Strategic planning is more stressed primarily in military operations, in the government and in business activities. In a business, strategic planning provides guidance regarding financial and marketing strategies, human resources, information technology adjustments and orientation of the company in general.

Within a government, strategic planning gives timely guidance for total governmental management and provides norms for the formulation of public policy and new laws. Exploitation of land and water resources, infrastructure development funding for water and waste water management, development of roads and parks as well as functional plans for land use and transportation, all come under governmental strategic planning guidance.

Needless to say, strategic planning guidance can be put to use in any activity that requires a coordinated effort of more than one person, whether it be entertainment, sports, arts, literature or even warfare.

Strategic planning guidance is meant to guide persons or organizations starting the strategic planning process for the first time and also those reviewing their existing plans. Accordingly, the guidance should never be considered as a guidebook or secret formula for success. Strategic planning guidance basically involves evolving simple and easy to follow steps towards an orchestrated, time-bound planning process. Such a route will allow the desired flexibility and a uniformity of approach useful for all the parties involved.

Of the many strategic planning guidelines, there are six factors that are worth mentioning. The first is the Mission of an organization and why or how it should be achieved. Situation Analysis studies the present status of the organization in terms of its mission, its future, the customers and specific strengths or weaknesses. The organization's Vision and Strategic Goals comes next. It tries to find out what the organization expects to achieve and identifies the key performance indicators. Next, you have Strategic Issues that point to obstacles or barriers facing the organization. Strategies or plans-of-action to overcome these barriers and reach the outlined goals takes priority at this point. Strategies decide the directions to be followed by the organization. Finally, Program Planning deals with plans and ideas that translate strategies into concrete, well-thought out actions.

Strategic planning is thus a complex process that requires careful coordination and adequate skills.

Enterprise architecture integrates the general decisions that have to be made within an organization. It helps to build an information support system. Enterprise architecture acts as a master plan that coordinates the different aspects of a business enterprise. These are the goals, objectives and strategies adopted in the business planning process. It also includes the business terms, organization structures, processes and data in business operations, application systems and databases involved in automation. The computer operating systems and network frame the technological infrastructure.

Enterprise architecture is an IT frame creation that assists in managing and reorganizing the different processes of an organization. It enables the personnel to make a business logic sketch and assists in converting the business objectives of the company into technology-assisted systems.

Enterprise architecture is divided into business, data, application and technical architecture. It helps to address various issues involved in the business process, where the main objective is to deliver business solutions. Enterprise architecture has different applications for the different facets of a business enterprise. It helps in organizational learning, strategic planning, organizational design, competitive advantage, business process re-engineering, and systems delivery.

Most business enterprises prosper on intellectual capital and not equipment or machinery. People who contribute new ideas, knowledge and skill are counted as assets. These intellectual assets of the business exceed the value of assets that appear on the balance sheet. The ability to tap these intellectual assets requires structural and intellectual assets such as manuals and software. Enterprise architecture helps to procure and explore the structural intellectual assets.

In the business being conducted these days, the focus is to reduce product development time. This architecture helps in the product differentiation, at a low cost. Enterprise architecture also assists in business process re-engineering and is very useful in providing the necessary information to facilitate desired progress.

Knowledge management may refer to the ways organizations collect, manage, and use the knowledge that they obtain.

Knowledge management is a term applied to techniques utilized for the methodical compilation, transfer, security and management of information in organizations, along with schemes designed to aid in making best use of that knowledge.

Specifically, it refers to tools and techniques intended to safeguard the availability of information that is held by key persons and make decision-making easy. It also has a role to play in reducing risk. It is both a software market as well as an area in consultancy practice, associated with disciplines such as competitive aptitude.

Knowledge management moreover designates an approach towards enhancing organizational results and organizational learning. This is achieved with the introduction of a collection of particular processes and practices for categorizing and capturing knowledge, experience, expertise and other intellectual resources. It also implies making such knowledge assets are accessible for transfer and are able to be used across the organization.

Knowledge management programs are, in general, tied to definite organizational goals and are projected to lead to the achievement of particular targeted results such as superior performance, competitive advantage, or higher levels of modernization.

Knowledge transfer, an aspect of knowledge management, has constantly existed in one form or another, such as through on-the-job discussions with peers, officially through apprenticeship, specialized training and mentoring programs, and recently technically through knowledge bases, professional systems, and other knowledge repositories. Knowledge management programs seek to intentionally appraise and manage the process of growth and application of intellectual capital.

Although knowledge management programs are quite similar to organizational learning initiatives, knowledge management may be differentiated from organizational learning due to its greater focus on the management of particular knowledge assets.

A reverse merger, also referred to as a reverse takeover, is a business transaction that converts a private company into a public company without having to go through the traditional paperwork and initial public offering processes. A reverse merger starts by a privately held company establishing a public shell company. The shareholders of the private company then sell their shares in the private company to the public shell company for shares in the public company. By going public in this manner the shareholders of the private company are able to maintain their ownership and control of the company after it goes public.

There are many reasons why private companies go public. The first reason is that it gives them more financing options to choose from. To raise money a public company can offer investors a secondary stock offer or they can exercise warrants. In addition to providing the company with additional funding opportunities going public also has many other business benefits. First it increases the liquidity of the company’s stock, secondly it allows the valuation of the company to increase based on the performance of the stock, next it allows the company to acquire other companies via stock transactions and finally it allows the company to attract new employees by offering stock incentives.

There are several ways reverse merger funding can be accomplished. The first way is through an all shares deal. This funding process basically uses company shares to complete mergers and acquisitions. The second method of funding reverse mergers is to use cash. The final method is to use a combination of cash and company shares to finance the transactions needed for the merger or acquisition.

What is corporate finance? In the United States corporate finance refers to the strategies, techniques and financial processes used to acquire, manage, and utilize capital assets. Some of the financial activities that are involved in corporate finance include: fundraising for start up ventures, securing investors, merging with other companies, orchestrating acquisitions, and selling company stocks. As this list illustrates there are a lot of business activities related to corporate finance. In order to perform all of these activities a lot of financial professionals need to be involved. Some of the professionals that are involved in corporate finance activities include: private investors, venture capitalists, banks, brokers, corporate attorneys and corporate financial experts.

What is globalization? Globalization is basically the merging of all worldwide markets. In the past most business was localized to isolated markets. However, with the advancements in technology and travel markets around the world have opened up and businesses have begun to serve markets outside of the company’s local area. Now a textile manufacturer in India can fill orders for people around the world and deliver the products within a matter of days instead of months.

How does globalization effect corporate finance? Globalization has almost eliminated isolated markets, and because of this competition for companies has dramatically increased. However, corporate finance options have also increased as a result of globalization. Now companies can utilize the financial resources of international investors. In order to take advantage of international investment funding opportunities companies need to expand their understanding of international finance.

What do Tylenol, New Coke, Jack-in-the-Box, Bag Leaf Spinach, Katrina and the World Trade Center have in common? They were all disasters. More specifically, they were all business disasters, and the outcomes of each of these disasters was completely dependent on managing needs and resources.

But what does triage have to do with business?

If a business is doing well, absolutely nothing.

However, in a global economy where labor is cheaper for “the big boys” overseas and markets are flooded with less expensive goods, where disgruntled employees or other malcontents take out their frustration on a business directly or its customers there are few businesses that do not regularly suffer a disaster. The problem is, they don’t know how to recognize one when it comes.

The first lesson from the disaster field office are the definitions: a disaster is when your needs exceed your resources. It’s a simple mathematic equation:

Disaster = Needs > Resources

A catastrophe is when your needs exceed all ability to respond. Again, it’s a simple mathematical equation:

Catastrophe = Needs > Ability to Respond.

Resiliency is defined in many ways. One definition is even of a book on the subject, Mastery Against Adversity (Disaster Life Support Publishing, 2007). But the simplest definition is that resiliency is the opposite of disaster. It is when your resources exceed your needs, or mathematically: Resilience = Resources > Needs.

The second lesson from the disaster field office is every business must have resilience to survive its disaster.

The third lesson from the disaster field office is that there are acceptable losses. Several years ago when New York City suffered its most recent blackout Arnie, who owned a small convenience store and ice creamery faced a business triage decision. With the power out he had ten flavors of ice cream in the cabinet that would soon melt. At 5 gallons per flavor there was slightly less than 50 gallons of ice cream up front. This was a small loss, but it would be compounded by the fact that he had over 100 gallons of ice cream in the back.

Arnie knew that he had a disaster on his hands. His needs (refrigerator) exceeded his resources (electricity). Arnie needed to make a simple triage decision. He had to decide where he could focus his efforts and his remaining resources so that his business would in fact reopen when the power came back on. He also needed to plan for as short a recover as possible. It takes a lot of effort to get rid of over 100 gallons of ice cream and a lot of dumpster space. The clean-up would be horrendous and if the disaster lingered too long his store would be filled with stench of sour milk and rotting ice cream.

