of July; there have been more since then]. How did that go?
KR: It went great! There was a very good mixture of people who are evaluating, should I do it, should I not, should I keep looking for a job? And there were some people who had the idea that they did want to make the leap and were wondering if now might be the right time. We had good attendance, we had great energy from the group, a good cross-section, and we also learned a lot about what people are looking for.
Because this was our first event we were very much using it as a sounding board to help figure out what people are looking for, how can we improve this, what kind of resources? So we’re at the very beginning of those conversations. But the fact that we’re having those conversations and people are engaging is very encouraging.
DW: Tell me about the event, what exactly was it? What do you do?
KR: We had people come in, we did half an hour of meet-and-greet, have some pizza and soda and beers, and just kind of socialize and share stories. Then we had three speakers. I actually kicked off the initial one, which was basically “Let’s get the least sexy stuff out of the way, here’s all the stuff you have to do according to the IRS if you’re self-employed.” I gave pretty much an overview of all the compliance stuff, all the tracking and reporting and bookkeeping and taxes and tax tips and things to think about, and then we moved into more of business stuff.
The second presentation was about going out and getting some business: Building a personal brand, letting people know what you’re trying to do, getting online and getting a presence. And then we capped it off with Lorna Li who spoke more specifically on online marketing – how to use the technology to increase leads, how to take advantage of the Internet to maximize your impact from an inbound sales and lead generation perspective.
Those went pretty well, but we got some good feedback from folks in terms of other places where they might like some help and so we’re going to modify that.
DW: One thing that really interests me in general is how at one level in business, everything’s about competition, but at the personal level, there’s this kind of cooperation, a kind of “sharing-ness”. You see these big companies in cut-throat competition but you get a bunch of bloggers or a bunch of developers in a room , and they all just want to help each other out. It’s kind of fascinating.
KR: That’s absolutely true, especially of small business owners. Because very few of them actually do compete directly. They love to just learn from each other and seek to help each other out, and they seek advice from others, and so that organic and community-based nature wins out. For example, we’re in downtown Campbell, and you see the local merchants here, out on the street, talking to each other and swapping stories. There is this great sense of camaraderie – they know that they’re in this together, they all share similar goals and challenges and so they share and learn from each other.
With Unintentional Entrepreneur, too, there’s almost a little bit of the little guy vs. big corporate America, especially if you just left corporate America. To be out there with other self-employed people is empowering! And it’s also a replacement for your social interaction, because it can be lonely – you don’t have your office mates, you don’t have the big crew of people that you could rely on. You’re out there and it’s pretty much you and maybe a couple of other people you interact with, some customers and vendors, so there’s also that social element to this.
DW: How will you know if Unintentional Entrepreneur is successful? What’s your best-case scendario?
KR: For us the ultimate great outcome is that the people who come to these events find that they can be successful, that if they’re good at it and they love it and they stick with it, they’re never going to have to rely on somebody else to give them a job again!
The first round of Unintentional Entrepreneur events appears to be over, but Kevin told me they’re already planning a new series of events, so stay tuned for an event near you – or contact the folks at Unintentional Entrepreneur and see about organizing an event in your own community! Be sure, too, to join the Unintentional Entrepreneur LinkedIn group to stay up-to-date on the latest news.
Dustin M. Wax is a freelance writer and project manager at Stepcase Lifehack. He can be reached though his freelancing site at DustinWax.comDon't Be Stupid: A Guide to Learning, Studying, and Succeeding at College.

Follow him on Twitter: @dwax.
Share This

The Era of the Unintentional Entrepreneur: An Interview with Kevin Reeth of Outright.com (Part 2)

