So, you get a call for a quote from a company you know nothing about. Nice opportunity, but you have lots of questions before you can come up with a financial figure. Trouble is, the company contact just wants a figure s/he can plug into a budget. Give the quote, get the job Suppose I…

That’s because of how it sounds. Business plan. Business plan. Drudge. Drudge. Market segmentation. Financial forecasting. Revenue streams. Potential competitive challenge. Is it any wonder? Most entrepreneurs, actually, don’t write a business plan before they start out. Often, they write the plan at the request of a bank when they go for additional financing. Or,…

Some of us are raised to never make a mistake.  Performance is everything and that performance is measured by a high school overall grade. In face, parents often raise their kids with the philosophy that to make a mistake is to be a mistake. People who start their own businesses, people who successfully run those…

So often in business we think our competition is the business just like ours. And we’re going to do it cheaper and better and that’s how we’ll take business away from our ‘competition.’ Those kinds of competitors can actually be strategic alliances for us. When we look at our customers choosing to spend money with…

I’m often asked by people to define the single greatest character trait for successful self-employment. It’s a logical question. There are so many attributes we need to start and run businesses. It’s helpful to have good organizational skills… people, places, things. It’s also helpful to have math skills so I can learn how to set…

A client of mine owns a Snow Removal/Lawn Care Company. In his first year of business, he sold a number of contracts for snow removal. Great deal for him, really because it was one of those ‘light’ years. He plowed three times. He came to me, worried that his customers had been shortchanged because it…

That’s what happened. Eight years after establishing my business program, branding it locally, paying for a sophisticated website, buying memberships to networking organizations in its name, wrapping my vehicle, winning awards… eight years of branding and promotion and achievement, and the unthinkable happened. I found myself in a trademark conflict. Here’s how it went: March…

You hear entrepreneurs say this all the time. Work hard! Play hard! In fact, its a phrase assigned to many successful people.

Alas, for many it really means work hard, work hard, work hard, work hard. Take a holiday in the south somewhere and work hard while youre there.

To my way of thinking, work hard, play hard starts at your daytimer. Whether its a paper version or an electronic version, outlook or daytimer, it begins right there.

What helps is to think of yourself having just six months left in your life. Six definitive months. What are the things you would want to achieve during those final six months? Write them down.

About Your Business As most self employed people know, there’s so much more to running your own business than simply doing it! Mark Evans of ME Consulting, in his blog, puts out a few thoughts for those with concierge businesses, and I’d like to add a bit here. Entitled 5 Key Lessons for Entrepreneurs, his…

They say that entrepreneurs don’t do that well in school. Makes sense, I guess. Steven Spielberg (the world reknown movie producer) has his grade 5 report card sitting on his desk. His teacher’s comment is a single line: this young man will amount to nothing. That says it all, really. So often, the entrepreneurial spirit…