Arnie ran a neighborhood store and his customers had already been in to purchase what he had on hand. With an old cigar box he had given up his computerized register and was going business “the old fashioned way”. But what to do with the ice cream?

Arnie doesn’t know if he was the first store owner to think of it, but in the sweltering heat Arnie struck upon an idea, give it away. After all, what would he be losing? The product would be ruined before refrigeration could be returned. So he simply gave away the ice cream. A small handmade sign in the window soon drew people in off the street. “Free Ice Cream.

In no time he had a line. He was giving away the ice cream, but what to hold it in? Ice cream cones! The cones were actually cheaper than Styrofoam cups, and Styrofoam have an unlimited shelf life. Would the ice cream cones go bad during the blackout? No, but you can’t give people ice cream in their hand, and the small loss in the cost of ice cream cones was less than the larger loss than the cost of Styrofoam cups.

To Arnie’s amazement, many people tried to pay him for the ice cream. Wanting to get rid of it as quickly as possible, before it all went bad and he had to carry it out back where it would create a horrendous stench, he simply refused. To his greater amazement people began to buy other items in the store, items that in all likelihood he would not have been able to sell at that moment in time simply because before the free ice cream sign he didn’t have many customers. Before he had given away all the ice cream, Arnie found that his store shelves were bare and his cigar box overflowing. His acceptable loss, the ice cream, had gained him an unexpected profit.

But that’s not the end of Arnie’s story. The power came back on and Arnie was resupplied with both ice cream and merchandise. He also saw a tremendous increase in business. People didn’t just come because he had given away ice cream. They came because they felt that Arnie cared about them. He had taken a tough decision and turned it into a benefit for those around him.

Triage has come to to be sorely misunderstood. Triage is not simply sorting the most important project or business goal, or even critically ill patient to the front of the line. Triage is determining what resources are available and how those resources can serve the largest number of goals or the largest number of people at any given moment in time.Triage is a continuous process, and it is a repeating process. In business that means constantly reassessing the resources available at hand both as they are expended and as they are resupplied. Business triage involves reassessing the needs and goals of the company on a minute by minute, hour by hour basis.

Arnie is just one example of businesses surviving and flourishing because of efficient business triage. Johnson & Johnson (cyanide in Tylenol) and Pepsi-Cola (needles in bottles) are two “big business” examples of the same principle.

In the business world triage missteps, failure to define an acceptable loss has resulted in product failures and brand damage (Coca-Cola with New Coke and Jack-in-the-Box with tainted hamburgers). The news examples disaster was taken to catastrophe because needs were not prioritized and goals not adjusted to the realities of available resources.

The lesson of business triage is that when a business faces a disaster it must accept that not all of its goals can be met until more resources are brought to bear. If those resources are not available then acceptable losses must be identified and sustained. This must be done dispassionately and with the same logical approach as business uses when choosing a vendor or a new project in which to invest.

Any form of training, so long as it is directed towards enhancing the present will always turn out to be a productive means for improvement. And for that matter, critical thinking is one form of training that creates the edge between the achievers and the non-achievers.

Critical thinking, in a nutshell, is the facility by which the mind is receptive towards new ideas. Yet, that doesn't stop there. Critical thinking goes beyond the acceptance of facts. Instead, this will lead you towards the channels of thinking that would take one piece at a time.

Say, if one concept is proposed on you, you will not accept this concept as it is. With critical thinking, you will take this concept from its general form and transform it into specific issues that create the map towards the bigger picture. This way, you will see flaws and good points and thus, understanding of the general to the specific ideas will be realized.

Critical thinking is a relatively profound idea. But central to this is the ability to discern what is valuable information from not. And from this, one can draw a concrete conclusion that can be applied to the demands of the condition.

Critical thinking itself is a discipline that aims the processing of information through effective and methodological methods, conceptualization and application of the concepts, creating thesis, synthesis and anti-thesis to transform an object of inquiry to its final and well-studied form, evaluation of the information with respect to the source, experience, observation, correct reasoning and data gathered. All these are applied depending on the needs of the certain situation. While these can all be used for a single inquiry, varying conditions don't often require one to manipulate information and therefore, learn in the process, many problems require the minimal use of the ideas as covered by critical reasoning.

As you might have noticed by now, critical thinking is an interweaving of thinking processes which in themselves are complex grounds to deal with. To complete the process, one must also consider the evaluation of certain precepts, elements of reasoning such as purpose of studying the problem, the problem itself, and the assumptions and the previous concepts as covered by the object at hand. To make things more complicated, one must also integrate concepts that deal with the various forms of thinking which include the scientific method, mathematical reasoning, the moral and ethical concepts and the philosophies that surround the inquiry.

However to simplify critical reasoning, one must have basic knowledge on correct logic because it is basically "logic". Don't be deceived though since sometimes, logical reasoning (if used incorrectly and not within the scope of the study of logic itself) may be very manipulative and deceiving.

Critical thinking has two major components:

One is the raw information and the well-established beliefs generated through the intellectual processing skills. The second is the intellectual commitment and the habit itself of thinking with minimal subjectivity and maximum objectivity. As common perception would tell us, critical thinking is not actually the mere gathering and retention of data and information, but should include the process by which this information are found and eventually treated. It is not also the possession of thinking skills alone but the actual application of these skills.

Critical thinking is not thinking alone. It is unique and free flowing but never tied to the primitive concepts of what thinking is. That is- simplistic approach to the processing of information.

Are you following the continuing evolution of thinking about Strategic Planning? It has moved from accepted practice of planning 5 years out, to planning activities and goals for the next 3-5 years, to an emphasis on the next one-two year window. And in many cases, organizations now say "We can't plan because we don't know what will happen next!"

One concept that is big now is called Adaptive Capacity, positioning the organization to be able to quickly identify and respond to changes outside and within the organization. Some theorists go so far as to say that preparing to react quickly is the best that we can do in our fast changing world.

I tend to disagree. I suggest that Adaptive Capacity is only good if it is a complement to your planning effort. Let me offer a ship analogy. In the old days(80's/early 90's) we used to feel comfortable looking so far into the future that we could not only define our destinations, but also design ships and crews that we could use well into the future. If we give up on defining our goal and merely design a flexible ship, that may limit our thinking to merely keeping the ship afloat - losing track of our ultimate destination.

As organizations plan in this environment of tighter resources, it becomes even more important to identify what the priorities of the organization are and to be able to prove that you are genuinely creating the impacts you claim - reaching your destination, not just keeping your boat afloat.

One place that organizations might begin this process is by identifying the "sweet spot" of their organization - where the following four items intersect:

1) Your MISSION
2) Your EXPERTISE
3) The NEEDS or OPPORTUNITIES of the COMMUNITY
4) The NEEDS and DESIRES of FUNDERS – (government, individual, corporations, and foundation.) In this same conversation, discuss other organizations that provide similar and complementary services.

For the Board, I find this type of discussion quickly cuts to the heart of the matter. If the circumstances apply to your organization, you might identify services that are off mission or discover you are following someone's personal passion but not filling a true need. You could even discover that you do not have the expertise to accomplish what you desire or that you are duplicating the work of other organizations when you might be reaching more people using your core expertise.

Bryan Orander is President of Charitable Advisors, based in Indianapolis, Indiana. Following a 12 year career with a Fortune 50 corporation and a 6 year stint as a Program Director for a large nonprofit, Bryan has been a full-time consultant with nonprofits for almost 10 years.

As a hotel owner/investor with perhaps one or two hotel assets, you have invested your hard-earned capital and risked exposure to recourse on your loans in pursuit of a profitable lodging operation. Moreover, given your limited exposure to the hotel industry, you may have selected a professional management firm to operate your hotel. Perhaps a “first-tier” management firm, a company that not only franchises hotels but also provides management services. Alternatively, you may have selected a “second-tier” firm. That is a hotel owner/franchise holder with dozens, maybe even hundreds of hotels who manage their own assets and those of others. Or perhaps you may have chosen a smaller, boutique firm with possibly a hotel or two of their own who are seeking to grow their management portfolio. No matter whom you have selected, your expecting that they will have your best interests at heart with each decision they make. Well that may not exactly be the case.

The goals of lodging property owners and investors are infrequently philosophically or financially fully aligned with the goals their appointed management or at times even their brand. Operators and brands often have competing objectives, which are in direct conflict with maximizing owners’ return. For example, brands have a stake in maintaining brand standards and creating “brand equity” which may not always be in the best economic interests of an individual lodging asset. Sure brands will argue that what’s good for the brand will have some trickle down affect on you, but changing your brand new wallpaper behind the front desk from one shade of beige to a shade the brand wants to install at all of its hotels (which I have been asked to do by a major brand - who shall remain nameless) is really just a poor use of capital that will never impact either revenues or guest satisfaction.