Dustin Wax — Fri, 21 Aug 2009 14:00:00 +0000

In Part 1 of this interview, Kevin Reeth (Co-founder and CEO of Outright.com) and I discussed some of the challenges and benefits of entrepreneurship and the emergence of a new breed of “unintentional entrepreneurs” – people who, because of the economic downturn, find themselves exploring the possibility of going freelance, starting their own business, or hiring out as a consultant. In part 2, we discuss some of the technological tools that make entrepreneurship – unintentional or otherwise – a viable option right now.
Kevin Reeth (KR): One of the good things about the timing now is that it has never been cheaper or easier to start a company from the logistics and marketing perspective. The ability to get your name out there, to get a web presence, to get online, to get people to be able to find you, has never been greater. If you just know the basics, you can use technology to better manage your time, better manage your processes, and then get paid and deal with the money. Open Source software, websites like ours [Outright.com], all this new technology has made it a lot easier.
Dustin Wax (DW): What are some of the most effective and promising tools that are out there for entrepreneurs?
KR: We’re big fans of social networks for self-employed people, because what it basically does is kind formalize those informal relationships. And you can get it down without worrying about curstomer relationship software and all that stuff. Of all of them, I think for professionals LinkedIn is the leading candidate.
Definitely get on Google and use Gmail and Google Calendars. It’s free, it’s awesome, and you can tie it to your own domain name using Google Apps for Your Domain. Phenomenal toolset, and it’s completely free.
And we strongly recommend that people take advantage of free online tools to get a web presence. Get a blog on Wordpress or Typepad or Blogger. If you want something a little more expensive, get a domain. Go to GoDaddy, get a domain, get cheap hosting, and get something very basic website up.
We also recommend Craigslist. It’s a great business tool! If you have to buy anything, do not pay retail. See if it’s on Craigslist first. Companies are started and fail all the time. And they’ve bought the things you need and they’re going to want to sell that stuff. You can find a lot of stuff in great condition. Also, you can use Craigslist to promote your services for free or very little.
And then of course, once you do start making a little bit of money and Uncle Sam wants their piece, then we strongly recommend people take a look at Outright.com.
DW: I think the real interesting thing right now is the way that data is being shared between different applications, like from Freshbooks to Outright. Once that stuff starts being really integrated, when you can put your LinkedIn contacts for instance into your CRM program or whatever, that’s going to be pretty interesting.
KR: I think you hit the nail right on the head, and that’s exactly where we’re trying to take this. You see it with The Small Business Web, a site that was put together with the folks at Freshbooks and Shoeboxed and BatchBook and MailChimp. One of the greatest things that has happened in the last few years with the web is, in addition to open source software, the open movement around data flow. You see this with Facebook and the number of developers they can get building on top of it, you see it with Twitter. Most of the success of Twitter is all the people who’ve built stuff on top of it to extend it in really new and creative ways. Making the data open and available basically creates the opportunity for the broader population to innovate on it and it creates little micro-industries. It’s a massive development and I think we are at the very beginning stages of this.
In Part 3 of this interview, Kevin and I will discuss the program at Unintentional Entrepreneur and how they’re working to provide knowledge and support to small business owners, solopreneurs, and freelancers. Be sure to check back Monday!
Dustin M. Wax is a freelance writer and project manager at Stepcase Lifehack. He can be reached though his freelancing site at DustinWax.comDon't Be Stupid: A Guide to Learning, Studying, and Succeeding at College.

Follow him on Twitter: @dwax.
Share This

The Era of the Unintentional Entrepreneur: An Interview with Kevin Reeth of Outright.com (Part 1)

