Does College Matter for Entrepreneurs?
Does College Matter for Entrepreneurs?
By Carol Tice
Does college get entrepreneurs ready for success? Or, is starting a business straight away a viable alternative for those who don’t want to slog through four years of higher education?
This question came to mind after recently perusing a small-business-focused infographic from the credit-card comparison site CreditDonkey. Among the fun facts about entrepreneurship in the graphic: Just over half of business owners have a college degree, according to recently released survey data from the U.S. Census Bureau.
This stat is particularly interesting because it would seem that entrepreneurs, on a whole, tend to have more education than the general public. Of the American labor force, fewer than half of workers don’t have a degree — 25 percent have only a high school diploma while another 19 percent attended but didn’t graduate from college, according to the Census Bureau.
It may be a chicken-and-egg question, but I’m betting that somewhere along the way the egg cracked and yoke got all over the place. Read More
Does Your Home Business Need Insurance?
Does Your Home Business Need Insurance?
By Carol Tice
Driving to clients’ homes always made Brandi Greygor nervous. As the owner of Sassy Mama Boutique, Greygor often drove as much as $10,000 in women-and-kids’ clothing and accessories to home parties and exhibition halls. She would set up merchandise, which then sat overnight unattended before an event took place.
Greygor wasn’t so worried about a dismal sale. She had no business insurance, and if a child were injured using one of her toys or a shopper was hurt, she could be sued for health-care costs. Also, if anything went wrong – if, say, merchandise were damaged, lost or stolen — Sassy Mama would face a big loss.
“That $10,000 of wholesale merchandise is $20,000 to $30,000 of income, if I were to lose that,” says Greygor, who is based in Union, Ky. Her 1-year-old home-based business was uninsured for more than nine months until April, when her worries about her risks led her to purchase insurance coverage.
Sassy Mama’s story is a common one. Sixty percent of home-based businesses lack adequate business insurance, according to the Independent Insurance Agents & Brokers of America, based in Alexandria, Va. Read More
How to Prepare to Launch Your Start-up
How to Prepare to Launch Your Start-up
By Matthew DeLuca
Preparing to launch your start-up means more than simply making sure you have a viable product and potential customers. Here are five tips on how to prepare yourself to be a founder.
John Bradberry was fascinated by the idea of how someone may prepare to start a company. Bradberry, himself an entrepreneur and venture capitalist, has worked for two decades as a consultant to small business owners, and he found himself attracted to the story of one of his clients, Decision One Mortgage founder JC Faulkner. “I wanted to understand why it worked so well, how did he bring the pieces of the puzzle together, and how does that apply to start-ups of other types,” Bradberry says.
For answers, he went first to academic research on the subject, and then thought back on his own experience as an entrepreneur. “One of the concepts that crystallized for me was readiness,” Bradberry says.
In his book 6 Secrets of Startup Success, Bradberry puts forward five steps that he says will help a person prepare to start a company. While laying the foundation for a successful company means making sure that one has a marketable product or service that will reach paying customers, founders who have already achieved some measure of success say that a dose of personal preparation may help a founder weather the early stages.
Here are Bradberry’s five steps, along with words of advice from entrepreneurs who have learned the value of personal preparation. Read More
http://www.inc.com/guides/201108/how-to-prepare-to-launch-your-start-up.html
Three Tips to Start a Consulting Business
Three Tips to Start a Consulting Business
By Jennifer Merritt
Starting a consulting business is one way of drawing on your expertise and creatively making use of problem-solving skills. It’s a popular – and potentially lucrative — avenue for aspiring business owners. The consulting industry in the U.S. generates nearly $100 billion in revenues each year, according to a Harvard Business School analysis conducted in 2007. And it’s an industry where one can earn upwards of $400 per hour depending on the work and location, according to the Association of Management Consulting Firms, a New York-based organization.
“People come into consulting from all different routes,” says Andrea Coutu, a Vancouver-based marketing consultant and founder of the blog Consultant Journal.
If you’re ready to hang your own consulting shingle, consider these three strategies to get started.
1. Establish your reputation before striking out on your own.
Ann Quinn spent more than a decade helping midsize, and some small, companies raise money in and around Baltimore. In 2009 Quinn was working at an investment bank and had few prospects for the big transactions the company was after.