Management companies, on the other hand, have an interest in growing their portfolios and their revenues (usually a percentage of yours) but may not be motivated to assist your lodging operation in achieving its individual peek financial performance in the short, or worse, long term. They may also lack expertise or the incentive to control costs, target the best market position for an individual property, maximize a hotel’s market penetration or possess the knowledge to find their way through the myriad of old and new distribution channels.

Given that the average management fees, which are currently around 2.5% of a hotel’s overall gross revenues (including any incentive fees), are significantly below the fees of yesteryear, is it any wonder. Over the last few years, in an attempt to grow revenues, management firms are focused on creating incremental revenue by adding properties to their roster at lower fees. Many of these firms are keeping the same amount of personnel and resources in place spreading them over more assets.

Take the following example. At the current rate of fees, an additional $25,000 in hotel revenues represents about $500 in fees. Let’s face it, $500 is not a significant enough return on the additional efforts, staff time and resource allocations that would be required by the management firm to generate that additional $25,000. However, as the owner, it can make the difference between paying your mortgage from cash flow or out of your pocket.

The economic facts just don’t add up. Consider a typical, select-service hotel with 100 guest rooms, an average daily rate of $70 and a 70% annual occupancy. The average fees for this hotel would be around $35,000. With management firms per hotel revenues at this low level, what can an owner truly expect of them? While your hotel may benefit from any buying power, it will also absorb any expenses derived from the management firms related travel, accounting services, co-operative marketing, etc. This is often an area where some revenue lost in the last few years is re-gained by some less scrupulous management firms.

When fees are at this low level, the game becomes volume. It is not my intention to bash any management firm. I was the Chief Operating Officer of three small to mid-size firms operating national brands as well as luxury independent hotels and I currently represent many hotel owners through our consulting practice. I see both sides of the issue. But… there are few business focused on volume sales in any industry that come to mind as being known for outstanding levels of service to its customers.

So what is an owner to do? Become an informed owner who takes charge in monitoring their hotel’s performance (or who hires someone to do so for them). Realize that for $35,000 a year in fees, your services may be restricted to limited oversight of an on property manager; hopefully a good one. If you engage a management firm now or are in the stages of interviewing one, ask yourself some questions about your relationship and how you will be informed of your hotel’s level of success. You may not need all of the suggested information below but you most certainly need some. Ask yourself do you…

•get a report from a representative of the firm who is on-site for a day or two each month detailing their findings of the physical plant, operations and sales efforts by the personnel they supervise? Does their finding match yours?

•receive timely monthly operational statements that compare results to the budget and last year?

•receive monthly reports on the hotel’s performance as measured by third party firms such as
1) Smith Travel Research’s STAR report to review your REVPAR performance against an accurate competitive set and market tract;
2) TravelClick’s Hotelligence reports to measure your GDS penetration;
3) Distribution channel contribution reports to review your brand, internet, wholesaler, GDS and other contributions to your revenues?

•receive monthly booking pace reports to review where you stand in revenues compared to the same time last year along with an action plan for improvement?

•receive monthly sales reports such as; Top Client Report demonstrating the hotel’s top 20 clients’ productivity and changes in their productivity year-over-year; reports on the returns generated from advertising expenditures in pay-per-click, GDS, print and other advertising media; and Sales Person Productivity Reports to determine who is selling and producing at your hotel?

•receive reports on the effectiveness of your reservations department (such as turndown and conversion reports) and the quality of a guest’s stay through secret shopper calls or visits?
•receive monthly reports on the satisfaction levels of your guests and your staff as compared to your brand or similar hotels?

•receive reports on industry performance in the areas of profitability, expenses, labor costs, REVPAR generation and market penetration of your hotel at least annually to compare your management company’s performance?

•receive annual reports on the changes in the market such as more or fewer competitors, new or closed businesses or industries in the area?

•receive an annual marketing plan with monthly or quarterly updates on progress?

•receive assistance in planning and implementing capital projects?

•receive an annual report on the condition of the asset and franchise compliance?

As an owner the ball is on your court and many times you hire a management firm because you are too busy to involve yourself in the details needed to assure that your return on your hotel investment is maximized. Perhaps its time for you to make a little time to investigate if this is happening?

Think you have what it takes to be an consultant or a coach? I wasn’t so sure I knew when I first started in 1999. All I knew was I desperately wanted to work from home to raise my two sons after my divorce. It took a lot of trial and error to get to the stabile and profitable business I am running now in 2006. There are some things I learned along the way I wish I knew much earlier in the game.

One thing I learned is that writing is a very small part of being a successful entrepreneur. Don’t get me wrong. You DO need to know how to write. But your success depends largely on your savvy as a businessperson. How do I know? Because I’ve played it from both sides of the street. And I didn’t begin to enjoy success until I started doing some very distinct things in my business.

Please let me share with you some of the mistakes I made starting out so you can avoid those pitfalls yourself…and catapult to success much faster than it took me.

Mistake #1: Don’t attract new clients

When I first started out in 1999 I had exactly one client. He kept me very busy…for awhile. Then, without warning, he suddenly shifted his business to 100% offline and began using a copywriter with more experience in that area. I floundered for 10 months before I got back on my feet again from that blow.

Solution: NEVER stop marketing yourself. Even if you have a full practice, don’t stop getting the word out. Write articles and press releases. Do interviews whenever possible. Start an ezine and/or a blog so your name is always out there. Don’t get caught flat-footed.

Mistake #2: Don’t effectively manage your clients

At first I was so grateful to have any clients I let them call all the shots – regardless of what was in my best interest. It took me a long time to realize every client is not a match for me. Sometimes they were unreasonable in deadlines. Other times they would call me at all hours…including 6 a.m. and even on the weekends. (Until I learned to communicate better there were even a few clients I had to fire!) Bottom line is you can never have enough communication.

Solution: Have the client fill out a detailed questionnaire to open up lines of communication or have a long phone interview (which you record). Get a feel for his or her expectations. Add an extra cushion to your deadline. If possible, get a gatekeeper (assistant) to set up schedule so you can focus on what you do best – writing.

Mistake #3: Poor time management

Eager to please, I often did not give myself enough lead time for an assignment. I’d say, “I’ll do it!” before I looked at the reality of my schedule. So I’d have to pull all nighters or miss important family events. I was incredibly stressed and not a lot of fun to be around.

Solution: Schedule your daily schedule BEFORE you go to bed at night. Turn off email until you’ve made some headway with your copy. And use a kitchen timer to work in increments of 35 minutes (studies show after that frame your mind craves distraction). When the ding goes off, get up, stretch and clear your head.

Mistake #4: Not getting paid enough

Face it…in your business you do a lot more work than most people realize. You have to do deep research in your industry, around your competition, and with your own target market. You have to attract leads. Then you have to write powerful copy that crawls inside the head of the prospect and leads them to a specific action. You should get paid what you are really worth – no exceptions.

Solution: Value yourself enough to get paid what you’re worth.

Mistake #5: Don’t invest in yourself

I have read the classic “Think and Grow Rich” 16 times. Every time I read it, I learn something new. I have watched the motivational movie "The Secret" 6 times to date. I go to seminars (even when I’ve heard the speakers before). Because I learn something new every time. I have a huge marketing library of books, binders, home study courses, CDs, DVDs, MP3s and I listen to them over and over. Again, every time I take in material, whether it’s new or old, I learn something new.

Successful people in all walks of life invest in themselves. It’s one of the keys that separates them from the less successful. (Trust me, at times it hurt to part with the massive amounts of cash I’ve laid out for this education. But the payoff happens every time. Just do it.)

Solution: If you’re looking to attract more money into your business, start by investing in yourself. Think LONG TERM. As the old adage says, “If you’re not growing, you’re dying.”

Like everyone else, I have received countless emails with long lists extolling nostalgic virtues from “the good old days.” Usually those lists remind us of youthful innocence and end with the belief that the world would be a better place if we could only return to that age of “pre-digital” naivety. But face it; change is going to happen no matter what. Each change modifies our personal and business lives for better or worse.

My observation is that those (especially in a business environment) who resist our constantly changing environment often suffer; those who embrace it and work to judicially affect positive change are able to bring new, better products and services to their customers, manage their businesses more efficiently, fend off competition, and lead their businesses to greater stability as they move into the future.

Unless we are adept at reading tea leaves or deciphering the vision in a crystal ball, seeing the future is best done by being aware of the key factors that affect your business and then developing plans to become proactive if or when those key factors become modified in some way. If traffic patterns are important to you then seek to be aware of planned road construction and develop “what-if” strategies well in advance of changes in traffic patterns. If changing fashion or design is crucial then read everything you can get your hands on about how fashion or design will affect your industry and consider what happened to most purveyors of millinery and buggy whips. If our aging “baby boomer” population is a demographic that you work with, learn more about the changing tastes, needs, and lifestyles of this key portion of your business and plan on changing the products and services you offer to make your business more attractive to them as they age.