Dustin Wax — Thu, 20 Aug 2009 14:00:00 +0000

With a background including successful stints with Yahoo, eGroups, and Intuit, Kevin Reeth was well-prepared to strike out on his own as a co-founder and CEO of the web start-up Outright.com, a free online bookkeeping platform for small businesses and self-employed persons. In today’s economic climate, though, more and more people are finding themselves thrown into entrepreneurship without a background like Reeth’s as their companies fold or downsize leaving them to strike out on their own.
To help these “unintentional entrepreneurs” get their feet under them, Reeth partnered with Network Solutions to form Unintentional Entrepreneur, a website and organization dedicated to helping newly self-employed workers get off on the right foot as freelancers, consultants, and small business owners. So far, Unintentional Entrepreneur has hosted free seminars in a handful of cities, with more on the way, combining formal presentations with social networking in an effort to provide the information and social environment fledgling entrepreneurs need to start building towards success.
After I wrote about Outright.com at Freelance Switch and on my own site, The Writer’s Technology Companion, several people at Outright.com contacted me and struck up a conversation, culminating in an offer to interview Reeth about Unintentional Entrepreneur and the challenges – and rewards – facing today’s entrepreneurs, unintentional or otherwise.
This is part 1 of a three-part series. In this section, Reeth and I discuss entrepreneurship in general. In part 2, we’ll discuss the way that technology is changing the entrepreneurial landscape, and in part 3 what Unintentional Entrepreneur is doing to help first-time self-employed workers. The interview was conducted on July 17, just after their first event in Los Angeles.
Dustin Wax (DW): Let’s start with a general question: What is an unintentional entrepreneur?
Kevin Reeth (KR): An awful lot of our customers are folks who were working in corporate America and had had paying jobs for years and had lost their job last fall or early this year, had been looking for a job, and had gotten to the point where they had to figure out something to do. And now they’re starting to hang out their own shingle to see if they can earn a living that way.
What’s interesting is, compare them to people who’ve been small business owners or self-employed for many years, who had gotten used to it. People leaving the confines of a corporate job quickly get a pretty significant wake-up call in terms of what it means to work for yourself.
DW: So you have the wave of people for whom entrepreneurship has become an only option, something that came onto their radar as an option not because of an internal drive to do it but because of the economy.
KR: Yes, I think that’s exactly right. This may not have been something that they thought about, maybe they never did have that drive, maybe they weren’t maybe wired that way or maybe they’re more risk-averse. But now they have certain practical realities that are forcing them to consider new options, and entrepreneurship is one of the options they’re considering. And so, they may have never done this before and may not understand what it means to operate as a business right now.
DW: What does it mean?
KR: The first focus, honestly, needs to be sales. If you don’t have people paying you, nothing else matters. You’re not going to be a very successful business for long.
Along with that, when you first get started, it’s all about networking. Your initial business is going to come through referrals, friends and family, and coworkers and associates. It’s not going to be through advertising and promotions, and not from fancy marketing stuff. By getting out there and getting connected to people, you will have opportunities present themselves.
And then where we tend to focus, where Outright focuses is on helping people understand that they need to prioritize their time, that time is going to be their most precious commodity. There’s a lot of stuff you can do dirt cheap or free, but one of the worst things you can do is get bogged down in the details of stuff that really doesn’t matter. Use technology where it can be most effective. Automate the stuff that doesn’t provide value, and doesn’t grow your business. Honestly, the back office stuff, the bookkeeping – we know it’s not sexy. This is not what you want to be spending your time doing. Use the technology available to automate that, so you can be out there, doing sales, servicing existing customers, getting more repeat business, not worrying about where the money is going, whether something is deductable or not, remembering to pay taxes on time.
DW: You said that the first focus is sales. There’s a skill set involved in sales, though, that very few people have. If you’re an engineering person or computer scientist or whatever, how can you develop or sharpen those sales skills?
KR: I think that’s actually more daunting than it has to be. People tend to think about it as, “OK, I have to go do sales, I have to sell myself.” And the secret with networking is that, if you go out there and just meet other people, you understand that all of us are in the same boat at the end of the day, all of us need help. It’s all just building relationships.Even at the big enterprise sales level, so much of sales comes down to whether people like each other, whether they get along, and whether they have a relationship. There is a bias in decision-making around purchases that goes beyond just the rational facts. So you don’t have to be the greatest salesperson in the world, you just need to be able to build relationships with people.
DW: We’ve talked about the challenges facing new entrepreneurs, but what are some of the benefits of being an entrepreneur, especially in today’s economy?
KR: One, I think it will become one of the most empowering experiences you can ever have. It’s one of those things where it is a personal journey for anybody who tries it. A lot of things are going to go wrong. You’re going to fail at a lot of things. But you’re going to learn an awful lot about yourself. You’re going to find out what you’re capable of, and that’s invaluable.
Another great thing is that you will extend your network dramatically. You are going to get to meet so many new and interesting people that no matter what the future holds, you’re going to build relationships that are going to last.
And there’s the education component. You’re going to be forced to learn more in the first three months working for yourself than in years working for someone else. And at the end of it, you will have that knowledge, you will have that experience. It’s going to make you better not only working for yourself but if you ever go back and work for someone else, you’re going to be significantly better at it.
These are not easy things, they’re not free, awesome things that just happen to you, you have to work for them. But the value you get out of that journey is immense.
In Part 2 of this series, we’ll discuss some of the ways technology is changing today’s small business and self-employment landscape, and the tools that Reeth recommends for new entrepreneurs. See you then!
Dustin M. Wax is a freelance writer and project manager at Stepcase Lifehack. He can be reached though his freelancing site at DustinWax.comDon't Be Stupid: A Guide to Learning, Studying, and Succeeding at College.