But she did begin to work with small companies and nonprofits that didn’t have good advisors to help grow their businesses. It was work she wanted to do, but it wasn’t lucrative for her firm. Read More
HR: Managing Lay Offs With Dignity
Managing Lay Offs With Dignity
By Liz Weber
With the potential for layoffs facing more and more companies, the realities of laying off great workers is confronting many business owners and managers: owners and managers who have never before faced this hard act. To help ease the pain for the employees being laid off, the owners and managers making the hard decisions, as well as those employees staying behind, I thought I’d share a 5 Step approach that may help you, your employees, and your business. It will not work for many of your businesses given union contracts, etc. but if it helps some others – use it.
Everyone knows the economy is uncertain and most employees are rightfully concerned about job stability. When people become nervous, the rumor mill kicks into high gear. We all know the rumor mill can destroy individuals quicker than many things. So if you haven’t yet, start communicating now. Lay out clearly how your company is and will address future business slow-downs.
Step 1 - Hold a “State of the Business” meeting with all employees and let them know the current state of your business. Let your employees know what your plan is for lay-offs and how you’ll handle lay offs if your company needs to resort to them. Share with your employees the following – or your own plan – for dealing with a slow down. The important thing is to communicate clearly the state of your business now and what will cause you to move to the next step.
Step 2 - Reduce management salaries. Should business start to slow down and you need to more proactively preserve cash and control costs, don’t immediately lay-off the lowest paid, front-line workers. They’re the people who do what your business is known for. Do what you can to retain them. Instead, consider doing what a few of my clients are doing: Read More
What is a Rising Entrepreneur?
What makes some people seek to make their own way in this world of “survival of the fittest”? We all have to eat and keep a roof over our heads, so why do some people become farmers while others choose and become content with being the farm hand?
What is the motivation behind becoming the policy maker instead of being the person who has to follows the policies? Is it the same as being the “follower”? The questions just go on and on. What are the emotional characteristics of an entrepreneur? They are:
High achievers and sometimes over-achievers
Strong believers that they control their destiny
Self-confident
Attracted to challenges
Innovative and possess high energy and drive
Risk takers
Adaptable to change
Can you imagine trying to live up to that list of job requirements? These are the people who have the courage to “fire their boss” and then become “the boss”. Entrepreneurs are faced with the full gambit of emotions sometimes on a daily basis. Whether they admit it or not, the entrepreneur feels the joy and independence of being responsible for his own fate and that of his employees while also facing the fears of the uncertainty of the business world.
Imagine how someone mentally survives when they are depending on bank loans and accounts receivables to ensure that their business runs smoothly and is profitable. And further, how do they deal with their emotions when the loan payments become delinquent, when the accounts receivables are not paid on time, or when payroll cannot be met? Don’t even talk about the pressures of making sure that obligations to the IRS are met. People commit suicide because they get into financial troubles and cannot support their families as they wish. The burden of the entrepreneur is multiplied by the number of employees employed by their company because the firm’s failure will not only affect their own family’s livelihood but the employee’s family also.
The entrepreneur has to be the person who can weather the storm, and accept failures along their path to success. One has to be able to emotionally take the downsides to being their own boss and stay in the game for the long haul. Entrepreneurs need to have the mindset to view risk as a challenge and not a negative. In other words as they say “we fall down but we get up”. Entrepreneurs have to appear to remain calm and confident while at times existing in the midst of uncertainty and constant change. They have to be dressed for success inwardly and outwardly. Are you emotionally ready for the challenge?
The purpose of the AWE Rising Entrepreneurs Business Coaching Program is to help new and experienced entrepreneurs improve their businesses through guidance, support and encouragement. AWE is there for you to discuss the pros and cons about new business ideas and ventures as well as help strengthen on going business processes to increase business quality and revenue.
Our coaches are experienced in all areas of business, including management and business organization, human resources, marketing, and business development. We help you, the entrepreneur, facilitate and navigate your dreams of achievement into a successful reality. AWE works with you to balance your personal and professional life so that you will be better equipped to face the everyday pressures of business ownership.
We base our coaching premise on the following quote:
“Human beings, by changing the inner attitudes of their minds, can change the outer aspects of their lives.” – William James
Big challenges can be very difficult to face just as they can be fascinating and exhilarating. AWE is there to share the bitter and the sweet. We are your partner on the journey to success!
Your Business should be progressing and growing everyday. Jump start your business in 2011, become a Rising Entrepreneur! Join our program today!
For more information please contact us at 301-256-4777 or info@aweinc.net . – AWE
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