The future belongs to those who are in position to take advantage of the changes it will bring so position yourself, your business, and your staff to embrace it rather than resist it and end up with a large inventory of buggy whips.

Proper goal setting is a critical element of any successful business. Without realistic goals, business owners and employees are often left to follow a vague and winding performance roadmap. A clear set of goals helps a business continuously improve, compete more effectively, and fine tune its operations and processes over time.

For many entrepreneurs, goal setting is not always the easiest endeavor. Most business owners are so focused on their daily operations that they may often confuse tasks with goals. To be clear, goals are used to directly support a strategic objective or business plan. Tasks are short-term activities that keep the business running. Finally, goals consist of a series of actionable tasks to achieve the desired results.

To help in the goal setting process, most successful businesses follow the S.M.A.R.T ("SMART") methodology. This handy acronym helps simplify the process of goal setting and ensures that objectives are defined in the most effective manner possible. When following the SMART process, all goals must be Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic and Time-limited. How does this work? Let us take a simple business example and walk through each of the SMART steps.

Sophie is an entrepreneur who owns and manages an architectural design firm. Her business is growing rapidly. She has grown from four employees to 15 in less than two years. She has a solid client base with several concurrent projects. Despite her firm's growth, her cash flow is a concern. Several of Sophie's clients rarely pay on time. This delinquency, if left unchecked, could cause a financial burden when trying to cover fixed costs such as salaries and office rent.

To help improve her cash flow situation, Sophie uses the SMART methodology to assist her in defining a cash flow improvement goal.

Specific - The statement, "Improving cash flow" is not a specific goal and would not prove useful to anyone trying to accomplish this objective. The goal must include more specific and actionable language. In this instance, Sophie wants to improve cash flow by reducing the time it takes her clients to pay.

Measurable - The statement, "…reducing the time it takes her clients to pay" is not measurable. Simply stopping here would make it difficult to achieve success. What amount of time is Sophie trying to reduce? After studying industry benchmarks, she quantifies her improvement goal. She wants to reduce the average payment cycle time from the current 45 days to a goal of 35 days.

Achievable - Is this goal achievable? Can she work with her clients and somehow encourage them to pay more quickly? After doing some analysis Sophie determines that part of the payment delay is the infrequency with which she sends out invoices. She also rarely calls her clients to follow up on past-due bills. A significant portion of this goal is within her immediate control. As such, Sophie feels this goal is clearly achievable.

Realistic - How realistic is it to expect a reduction in payment cycle time by 10 days? Again, using her research and industry benchmarks, Sophie feels that this amount of time is quite realistic. Besides, the payment term included in all of her project contracts is 30 days!

Time-limited - Finally, Sophie needs to place time limitations around her goal. A goal that lingers is not useful. Expectations must be set around when the objective is to be accomplished. Establishing time limits also helps business owners prioritize and plan for goals throughout the year. In this example, Sophie decides that she wants to achieve the reduction in client payment cycle time within six months.

Using the above process, Sophie's formal goal reads as follows: Within six months, reduce the average time it takes clients to pay invoices from 45 to 35 days.

Using the SMART approach to goal setting, business owners can set specific, measurable, achievable, realistic and time-limited objectives. While the process may seem difficult at first, it quickly can become second nature. This method ensures consistency across goals and helps business owners and employees alike clearly understand what is expected to accomplish any goal they set.

Traditional “business planning” falls under the “500 Pound Gorilla” umbrella. How long do we sidestep a problem (The 500 Pound Gorilla) before someone finally does something about it? As business plans go, it has been decades of the same approach. No one really understands formal business plans yet we continue to write them. Somewhere someone deemed the 2 inch thick document we call a formal business plan the defacto standard despite the fact it's purpose rarely gets exercised. From personal experience representing many clients, formal plans only serve to make the bankers feel good, even though they typically can’t understand them. Remember that the bank isn’t operating your business -- you are. Your business plan has to work for you personally - not the banker fewer than 5% of plan authors (entrepreneurs) will ever meet.

“Formal” plans are cold, sterile and really provide little fuel to motivate the user. A business plan is written first and foremost to give you an opportunity to make mistakes and air out ideas on paper, before opening your wallet and to give you a map to follow. None of us would hop on a plane to journey cross-country without at least a compass and a map or a major road to follow. Going into business requires the same discipline, you need a guideline so you can get to the place you want to go quicker, sooner and safer.

Many struggles in a business could have been avoided or at least minimized had the entrepreneur walked through the planning stages. Writing a plan commits your mind to a vision which is incredibly powerful. Be sure to plan out your business step by step and iron out the kinks. Ask some people you trust to take a look at it and shoot holes in your idea. It is often tough to take but better it happen now when you have little wrapped up into your idea then later when you hit the pavement for real.

Now go and make it happen – strategically, methodically and with a clear vision.

It may sound strange to say, but incorporating a small business can be scary. I have been a business advisor for many years, and I have led many clients to incorporate a small business. Many of them are very hesitant to. This is understandable. When you own a small business, you put your heart and soul into it. It is yours, and yours alone. If it succeeds, you succeed. If it fails, you fail. You are tied to small businesses as you would be tied to your wife and children.

Incorporating a small business takes it out of your hands to some degree. It means that the investors have control over some of the decisions that you make, and that some of the profit belongs to them. This leads many people to not want to get a business incorporated. This is understandable, but it is still the wrong decision. The advantages to incorporating a small business outweigh the disadvantages by far. Incorporating a business means that you have less financial liability, less legal liability, and more freedom with your own resources. If your business goes under, you are not necessarily going to go under with it if it has been incorporated. Instead, the losses are spread among the investors.

Even if your business is doing well, you should still consider incorporating it. Incorporating a small business is usually the first step to making it into a larger operation. When you incorporate a business, you free up a huge amount of capital. Even if you have been making a tidy profit on your own, you could multiply the amount that you have to work with by an order of magnitude. This is something to consider. You dreams may have to become bigger! incorporating a small business is the only way to become rich and hugely successful. Many people have taken that step, and many more will.

Before you incorporate a small business, you have to come up with a good business plan. Otherwise, all you are doing is taking the business out of your own hands. Incorporating a small business means that you have greater financial power, but with that power comes responsibility. You are almost required to expand your business, but how will you go about doing that? These are the decisions that you must make before you decide to incorporate, but you do not have to make them alone. A good business advisor can really help you.

The success of a commercial web site depends on the quantity
and quality of "traffic" in just the same way a brick and mortar
business depends on traffic.

Parking for instance is a huge factor
when dealing with physical foot traffic.

Neighborhood location has everything to do with the quality
of the traffic a business can expect. When you start your
Internet business you will have the same concerns only
mutated a bit, people don't have feet on the internet.

Web traffic is defined by wikipedia as the amount of data sent and received by visitors to a web site. It is a large portion of Internet traffic. This is determined by the number of visitors and the number of pages they visit.

The Internet is an "Information Highway". The first thing to adjust to when moving your business on-line is that web traffic is generally interested in information. The Internet culture demands more information about your product than customers ever have before. They trust the salesman less and they want to see some content and social proof.

Lets look at increasing web traffic with metaphors from our previous example. You want web traffic to stop and "park" at your website, long enough for you to give your pitch. This is where content generation comes into play. They more you can inform your prospect about the benefits of your service or product the more interested they will become.

Web traffic moves very quickly. To succeed you must be able to get them to stop and then you must keep their attention before they move on to find the "answer" to their problem. Mark Joyner in "The Irresistible Offer" says we have three seconds to make our offer...this is true in business, but even less forgiving on the Internet.

Ewen Chia and Jo Han Mok, "Web Traffic Giants", have shown the basic strategies on how to stop traffic and then direct that traffic to your sales pitch in their one hour tele-seminar given in Autopilot Traffic Machine Elite.

The older more common techniques of increasing web traffic are given by the wikipedia and include placement of a site in search engines and purchase of advertising, including bulk e-mail, pop-up ads, and in-page advertisements. Web traffic can also be increased by purchasing non-Internet based advertising. These methods have lost a great deal of effectiveness in the last few years and does not build "REAL" web traffic.

The more cutting edge technology of using social networks, blogs, articles, and participation in niche forums is outlined in newer systems like Autopilot Traffic Machine Elite. This is a tried and true way to stop web traffic at your website and direct them to your sales pitch.

Chia and Mok call them "Feeder Pages". The feeder page is the employee who greets the customer asks them about their day, shares the news, tells about a new product and only when the customer is ready to make the purchase does the employee discuss payment and make the up-sell. Your "Feeder Pages" are the reason traffic continues back to your site. It is like the pretty waitress who inspires you to stop at the small diner and drink crappy coffee and greasy eggs for breakfast everyday because she always has a interesting story, joke, or a bit of gossip that you can use at the office. A place to stop. A place to park your butt. Claude Hopkins in his book "Scientific Advertising" makes it clear from the very beginning of advertising history that your sales copy (Feeder Page) is your "salesman in print".