Follow him on Twitter: @dwax.
Share This

How to Do Good AND Make a Profit

Arvind Devalia — Tue, 18 Aug 2009 13:00:50 +0000

With the world economic and business outlook still so uncertain, a key question is just how the businesses world can continue to do good as well as maintain their bottom line.
Over the last few years, Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) has become such a buzz word for business people with companies sprouting all sorts of CSR initiatives, but are companies really embracing CSR because they believe in it or are they in it for entirely selfish reasons?
Are they really acting out of some kind of moral duty or is the reality still that they only care about the bottom line?
In simpler terms, CSR means “doing the right thing”. A company’s commitment to CSR therefore implies ethical conduct and a moral sense of what is right and what is wrong, and it should aim to eliminate or minimise any negative impact of its business activities.
With the unscrupulous behaviour of the major banks over the last few years which has led to the current worldwide economic downturn, never before has it been so pertinent that business people are seen to be doing the right thing.
Even President Obama has been urging businesses to do the right thing and become socially responsible. His approach and vision is refreshing from all that has gone before us for so long.
So the business person today faces a major dilemma. Whereas on the one hand, his or her company has to minimise the negative impact of its business activities on the environment, employees, suppliers, customers and the wider community, on the other hand it is only by maximising the company’s return can all these stakeholder groups be served adequately.
What is Personal Social Responsibility?
The pre-requisite for understanding and accepting the need for CSR and subsequently implementing it successfully is the concept of Personal Social Responsibility (PSR).
PSR is all about doing to others what you would like others do to you. It is about recognising how your behaviour affects others, and holding yourself accountable for your actions. It is about being in integrity and doing the right thing for the right moral reasons.
The key question to ask is how can we as individuals and businesses improve the world?
Ideally a PSR aware person will:-
1. Always endeavour to have a positive effect on others.
2. Have a mind set to contribute.
3. Refrain from causing negativity in his environment e.g. by throwing litter on the ground, or by gossiping.
4. His social and economic activities will have a positive or neutral impact on the environment.
However the real challenge the world faces today is for people at the top of the business world to do the “right” thing for themselves, their children and the world.
Increasingly more and more companies must wake up to their responsibilities to the environment, the larger community and the global implications of their activities.
Create your own PSR vision and journey
Clearly the business debate is no longer about whether a company should make a substantial commitment to CSR but just how? Business people really do have to get their CSR act together and actually start doing stuff.
So where do you begin? Start by firstly becoming aware of the concept of PSR. By coming from a place of being socially responsible for all your actions, you will immediately begin to think differently. And that will form a solid foundation for understanding and developing CSR in your business.
Remember that PSR is more than just merely recycling paper or giving out money to your chosen charity. It is all about taking a firm stand and making a commitment towards giving back to society and at the same time ensuring the long term viability and profitability of your business.
To get you started, my PSR vision is that as individuals we always do the best for us and the people in our lives, and at the same time our businesses endeavour to do the best for the world at large.
Reach your own PSR vision by spending some time and answering the following questions. These questions will help you to develop your own understanding of PSR and CSR and ultimately create a plan of action that suits you and your business:-
1. How will the world be a better place because you have lived?
2. How will the world and future generations benefit from your company’s activities?

3. What legacy are you leaving behind through your work?
4. What would you like to be said about you after you die? And about your work?

5. If you only had six months to live, how would you spend some of that time making a difference in the world? In which area would you create the most urgency and why?

6. What does Corporate Social Responsibility mean to you? What does it mean to your company / business?

7. Do you believe that you and your business have a moral duty to respond to world problems? Why? What’s the ideal response to the various problems?

8. Can companies be socially responsible and be profitable at the same time? What level of profits is acceptable to you and why?

9. What do you think about this statement – “Responsible business should be about profit making, not profiteering?” Why?

10. What positive lessons can you learn from businesses that you think have a social conscience? What do you really like about the ethics of those businesses whose ethics you admire? What can you learn from them to apply in your own business?

11. If your children asked you if your business was ethical in all its activities, would you be able to look them in the eye and honestly say YES?! If NOT, what will it take for you to answer YES?

12. What legacy is your business creating for the children of tomorrow? Socially? Ethically? Environmentally?

13. What do you NOT want your business to continue doing?

14. If there was one thing you could change about your business and its ethics policy, what would it be? When will you make this change?

15. What is really stopping you and your business from being more socially responsible? What will you do next?

16. Having been on this short journey of discovering Personal Social Responsibility, how will you now live your life differently?

