With more and more high-tech ways in which to communicate, some business owners are wondering whether face-to-face staff meetings are worth their time and energy. After all, can’t a text, e-chat or email accomplish the same thing in less time? The Value of Face-to-Face Meetings The fact is that many specific actions can be accomplished through digital interactions, but at the … [Read more...]
Inventory Management for Small Business
There are millions of small businesses throughout the United States. Small businesses have some unique challenges because they have the same duties to fulfill as their larger counterparts but without the massive budget or staffing to get it done. Whereas a large company can hire specialist in every area, a small business often requires one person to where multiple hats. This … [Read more...]
Contracts That Hurt You
Millions of people are taking the leap to start their own business every year. Whether a solopreneur or part of a skilled start up team - new business owners are busy. Starting a business may start with a dream but businesses succeed with hard work, determination, and the drive to forge ahead. Many people, after starting a company, realizing the amount of time it takes find … [Read more...]
Management by Generations
There is an absolute truth in being an entrepreneur that you will be out of your depth on many occasions. Knowing this fact makes it easier to shift your perspective from a defensive stance to a position on learning from unexpected sources. I recently encountered a similar situation with a younger member of a board for a national organization, here’s what I learned. While it’s … [Read more...]
Scrappy Women – An Interview With Founder Kimberly Wiefling
Are you an aggressive female with dreams, and will not take no for an answer? Would you rather speak your mind than go quietly into the night? If so you may be a Scrappy Woman. The other day I had the privilege of connecting with Kimberly Wiefling, President of Wiefling Consulting and Founder of ScrappyWomen.biz . Kimberly is a woman who speaks her mind and would rather … [Read more...]
Dealing with Difficult Personalities
Leadership is one of those jobs that no matter how good the pay, it is never enough for the amount of personality issues you deal with. Well this morning as I had the honor of dealing with a difficult personality, I managed to garner a few nuggets of wisdom. Remember they have a point While this nugget is hard to swallow when the difficult personality has decided to … [Read more...]
Questions of Greatness
Many people think that entrepreneurs have delusions of grandeur, but the truth is that many of us are running on fear. The fear that we may fail, the fear that we may be a success or the fear that we may find out that entrepreneurship is not for us. As I was going over the usual suspects for an article topic this morning, it dawned on me that there are specific … [Read more...]
What Leadership Knows Matters
Last night in a conversation on a treadmill, a friend was rehashing her take on management and questioning why certain efforts were made with no regard to cost, effort and effect. It was an interesting conversation and as a business owner it was nice to see the other side of the table. As owners we sometimes forget how much our decisions influence our staff, so here are the … [Read more...]
Control Your Brand!
As a small business owner many things are out of our control. As daunting as this seems, I attended an event here in D.C. a few weeks ago that challenged small business to think about their brand in relation to the perception of their CEO. Big companies manage this perception, but as big business the CEO's are somewhat removed from the process. Small business don't … [Read more...]
Amplify the Employee Voice
Guest post by Sarah Hedayati (learn more about Sarah at the end of this post) I’ve been fond of the show Undercover Boss since it premiered two years ago. I hadn’t seen the show in a while, so the other night I decided to tune in. Most of the episodes focus on a CEO who goes undercover and takes on some of the grunt jobs to find out what it’s like to work for their … [Read more...]