The second metaphor is location or neighborhood. In a brick and mortar business location is everything. No one wants to buy expensive stuff in the slum.

The Internet is all the same street? Nope.

Very much like the grid of roads that criss cross in a city the Internet is built up of a giant matrix. Instead of buildings we have web sites. Some collaborative websites like group blogs web out in many many different directions. These networks are now organizing along what are called Social Networks. Individuals are being defined by the quality of the information that they are known for. Good sources of info are shared between friends and this builds connections to that good source of info. With Social Networks like MySpace the individuals who are connected to these sources have spawned entire communities.

It is called Social Proof. To be taken seriously and trusted in the market place you must belong to a network of individuals who will validate your information. Much the way location is evidence of Social Proof so is position in the "Social Network" crucial to real business success on-line. When you can pay the rent to operate on 5th Avenue in New York it shows that you have some clout. It shows that you are a member of the "High Class" community. To build quality traffic to your business you must be known in your niche as a competent and helpful individual by as many competent and helpful individuals as possible.

With all this you still have one website that you are promoting. There is another level altogether that you may not have suspected. Modern Internet technology makes it easy to create what is called an affiliate network with services like ClickBank.

To build real traffic to your product promotion you need dozens of websites promoting you. You would never have time to create and manage all these sites. Many web entrepreneurs have thrown their hands up in disgust at how much work was required to sell on-line. Autopilot Traffic Machine shows you how to create and pay a network of sales persons, all with their own website and skill set, who will promote your product for a portion of the profit.

It is pure geometry. If you spend your time and energy and sell three packages in a month and make $ 300.00 you are wasting your time, when if you spend that same energy and time and sell three affiliate packages who in turn sell three affiliate packages you have made $450.00. Chances are you can attract someone with a network and they may sell 10 packages to prospects that you would have ever been able to reach.

To build real traffic you have to build a real web traffic system such as an affiliate network. Much of it has been made easy by ClickBank, at least the technical scripts and the payment system. Attracting and training affiliates is more of a challenge but offers wonderful opportunities to keep in contact with your potential prospects.

With technology today we are leveling the playing field for all, and as a result can process your survey requirements more quickly and with a greater degree of cost effectiveness than you ever thought possible. We respect tight timelines and tight budgets, so we built our entire platform around ROI. (Return On Investment)

FACT: For your survey to truly offer the smallest margin of error, (+/- 2%, nine times out of ten), the survey response needs to yield at least 2,000 responses, regardless of the original sample size. We encourage all clients to shoot for no less than 750 as a minimum response level.

Most direct mail surveys rarely see a 3% return. In fact, we have a recent case study of a 14,000 piece mail out, at considerable expense, that returned less than a 1% response. This is not an uncommon problem but no longer acceptable!

FACT: The highest survey response rates come from targeted surveys. IE: A survey targeting a particular interest group, like a university alumni. The least response comes from a random, untargeted approach.

If you mailed 25,000 printed surveys that included a return envelope and prepaid postage, your costs would generally average at least $2.00 per unit. Which is clearly the wrong way to measure. Measure by response only and the true costs are very magnified. On 25,000 pieces mailed, a 4% return would be 1,000. Now the hard core truth .. that's a real $50,000.00 cost divided by only 1,000 returns = $50.00 per response. And that expense is clearly unacceptable these days. ROI Surveys only charge by the response, and thus we remain extremely efficient and, accountable. A $50,000.00 expense is quite common and can just as easily be in the hundreds of thousands of dollars. After all that expense, you would still have to analyze the data from the returned surveys. That means a further expense in having staff enter the information into a proper spread sheet.

FACT: The highest survey returns happen when there is a live conversation in place. A face to face survey or one conducted by telephone. Whenever there is a form of human dialogue in play, there is always a much higher response. After all, surveys that arrive in the mail, unannounced, appear to be no better than the regular junk mail we all hate so much, or the never ending spam we receive online.

We suggest a personalized one-on-one call with your client and after having a chance to connect with them personally, ask if they would mind taking your short survey. BTW: This technique always gets the highest response rate. At this point you would simply transfer the call over to our automated phone survey. A very smooth and seamless process, and proven successful by Nipissing University.

FACT: Simply from the perspective of consistency, the automated survey will out perform the live call. Confused? Don't be! Every respondent who is transferred to the automated survey is asked each question in the same polite professional manner, each and every time. In this way, there is no possibility of someone stumbling over the words or reading them without any sense of sincerity, as might happen if the call were live. This of course brings a great deal of consistency into play, and after all, it’s our responsibility to make the survey as reliable and valid, as possible. We only use professional broadcasters for our automated voices. All voices are accent neutral, and research has proven them to be far more pleasing to the respondent, and thus, a better response is achieved.

We recently completed a survey for Mr. Ken Crocker, Executive Director, University Advancement at Nipissing University. Ken is a seasoned player in the Advancement arena and would be more than happy to speak about our services. He can be reached at 705-474-3450 Ex 4426 or by email at kenc@nipissingu.ca

FACT: We increased Nipissing University's survey response rate by over 500% and at the same time reduced their survey costs by over 90%. Once the survey question structure was organized, the automated voice survey was executed and in progress within 48 hours. When the survey was complete, the data was organized and handed over to Mr. Crocker in presentation form, in less than a week.

With today's technology we are able to capture responses in real time, thus making time sensitive data analysis a non issue. If the survey ended today, a complete break out with pie charts etc would be available within a week. This applies anywhere in North America.

FACT: The most expensive survey methods are as follows:
→ Direct mail surveys - $55.00 per response
→ Live call out telephone survey - $10.00 per response
→ Automated voice survey - $ 3.50 per response (we average under $3.00)
→ Web portal survey - $0.40 per response

We are all trying to leverage more from a time management and budget perspective, ROI Surveys is clearly the most efficient and cost effective solution. No need to download software and train staff on yet another system. We collect the data and return it, presentation ready. Our focus is automated phone and web portal surveys. And if you already have a busy website, you only need to add a link to our survey or consider getting customers to take a survey right from your already established IVR system.

How often has your organization spent months coming up with a business strategy, and paid a fortune to outside consultants for help, only to see the grand plans fizzle out over time? In most cases, attempts are made to retrofit activities performed throughout the year back to the strategy to feign adherence, until such time as it is completely abandoned. A couple of years pass and the process repeats. It’s classic fodder for the Dilbert comic strip. How does one over come this all too common occurrence? Below are some tips on how to approach a strategy and execute it successfully.

Developing Strategies and Goals

Keep it Simple and Make It Quick - If it takes 6 months to come up with a strategy, there’s a problem. Either it is not a priority, or you are getting too carried away. Set a goal to have the planning completed in one month. After all, this is serious business right? It’s crucial to the success of your organization, so timely completion is very important. The strategy should not be complicated. It should be easily understood by all stakeholders.

Make It a Priority - In order to complete this type of activity quickly, upper management must make it a priority to design and implement the plans. There can be no excuses for not completing it. Being “busy” is not an excuse. There must be full preparation and participation in meetings. Realistic deadlines are set and honored. Those who don’t play along must be held accountable.

Look to the Inside - Resist the urge to call on the consultants. Your people don’t have time, right? Problem is, it will take as much of their time to meet with the consultants as it would to come up with the plan on their own. You also want the expert opinion. In most cases, though, your personnel know what needs to be done. They just need the opportunity to put their ideas forward. This gives them a vested interest in succeeding, and does not allow the outside consulting firm to be made the scapegoat. All too often consultants tell you what you already know anyway, or they set you up with the trendy strategy of the day. If you’ve really lost your way, outside consultants might be the answer. In most cases, though, the money is better spent on implementation of the plan.

Walk the Talk – If a strategic initiative is contradictory, you’ll need to eliminate it. For example, if one of your tasks to grow your business is to establish an employee referral program, you need to make sure that the workers like their jobs. If they don’t, they won’t be very willing to recommend the organization to others. Spend time addressing the morale problem prior to executing the referral program.

Communicate Early and Often – Explain to all stakeholders the reason for re-setting strategy. Be honest. Nothing turns employees off more than hidden agendas: “Oh, a new strategy. How many people will be laid off this time?” Explain the importance. Lay out the expectations with time frames, etc. Explain why it is important for everyone to participate and let them know what their roles will be. Follow up frequently with updates.

Set Realistic Goals – Set realistic and measurable goals for each strategy. Again, don’t get carried away.

Developing Initiatives/Tactics and Delivering

Ask the Employees - Once the strategy is set, let the employees help with the initiatives and the actions that support them. This gives them a sense of ownership. They are the closest to the ground so they know what will make the clients happy; make themselves more productive, etc.

Again, Keep it Simple – One of the main reasons implementation fails is that the plans are unrealistic. There are so many things to get done. Many efforts start, but none complete. To avoid this, pick just one initiative. How do you choose? Don’t pick one that is most easily measured, or that is easiest to achieve. Rather, pick the one that will have the most positive impact on the organization. If a project will take months to complete, break it into measurable phases that take no longer than one month to finish.