17. In what ways will you apply Personal Social Responsibility in your life from now on?
So begin today on your journey through this exciting, challenging and ultimately fulfilling world of business ethics, social responsibility and sustainability.
Make your life and your actions count from today.
Make it happen! Good luck and enjoy your journey.
“Come from a place of being socially responsible – you owe it to our future generations.” ~ Arvind Devalia
Arvind Devalia is a performance coach, social entrepreneur, speaker and writer who aspires to live a life of contribution, connection and celebration. His blog “Make It Happen” focuses on making things happen in your life and the world.
His main books are “Get the Life you Love and Live it" and “Personal Social Responsibility”, both of which are available from Amazon.
To get Arvind’s FREE ebook “Make It Happen”, click here
Share This

What You Need To Know To Make Sense of Business Bartering

Susan Baroncini-Moe — Tue, 04 Aug 2009 13:00:45 +0000

Bartering, trading one good for another, is becoming increasingly popular as the value of the dollar continues to plummet. There are several bartering systems available online (some better than others) and activity on these web sites has increased as the economy has gotten more and more troubled. However, when you move into cashless economies, it’s easy to get sucked in. Here are a few things you need to know to make it work for you.
1. Use an established bartering system.
Bartering on your own is often fraught with difficulties. Establishing “what’s fair” is rarely easy, especially if you’re the guy who charges $100/hour and you’re negotiating with someone who charges substantially less. One hour isn’t always equal to one hour, and that’s not always an easy concept to explain.
Instead, use established systems that operate with their own version of “dollars” and have structures in place to ensure that everyone follows through on their end of the bargain. The way these systems work is that you join the system and let people know what you have to offer. People use dollars they already have in the system pay you for your products or services. Then you use your system dollars to pay for products and services that you need.
2. Use bartering systems as a marketing tool.
Bartering systems can act as a solid marketing tool for your business, when used the right way. People already in bartering systems have dollars that have to be spent in the system. So you’re entering a marketplace of willing investors.
Plus, people tend to look at these dollars slightly differently from “real dollars” and are more willing to spend them. Bring the right product or service into the system, and you could introduce your product or service to a large group of willing buyers very quickly.
3. Avoid getting too heavily invested.
One thing you want to avoid is getting too heavily invested in any bartering community. If there’s something in the system that you really need and would have invested in anyway, this can be a good way to obtain it. However, you can’t guarantee the quality of the professionals in the system. Just because they’re in the system doesn’t mean they’re the best ones for the job.
And let’s face it…your mortgage company and the utility companies probably don’t accept bartering dollars. You need real dollars for the real world, and bartering dollars just don’t transfer.
4. Spend your bartering dollars right away.
There’s another truth about bartering dollars, and that’s that all of these bartering systems are businesses that are owned by someone. In this uncertain economy, companies go out of business in the blink of an eye. So make sure you don’t leave your bartering dollars in these systems for long. Spend your dollars quickly, just in case, so you don’t have thousands invested in this system that could drop off the face of existence without any warning.
5. Transition bartering relationships to cash relationships.
When clients ask me about entering into bartering systems, I advise them to keep their offerings to introductory services only. Figure out which services frequently act as a “point of entry” to your business and offer those as barters, then convert your bartering clients into cash-paying clients as quickly as possible to avoid getting too heavily invested in the long-term.
And, make sure you don’t get behind the eight-ball on any transaction — don’t offer to barter for something you yourself have to pay real dollars for.
6. Prepare for taxes.
Finally, don’t forget that the IRS views bartering dollars as exactly the same as real dollars. Earn a dollar in a bartering system, and you’ll still have to pay taxes on that money in real dollars later. Plan accordingly!
Bartering can be a great way to market your business and gain new clients and trade for services you need for your business. However, there are pitfalls. Plan ahead, avoid being too heavily invested, and transition barter clients into cash-paying ones, and you can benefit greatly from these systems.
Susan Baroncini-Moe is the CEO of Business in Blue Jeans and the person that small biz owners call when they're ready for hands-on help creating a meaningful business that creates more freedom and flexibility in their lives. Learn more at BusinessInBlueJeans.com. Other links: The Experts Series and Susan's No Suits Allowed! E-zine.
Share This