Put a Plan in Place and Execute with a Vengeance – Put a plan in place for the one initiative and complete it by the stated due date come hell or high water. Once completed, pick one or two more and repeat. This process of taking little bites builds up a sense of accomplishment and success, and gradually major progress is made toward the achievement of the strategy.

Communicate, Communicate, Communicate – Review the plan in team meetings. Send out e-mail updates. This indicates the importance of the projects and highlights progress and success.

Stay involved Big Shots - Upper management must remain involved. They can’t bail out after the strategy is set. They must be actively engaged throughout.

It’s a lot of effort to come up with a good strategy. It’s an even larger effort to implement a plan to achieve it. By following the above suggestions, you will be well on your way toward achieving a successful strategic program.

Is it possible for your people (or you, their leader) to make a sales call today, without a goal/target and an outcome clearly in mind?

A sales call today is costing your organisation between $150 - $500 every single time a sales person walks through a customer's/prospect's door. (These figures are based on numerous industry surveys conducted over the years.)

The answer to the above question is a resounding 'NO'.

Sales people simply cannot be vendors (order takers) or tourists ('just in the area, thought I would pop in') any more. Customers and prospects today are sharper, busier, more demanding and conscious of the value their suppliers (should) offer them.

Listed below are some of the key areas of the Planning Process, so your sales team will, in the words of ice hockey legend Wayne Gretzky ... 'skate to where the puck is going, not where it has been'.

1. Look at the Relationship 'GAP'. How are you perceived by your customers today? How do you want to be perceived in 6 - 12 months? What specific actions do you have to do to get there? This is a great sales team exercise.
2. Analyse your current customer base. Look for growth and product penetration opportunities; seek creative ways to help your customers grow their business. Do your people have upsell, cross-sell and account penetration objectives for every customer?
3. Know what business you are in - are you a one stop shop? Fountain of knowledge for your customers? A profit-making machine - again, for your customers? Or, is your company on the lower end of a customer's wish list, due to poor service from a member of your team?
4. Know what your customers want and need and create REAL VALUE for them - assist them with marketing and promotion? Train their staff (your product sales will soar, if you do)? What can you do to add REAL VALUE??
5. If you know the answer to the above, benchmark your sales team - this will determine your critical factors necessary for success and allow you to measure your team's sales and service excellence. Seek feedback from your customers on your sales team's performance.
6. Squeeze the most out of your time each day. Make each day GOLD by prioritising and preparing, long term planning will inevitably fail if you don't look after the everyday business - this takes commitment to the task and the process. Are your people good time and resource managers?
7. Your people should have a PURPOSE for every single call they make - a primary purpose; a value-adding purpose; establish a call back purpose as well. Your people will only build relationships with their customers if they know why they are calling.
8. Develop a plan for New Business Acquisition and Lost Business Reactivation. Will this be 5% - 10% - 20% of time spent? A plan definitely needs to be factored in to your long term planning.
9. Use the telephone! Keep in touch calls to customers, follow up, gaining appointments and low yield sales are all important but do not require personal calls all the time. The telephone is a powerful sales and service tool.
10. Develop and utilise a data base. This will enable you and your team to save time, control the sales process and gain instant feedback on what is happening in your market. Sales funnel development is also an essential sales tool.

Work with your sales team to develop and build on the above strategies and you will ensure successful results … and increased bottom line profits.

When I'm Calling You ... Will You Answer True?

Making the move to an Outbound Call Operation

Since there are so many meaningful initials and acronyms floating around in business today, let's start by giving the subject matter here a REALLY COOL acronym - MOCO (Moving (to an) Outbound Call Operation). Has sort of a coffee bean 'flavour' to it.

Now, down to business.

Organisations of all shapes and sizes are becoming more proactive in their approach to telephone selling.

Incidentally, what does 'Proactive' mean? It is one of many hyped words/phrases that tend to float around the world of business - like 'empowerment' and 'synergy'. It means, simply: To control a given situation or to create a new situation.

So, Your Inbound Call Centre/Help Desk can indeed be a proactive environment (add on sales, special offers, new product information and more). And, when you elect to commence MOCOing you will be creating a new 'situation'. However, a word of caution:

If your current inbound operation is not truly proactive - customer friendly, technologically sound, team focused and well managed - you have virtually no hope of establishing and successfully launching an outbound operation.

There are some extremely important questions to ask, for a start:

Why are you doing it?

Build and manage better relationships with established customers?

Re-gain lost accounts?

Gain new business?

Obviously the above will be achieved through a variety of methodologies to gain best results.

Will it be a stand-along operation or will you LINK it to other key areas within your organisation?

For instance, those of you who want to reduce the workload of your field sales force in dealing with marginal, distance or no-growth accounts - adding outbound telemarketing becomes as simple as A, B, C.

A accounts (and potential A's) are managed by your field sales force.

B accounts (and potential B's) are managed by your outbound telemarketing team. Also, they can support the field sales force with A account backup/support.

C accounts are encouraged to contact your Customer Service Call Centre. If this is a proactive Call Centre, then these customers will be well serviced.

Also, a combined customer service/telemarketing team can have a dramatic impact on bottom line results by offering customers a total service structure.

Who will we have on our team?

Let's start with Charlie - been with the company 25 years, as a sales 'rep' (I hate that word, but it is appropriate for now) and has found the going tough in the last 5-6 years (or he has been in accounts, warehouse, front counter - whatever). Will Charlie be a good telemarketer. Probably not - one example, of a salesperson making six calls a day moving to an environment where they are expected to make six calls an hour, should suffice!

How about Kylie - been a CSO for 10 years and has a 'natural' ability with customers but gets a bit stressed at certain times or with certain people. How will Kylie go? Probably not all that well.

The point here is - you may not be able to staff your outbound call centre entirely with your current staff. There are a number of processes to go through - interviewing, testing, career appraisal, discussing performance standards and training. I personally observed a major organisation totally fail in their bid to establish a telemarketing operation because they did not have the right people (all internally chosen from other departments with lessening staff requirements).

On the other hand, many of your customer service people may view a telemarketing role (say as part of a mix in their career) as a tremendous career boost.

Who will the Leader be?

Do you have a leader ...

who will take ownership and responsibility? who has experience and expertise (or who has the ability to learn quickly)? who will commit to long term goals and a successful outcome? who will gather the resources necessary to sustain momentum? who will develop a top team to ensure success?

What is the PURPOSE of the Move

Can everyone involved 'see' the outcomes in terms of departmental growth, better customer relationships, greater revenue and improved results?

Can everyone involved understand the benefits to customers - internal and external - that this move will bring?

Is everyone positive and excited about the move?

Is there a common VISION, PURPOSE, OBJECTIVES and STRATEGY to ensure a successful shift.

Is the organisation culture right to ensure success?

Who else needs to be involved - internal/external?

Does the leader and their management team have the commitment, co-operation and collaboration of senior people within the organisation?

Are other key people within the organisation taking responsibility and accountability to ensure a smooth transition?

Who will you use externally (if not fully covered internally) for IT/Telecommunications transitions, recruitment and training? What is their experience, what are their successes and who will work with you to achieve your goals?

How will you monitor progress?

Can you measure the success of the move in real terms?

Are you able to benchmark progress either through key performance indicators, results achieved to date, the implementation process, or a combination of all three?

How will your current systems and structures be changed or modified?

Will you need to radically alter your current contact management system to grow and evolve with as the operation expands?

Will you be linking your inbound/outbound operation? What other areas are in this link - the sales force, marketing, accounting, warehouse, branch network?

Do you have unique needs that will require optimising or altering your current IT and telecommunications?

How will you distribute, share and synchronise customer/prospect information to relevant people/departments?

How will you allow your team to fully exploit the power of new/altered technology with a minimum of fuss, expense and learning time?

For those of you currently undertaking this task of MOCOing - all the best. Things have changed from a number of years ago and outbound telephone sales has become recognised, as it should be, for its professional approach, its vital link to the company and for the skills of its people.

As mentioned in the model above, LEADERSHIP is still the key to success and continuing Customer Satisfaction must be the main outcome.

Be confident and self assured for SUCCESS at Telemarketing. Never, ever give into setbacks. And, as Victor Kiam said 'Procrastination is opportunity's assassin'.

In business, as in life, adversity is a recurrent and inescapable event. The cliché:

“Into every life a little rain must fall”

is true no matter one’s education or level of success. The key difference between the businesses that close never to reopen again and those that thrive through their adversity is resilience.

Everyone knows that there is nothing more dangerous than a wounded animal. An injured animal seeks to protect itself by striking out against all who approach. However dogs are unique in that they will invariably find one person with whom to bond. This difference is inexplicable, but predictable. They may not even choose their owner or master. Nonetheless wounded dogs will drag themselves to the feet of their chosen protector, nuzzling and begging for help. These wounded dogs know that they are no longer capable of caring for themselves and that one more adversity befalls them and they will die.

Businesses become wounded dogs when they fail to ensure that an adversity does not evolve into a disaster. In two decades of disaster field work and consulting to companies large and small I have seen and helped more than my share of wounded dogs. In all cases it did not matter whether the adversity came from outside the company such as a hurricane, earthquake or terrorist attack or if the adversity came from within; poor product design, marketing mishaps, financial missteps, or employee sabotage. The result is always the same. Some critical business pathway collapses resulting in a business disaster.

Observers both inside and outside the wounded business say that the disaster was “inevitable.” In the disaster field office, we know that no disaster is “inevitable.” Disaster is a simple equation no more different than profit and loss.

Disaster = Needs > Resources.

The most basic analogy is the financial disaster of “want” exceeding “wallet,” but this same equation holds true in all other critical areas of business. Conversely, resilience, the ability to cope with adversity and stave off disaster, is also represented by the simple equation:

Resilience = Resources > Needs.

Again the analogy is the financial resilience of “wallet” exceeding “wants.”

Now if this were the end of the story, one short speech, one short consultation, one small article in the Wall Street Journal and I could end all business disasters. The trick here is being able to identify what resources to have in abundance since nobody can have resources for all contingencies. Resource identification is based not on determining every possible adversity that can face a business. This is an incalculably high number and bounded only by the imagination not only of those that run the business but all of those who may wish it ill.

Rather, resource determination is based on an evaluation of the processes and pathways unique to each business. It requires the identification of “choke points,” those critical pathways that, if narrowed or destroyed, will choke off the life of the business. It is these critical steps for which resources are amassed. The goal is to ensure that no choke point becomes so narrow as to strangle the life of the business. This ensures resilience.

Some have adapted well through the application of the lessons I learned in the disaster field office. Others have failed to learn these lessons resulting in business disaster. In a few cases, the businesses stumbled upon their resilience. In others they were guided to it. But in all cases it was the identification of choke points and the allocation of resources that ensured that a business remained in business and did not become a wounded dog

People sign up for my grant writing workshops to learn to write grant proposals. I often find they have great ideas, big hearts, and lots of activities that they believe will make a difference. What I tell them all—even those who want to hire me as a grant writer—is they need a sound plan before they start writing. There are an infinite number of activities that one can engage in on behalf of hunger, literacy, homelessness, pollution, etc. If these activities aren’t linked to objectives plotted to reach a goal, you will be exhausted with no measurable differences occurring over time. If you’re attempting to address the root causes of issues, plan first, and focus your energies in ways that are more apt to move your organization toward your realization of long-term goals.

How is planning different from answering the questions posed in a grant application?

Strategic planning is a process of thinking through a project in light of every imaginable detail. A great plan is based on reality. It factors in:

* what you intend to accomplish;
* the resources that you have as an organization;
* any partners or stakeholders who care about and support your vision; and
* your strengths and weaknesses.

After you’ve identified this information, you can begin to plot the kinds of activities you might deliver. There are so many ways to tackle a problem or issue. Your approach must be based on the above information, as well as the specific needs of the clients, environment, or issues addressed. This requires hours and hours of research. Consider how many agencies and organizations receive grants and run full time, and yet there are negligible changes after years or decades of project implementation.

Which brings us to research-based approaches.

Many funders now want to know whether there is research that supports your proposed methods for grant implementation. We can all brainstorm and come up with lovely ideas, but successes are based on more than fantasies. Just think of how many concerns there are about the education system. In spite of billions of dollars invested, significant numbers of children still can’t read. Now, however, there is a growing body of research that supports using particular strategies to ameliorate specific conditions and challenges. Such research reinforces the wisdom of your choices for intervention or prevention programs.

Strategic planning can be a time-consuming endeavor, and it delays our desire to get the money yesterday; however, writing a winning grant proposal that will make a difference is hinged on in-depth thinking beforehand.

Man is inherently prone to either giving up or making up with the problem as they come his paths. Since problem is a great part of one's life, it is expected for a person to create a suitable and well-adopted entity in him. In fact, man would never be complete unless he passes through many of these.

Life, as we know it, is a mixture of obstacles and highways. If we are to notice this one fact, we would all appreciate the balance that is set, even in the midst of our agonies.

If this is true, then why are there so many people suffering over petty things? Why is it that common perception tells us that when one is in his lowest point, there is nothing more that could save him from destruction? And why is it that when one experiences pain, there is nothing else that creeps in him but pain alone?

These may all be true. But have you ever noticed how the road of your perdition bends to somewhere calmer? To a road that is less traveled because one is overwhelmed with self pity and too much concern on his agonies? To a bend along the ever-crooked road that continuously slopes downhill? To an alley that sheds light to the distressed?

These are not new to you and the road that we are pertaining to here is not a road that you haven't heard before. Strangely enough though, you have never taken time to turn to this road and explore what avenues it could offer in solving your problem.

Thus, the problem in not solving your problem lies in your belief and convictions, in your pessimistic views of life and in your attention to the dark clouds overhead.

You are the subject here. Thus, the solution or the complication of your problem will be largely dependent on whatever actions you take lies in the attitude you have once you embark on dealing with your problems.

Knowing these, it would be easier to start with solving your problem. However, knowledge alone on the problem without practical initiatives would bring you to nothing. In fact, we are often subjugated when we know too much. Have you ever heard of paralysis in analysis? Well, that's the very core of the problem. But we are not saying that you must not know your problems well enough. It is just that once we are exposed to the facts relating to our problems, we are further overwhelmed by the odds that we are trying to trample on that in the end, we become hopeless, not wanting to resolve our problems any longer.

Don't throw up. Don't hold back. Never quit.

You may have heard all these before but looking at them from another point of view, you will find that these classics are always new, depending on how you apply them to your condition.

When you are trying to solve a problem, never jump on the nearest window that you can see or lay yourself on the nearest mud pool that's within your sight. Ignore these. Instead, look at the brightest sides of the mountain where the sun rises and where the fields are truly luscious. Seek the nearest spring lakes and hunt for the most wonderful creature within your boundaries.

Change your perspectives. Change the way you look at things. Sometimes, the solution to your problems lies on your very eyes.

In 2005 General Motors launched a consumer incentive program after a few years of sluggish sales. From this promotion alone, the auto maker’s share of the US market jumped almost seven per cent in just 30 days. So do business incentives work? Yes they do, if it’s done right. If you are a business owner or a decision maker in a company and you have not seriously considered incentives or you’ve “been there done that” already, you might want to revisit the dynamics of business incentives and of being a step ahead of your competition.

Most high level executives will say it’s important for them to incentivize their staff – yes, that’s a real word - yet they believe by giving them an engraved pen or a baseball cap is enough. The reality is there is a disconnect that can be traced to the 80/20 rule. In case you’re unfamiliar with this term the Reader’s Digest version is that 20% of your staff are responsible for 80% of your results. Because of this companies don’t feel the need to shower everyone with gifts when only a small percentage of employees actually produce anyway, which explains why many companies don’t have incentive programs at all. This creates the domino effect: the employee doesn’t feel appreciated, performance eventually stagnates or declines and managers end up talking to, writing up or letting the employee go to find someone else who’s always motivated. Do you realize how expensive that is? The cost-per-hire ratios and the man hours it takes to find another person is staggering.

Of course there are many companies who operate successfully with highly productive people. And for those smoother running ships, you can be assured there is an incentive program in place. Business is a partnership, be that with an employee or a customer. There is a symbiotic relationship you cannot deny or you will die, and this transcends into personal relationships too. To put it another way, if you are not appreciated in some tangible capacity you will not be there for long. And like the principles in the laws of gravity, this never changes. When was the last time you gave your partner flowers or movie tickets? When was the last time you hugged your teenaged son or daughter? There is, however, a right way and a wrong way in the world of appreciation. As an example with Christmas’ gone by, have you ever received something you wanted to give back immediately? Yeah, we’ve all been there but the right thing to do is to say thank you and that you love it. The same can be said in receiving a travel mug from your employer for instance. It’s a nice gesture and you appreciate it but, come on, after you use it once it sits in your house or your office collecting dust. The one incentive everyone agrees on that can positively affect your work environment is travel. Statistically proven, it is the number one incentive employees, clients – people – prefer over anything else.

While we all know cash is king you also know that once you give it, that lucky employee will spend it all within a day or two and then it’s gone and forgotten. With travel, you never forget who gave it to you and the photos you take while away become treasured memories for years. Perhaps even more important is if that employee leaves your company; it’s like going to a great restaurant, they’re going to tell someone about it. Companies such as Coastal Vacations provide an inexpensive, unique and simple to use lifetime discount travel package that caters to every personal whim from mini-getaways to hotel stays, theme parks, luxury condos, dining, golfing and a lot more. It has many uses such as igniting sales through contests to retirement gifts, rewarding employees or just to say “thank you”. So when the time comes to implement an incentive program that will ultimately push your organization forward, think about the long term positive affects of what a little getaway will do for you.