How to Be A Good Web Firm Consumer

Susan Baroncini-Moe — Thu, 16 Jul 2009 13:00:55 +0000

So you’ve hired a web firm to design your new web site. Now what? Today I’m completing my Business Web Series and talking about what you can do to be a good consumer of web site developers and designers.
Just like most business owners have tales of woe from having their web sites designed, most web developers and designers have stories of their own. Educate yourself, hire the right experts to help you through this process, and hold up your end of the bargain and you may sail through without being the star of one of the web firm’s horror stories (or your own!).
1. Negotiate knowledgeably.
When you get a quote from a web firm, it just makes good sense to shop around. But when you shop around, compare apples to apples. Comparing a quote from an American firm, where you’ll most likely have an English-speaking team to work with, with a quote from a firm in a Third World country, where living expenses are a fraction of U.S. costs, just isn’t fair. You don’t want to approach your web firm with, “Why does it cost this much, when I can have a site built in India for $300?”
Also, if you’re working with that rare breed of web firm where you’ll get both web strategy advice and search engine optimization, you simply cannot compare the pricing with your standard web design firm. So make sure you’re comparing like quotes before you consider asking for a price match.
2. Hold up your end of the bargain.
One of the most frustrating things for a web developer is when the client doesn’t provide timely feedback. In many cases, when you hire a web firm, you pay for part of your web site upfront, then you have to pay the rest just before launch. If you’re not providing timely feedback, not only are you holding up the launch and jeopardizing your timeline, but you’re also keeping your team from getting paid. In this economy, that’s not good for anyone. So make sure you pay your bills on time and provide responsive, useful feedback quickly to keep things moving along.
In addition, if you haven’t hired the web firm to provide you with content or copywriting, make sure you provide them with your content in a timely manner. The last thing you want is for your web site to be held up because you haven’t delivered the materials, or worse, launch without content. Make sure you
3. Be smart and educate yourself.
I recently talked with a potential client who’d been spending hundreds of dollars each month for a firm to “do search engine optimization” on her web site. She had no idea what that meant, but kept paying them anyway. In the meantime, this firm hadn’t touched her code or her copy, two of the hallmarks of a pretty substantial scam in my book.
I’m not suggesting that every small business owner should know everything about what constitutes good or bad SEO. If you don’t have the time or the technical know-how to educate yourself in what your web site needs or to learn enough to know when you’re being scammed, then you need a trusted adviser who does know these things and can watch over your project and protect your interests.
4. Don’t be swayed by “pretty.”
This one isn’t so much about being a good web consumer for your developer’s benefit as being a good consumer for your business. Too many business owners today are persuaded that “pretty” is the most important part of their web design. It’s not.
An attractive web site certainly is important, but it’s not the most important thing. There are specific business elements and “screen real estate” issues
like what goes “above the fold” that you need to pay attention to as well. And these things may be even more important than “pretty.” Stay too focused on the appearance of your site and you’ll likely end up with a site that doesn’t meet your business needs and has poor usability. Instead, try to strike a balance between the appearance of the site and meeting your business goals. Again, if you don’t know how to do this, hire someone who does.
Having a web site designed can seem like a harrowing experience for many business owners. The investment in a strong web site can seem substantial for the micro-entrepreneur, especially considering the many potential pitfalls. That said, if you don’t have the time, inclination, or tech-savvy spirit to learn what you need to know to avoid those pitfalls and be a good consumer (for your own good, as well as the good of your design firm), hire an expert who can navigate the process for you and help you meet your business goals.

Susan Baroncini-Moe is the CEO of Business in Blue Jeans and the person that small biz owners call when they're ready for hands-on help creating a meaningful business that creates more freedom and flexibility in their lives. Learn more at BusinessInBlueJeans.com. Other links: The Experts Series and Susan's No Suits Allowed! E-zine.
Share This

How to Hire A Web Design Firm

Susan Baroncini-Moe — Fri, 03 Jul 2009 13:00:40 +0000

How many times have you heard stories of people who hired web firms to design and develop their web sites and either got substandard sites or the developer ran off with their money? Or what about the entrepreneur who “hired” his nephew/friend/daughter to design the site for free, and the results were disasterous and this small business owner didn’t feel comfortable offering much constructive criticism on a job done for free?
As a small business consultant, I’ve heard these stories so many times. And I go back and forth between feeling heartbroken and really angry on behalf of my clients, for what they endured before finally seeking help. That is why I decided to write this series of four articles on web sites for small business. Today, in the third article in this series, I’ll share with you my best tips for hiring a web design firm.
When you hire a web firm, your job as a savvy consumer is to make sure your web firm has the right components as well as the answers to several questions before you give them your hard-earned money. Here are some things to look for and questions to ask, as well as a few red flags to watch out for:
Look For This: A Real Business
Your web design firm should be a real business. That doesn’t necessarily mean that they need a big office and overhead. What it does mean, however, is that you should probably avoid hiring your family members, friends, and “that guy you know from church” as your web developer. You need a business relationship with your web team for many reasons, including so that you can feel comfortable negotiating, providing honest and critical feedback, and being straightforward if there’s ever a time when you aren’t happy with your firm’s work.
Don’t be afraid to ask for references. You should be able to get a couple of client names and phone numbers so you can talk to real people and get a solid feel for what it’s like to work with this team.
Look For This: A Web Site
Your web firm should have a web site — a good one. It doesn’t have to be designed in a style that you like, but generally speaking, it should have the components I talked about in my last article. Don’t let any web firm tell you that they’ve been so busy working on clients’ projects that they haven’t designed their own site. If they don’t know that a strong web site is the calling card for their business, they probably shouldn’t be designing a web site for your business.
Further, you need to see a portfolio of their previous work and it should be easy to find on their web site. Most of the porfolio sites should still be live. However, if you come across some sites have changed or that are no longer live, don’t necessarily hold that against the developer. In this economy, companies are going out of business right and left. Plus, companies often re-design their sites and may or may not use the same team to do it.
Question to Ask: What are the components that my web site should include?
If your web firm starts to answer this question without asking about your business, consider that a pretty big red flag and run the other way. There are some general components that most business web sites should have (print out my last article for easy reference), however when you’re working with a web firm, they shouldn’t answer this question unless they know more about what you do, what industry you’re in, and what you want your web site to accomplish for your business.
Question to Ask: Will you design my site from scratch or use templates?
A strong web design firm will design an original site for you. They won’t send you a site design that looks generic, or that is based on a pre-fab template. Price can be a good indicator for whether your team is using templates or original designs. If the estimate for your site is under $1,000, it’s more likely that you’re not getting an original design. However, I’ve seen several firms charge what I consider a ridiculous amount of money to provide a pre-fab template site.
Why is a template bad? You want your web site to stand out as original and distinct. Your site should be designed to carefully reflect your brand. How much can a template design represent your brand, if others around the world have the exact same web site that you have? What distinguishes you from them? Smart investing in your business makes sense, and for most businesses, investing in a solid web site that incorporates at least the elements I recommend, as well as embodies your branding, makes for a strong ROI.
Question to Ask: How will you incorporate search engine optimization principles into my site?
When you ask this question, if all they do is talk about meta tags and keywords, that’s a big red flag. If a web firm is serious about their business, they should know and understand principles of SEO and how these principles apply to the code, the copy, and all of the content of your site.
If they talk to you about using Flash for your site, ask them if that will cause any problems getting your site content indexed. Take note of how they answer this question. The actual answer is murky and complex and they shouldn’t just say, “Flash isn’t a problem for Google.”
Question to Ask: Do you work with or have a business relationship with any small business consultants?
The best web firms often have business consultants on staff or have a relationship with small business consultants who can work with clients on developing business concepts that may not have been addressed previously. For example, if a client wants a web site that reflects his/her brand, but that brand hasn’t been fully developed, it helps the web team create a better site if a small business consultant is involved.
But beware: the wrong consultant can muddy the waters, while the right consultant, one who understands both sound business principles as well as technical jargon and web lingo can often bridge the gap between developer and client, making the communication smoother and providing key contributions that make the end product much stronger.
In fact, you may want to look for a small business consultant first, before you hire the web team. A good consultant should have a relationship with designers and developers s/he’s worked with before. This is a great way to get the benefit of working with someone your consultant has already vetted, and your consultant can get better pricing than you’d get on your own. Plus, if you choose the right consultant, you can have him or her working with you and your web team as an intermediary, and s/he can head off any potential disasters, keep your team accountable, and manage the project for you so you can focus on your business.
Look For This: Pricing
Just like any other industry, there are those who will overcharge and those who try to undercut the competition. Your challenge is to find the pricing balance. If you pay too little in terms of the dollar amount for your web site, you may pay more in other ways.
Several experts suggest that you can outsource your web design to overseas developers to get a fabulous web site for a very, very low price. While there are cases where this strategy can work, you must be cautious. There are many unseen costs associated with this kind of overseas outsourcing.
First, if you don’t know how to find a reliable, high quality team overseas, you risk giving your money and/or sensitive personal information to unscrupulous vendors.
Second, when you work with overseas vendors, you may experience language barriers that are difficult to overcome. This can result in disaster for your web site. Don’t get me wrong — there are some phenomenal web firms around the world, and you can get a good price, but road to finding these firms is littered with firms that will provide shoddy work or worse.
[Note: I'm frequently asked if eLance is a good place to find a web design firm. On the whole, there are both phenomenal and terrible designers on eLance. You'll find freelancers who are excellent at what they do, folks who are just average, unscrupulous people who will do poor work and run away with your money, and people who are just starting out and using eLance as a means to providing low-cost web sites in order to build their portfolio. Like eBay, you can check ratings and reviews from former clients, but in my experience, these reviews aren't always accurate indicators of future performance. Can you get a fantastic price working through eLance? Sure. But you're taking a gamble: you may ultimately pay a higher price if you don't get what you want and can't get your money back, then have to pay another designer to fix things. My best advice for working via eLance is to use the Escrow system. Don't pay more than half upfront, and don't pay for the completed design until everything is done.]
The best solution is to work with a reputable firm with references that will take your budget into account and find high quality solutions that fit what you can afford.
Question to Ask: Can you develop my site in a content management system?
If you want to manage your site yourself without learning HTML or Dreamweaver, ask your web team if they can develop your site using a content management system. Within this framework, you should be able to manage your site, including editing, adding pages, deleting pages, and more, from virtually anywhere in the world that you can access the web via a browser.
The Most Important Thing You Should Know:
Your contact at your web firm should be able to talk to you in your language, but also be able to easily converse with the programmers. You need someone who can explain things that you don’t understand without being condescending, and make web principles you should know accessible. Customer service is paramount in the web industry, and you want someone who will return your e-mails and phone calls in a timely manner.
Keep in mind that while the design responsibilities fall squarely on the shoulders of your web design firm, you have some responsibilities as well. Next week, in the last article in this four-part series, I’ll talk about how you can help your web design firm create a phenomenal web site for your business.
Susan Baroncini-Moe is the CEO of Business in Blue Jeans and the person that small biz owners call when they're ready for hands-on help creating a meaningful business that creates more freedom and flexibility in their lives. Learn more at BusinessInBlueJeans.com. Other links: The Experts Series and Susan's No Suits Allowed! E-zine.
Share This

How to Get Promoted

Paul Sloane — Mon, 22 Jun 2009 13:00:07 +0000

If you work in a large organization and are ambitious for career progression then here are a number of things that you can do to assist your journey.
1. Do your job well. I know that this is stating the obvious but it is the starting point.   For promotion it is a necessary but not a sufficient requirement that you perform your current duties diligently. Many people think that this is all they need to do and that the rewards, recognition and promotion will follow. Corporate life is not ‘fair’ in this sense. Many people do great work and are passed over. You need to excel in your current role and do much more to climb the ladder.
2. Get noticed. One of the best ways to be promoted is if a senior manager in another department wants you. But this can only happen if they are aware of you. So you have to find ways to get in front of other people, particularly senior people, in a way that displays your good qualities and makes you memorable.
3. Volunteer. If someone is needed to present a proposal on behalf of your department, volunteer. If members are needed for a cross-departmental task force, volunteer. If the social committee want someone to help organize the staff barbecue, volunteer. Take on additional responsibilities both inside and outside your department. This shows that you are willing to get involved and it gets you noticed.
4. Discuss your ambitions with your manager. Make sure that your boss and your boss’s boss know that you are keen to be promoted. You can do this in a quiet professional way. Do not threaten or demand. Have a discussion where you ask the question, ‘What do I have to do to get promoted?’    Develop a plan. Senior managers understand ambition and there is nothing wrong with being ambitious so make sure that they understand your goals.
5. Work well with people. Many people who are technically proficient and excellent at task management do not get promoted because they lack people skills. Be aware of how you are perceived. Ask for feedback. It is not a question of popularity; it is more about communication, trust and dependability.   Try not to make enemies. Find ways to work effectively with other people and you are more likely to be seen as ‘management material’.
6. Contribute ideas. Make positive, constructive suggestions for how things could be done better. Most managers (though not all) welcome this and it will signal that you are someone who can think about bigger issues. It shows that you welcome rather than fear change.
7. If you cannot move up, move across. Look for ways to broaden your experience. It you cannot move up in your area then consider moving across into a different area of the business at the same level so that you can learn new skills and make new contacts.
8. Have a plan. Set yourself goals for advancement and measure progress against them.   If you need to acquire certain skills or experiences then plan to do so. If you are turned down for promotion, ask why. If you cannot meet your plan in your current organization or if you can make no more progress or if you no longer enjoy the work then look elsewhere. There are plenty of opportunities for ambitious people who work hard and are keen to learn.
Paul Sloane is an author and speaker on leadership, innovation and lateral thinking. His most recent book is The Innovative Leader. He helps organizations improve innovation, creativity and leadership. He is the founder of Destination Innovation. He has written 15 books of lateral thinking puzzles and hosts the lateral puzzles forum.Follow him on Twitter at twitter.com/PaulSloane.
Share This