The recent cover stories in USA Today, beautifully depict the potential spectrum of disease and the implications of human vulnerability to pandemic flu and specifically the H5N1 avian flu strain.

But the real threat lies not in the obscure genetics of a common virus or in the family lineages of its victims. The true impact of this disease lies in the numbers. In 1918 100 percent of the entire world was exposed to what would later be called the Spanish Flu. This new strain of avian flu had never been encountered before by a human population, and as a result, there was no immunity to this particular strain. Of that world population, one third would ultimately fall ill, in fact, 50 to 80 percent of the youngest, healthiest, and strongest would fall ill when future generations would divide out the victims.

Of those that fell ill, half ultimately required some assisted care. They were placed in infirmaries or makeshift hospitals in warehouses, wharfs, and military barracks. In today's world, they would qualify for hospital care or home health nursing.

Of those hospitals and infirmaries, half suffer extreme respiratory difficulties as their lungs filled with fluid and blood, the result of their own bodies' counterattack on the viral invasion. Coughing and frothing at the mouth, occasionally spitting up blood, these individuals would have a disease that today’s medical professionals call ARDS, Acute Respiratory Distress Syndrome. In the modern medical age, these patients would have a plastic tube placed into their lungs to assist their breathing and a ventilator would force air in and out of their lungs. Half of the ARDS patients 1918 died.

But it's not percentages, but real numbers that portend the severity of this disease. There are over 300 million people in the United States and over 6 billion worldwide.

One third of those will fall ill. One hundred million here at home and two billion across the planet.

Half of those individuals will qualify for hospitalization. Unfortunately, in a survey performed by the American Hospital Association in 2005, there are only 955,768 hospital beds in the United States, far short of the 50 million that would be needed. To make this situation work, at the peak of cold and flu season in 2005, only four percent of these hospital beds were available and unoccupied. That means that there will be fewer than 40,000 hospital beds available for this onslaught of 50 million patients.

Of the 50 million patients who qualify for hospitalization, half or more will need ventilators. Dr. Michael Olsterholm in a New England Journal of Medicine article in 2004 found that there were only 105,000 ventilators in the United States. Of these, a high percentage were either already in use for chronic ventilator-dependent patients such as small children and spinal cord patients, or were out of service for cleaning and repair, leaving just over 16,000 ventilators available nationwide to help 25 million flu related ARDS victims breathe.

Of the 25 million with ADRS, with or without ventilator care, half would be expected to die. This 12.5 million people will pass away in waves as pandemic influenza spread over a span of only 12 to 18 months.

Now, admittedly, these are the most dire numbers. The pandemic flu could prove to be far less deadly, far less contagious. On the other hand, H5N1 has already proven to be a formidable foe with death rates initially greater than 70 percent and now still hovering around 50 percent.

The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) have given optimistic sounding percentages but as the old adage goes, the "devil is in the details". Let's look at the percentages and the details.

* One third of 100 percent is 33 percent.
* This is the “attack rate”.
* Half of 33 percent is 16.5 percent.
* This is the number of people who qualify for hospitalization, but the CDC knows that in the event of a pandemic, only the most sick will actually be placed in the hospital. Clearly the most sick will be those with ARDS.
* Half of 16.5 percent is 8.25 percent.
* These are the sickest of the sick, those with ARDS. Rounded off, this is 8 percent, the number that the CDC says to expect for hospitalization.
* Half of 8 percent is 4 percent.
* This is the expected death rate predicted by the CDC.


The “devil in the details” is that these percentages are based on "the total population." Physicians, medical planners, and other pundits usually discuss percentages based on "those with the flu". We are not talking about “those with the flu” we are talking about a number three times that size.

USA Today showed us how two third world countries are struggling and in some cases failing to deal with the crushing weight of a comparatively small outbreak of avian flu (H5N1). In Indonesia, the efforts are crippled at best. In Vietnam, the efforts are being met with greater success, but the disease rages on. The industrialized world relies on the fact that its health care is unmatched. The United States likes to believe that US health care exceeds all other. The numbers show that when this disease strikes the whole world is at peril.

What are the answers? As with any impending disaster, the answers lie in preparation, planning, and practice; Repeated, Relentless, and Rigorous practice. It is the responsibility not just of government but of private health care institutions, hospitals, health care professionals, businesses, corporations, and yes, even individuals, to prepare now for the worst while hoping for a reprieve. We can no longer afford to prepare for the best and then stand awestruck when the worst occurs.

Imagine arriving at work and two-thirds of your employees are out sick. Now imagine that you are the manager of a large supermarket or a Wal-mart a Super Target. This is exactly the situation that America's retailers and manufacturers face with the coming avian flu pandemic.

The avian flu will be a novel virus, one never seen before by the human immune system. The current disease of concern is the H5:N1 strain of avian flu. However, any novel avian flu will have the same effect as was seen in 1918. In 1918, one-third of the United States population fell ill. Half of these sick individuals required some form of institutional care (hospital, infirmary, or quarantined home care). Of those in institutional care, half developed severe pneumonia and half of those with pneumonia died. In short, 33% got of the total population sick and 8% of the total population died.

When these ominous numbers were scrutinized further, a far more dire picture evolved. Research into the 1918 pandemic, as well as pandemics before and since 1918, have shown that the majority of illness and death occurred not in the very old or the very young, not in the sick and infirm, but in those who are in the "prime of life"; those age 18 to 40.

Because of the way that novel avian viruses (pandemics) attack the lungs and cause "immune system storms", the ultimate irony of a pandemic is that the younger and stronger you are the more likely you are to die. In 1918 fully two-thirds of all those who became ill were in the age range of 18 to 40. More distressing is the fact that 98 percent of all of those who died were age 18 to 40 years. In fact, those over age 55 had no greater rate of illness or death during the pandemic of 1918 than they did in any other flu season in the years immediately before or after that great pandemic. Similarly, those less than 18 years of age suffered no increase in death rate.

The implications for America's retailers and America's manufacturers are inescapable. Fully two-thirds of the active workforce will fall ill during the 16 to 18 months of the disease throughout the pandemic. Twenty-five percent of the young workforce (the 18 to 40 years) will die in that 18 months. Who will replace them? Where will American industry, America's retail sector, and American business find employees?

America's employers have become accustomed to a ready workforce. If an employer finds that they have a job vacancy, no worries! They have become complacent knowing that they can readily replace an employee with the help of such services as Monster.com and other job-matching tools. Take away 25 percent of the workforce due to death and two-thirds of workforce due to illness and you will see a dramatic shift in the balance of the employer-employee relationship. When there are not enough employees, salaries will rise, prices will rise, and customer service will fall.

The solution? Plan now.

1. Those of us who have sought jobs are all too familiar with the refrain: "I'll keep your resume on file." Now employers must do exactly that. This is the time for employers to not only develop a ready pool of applicants, but to stay in touch with them in the same way that they stay in touch with their most valued customers. Employees will find other jobs in the interim, but when employees become scarce, it is the employers who have shown a genuine interest in the person and the success of perspective employees who will prevail when the bidding wars begin.

2. Hire now across a spectrum of ages. Many employers concentrate their workforce in certain demographic age groups because they believe that their customers will identify better with these demographics or because of an age-based bias that convinces the employer that certain employees are better suited to certain work, certain work environments, or represent greater or lesser degrees of reliability. The coming pandemic lends a new variable to which employers must adapt. Employees less than 18 years of age and greater than 55 years of age are less likely to be ill during the pandemic and less likely to die. Providing a more homogonous mix of employee ages will statistically decrease the impacts of the pandemic on the wise employer's workplace.

3. Finally, workplace health promotion programs and health benefits, as well as a strict adherence to hygiene and clean workplaces will decrease the impact of the pandemic on the employees, the workforce, the employer and ultimately the place of business.

We cannot avoid the coming pandemic. We cannot avoid the coming impact on men and women alike, old and young alike, rich and poor alike. But we can prepare now, we can make our jobs and our workforces resilient.

I was watching a business program on the weekend and exercising some of the hindsight that is of course crystal clear once you've left a business or for that matter any part in your career development.

The program was reviewing the implementation of an automated cash register system in a food / retail shop. It showed how under a new system that all the cash registers were touch screens which accurately recorded all the information pertaining to each sale and then directly put that information into the accounting software. It also showed that now the shop owner, from her home, could get reports on how productive each staff member was, what sales were per hour, what areas were moving quickly etc. What great tool for leverage for this business owner.

As a small business owner I know that many of us start up our businesses and implement our own strategies for many areas including accounting and data recording. We'll use a normal cash register, or a ledger book, or if you're adept with a spreadsheet like I am, you can pretty much make up your own system for anything to do with recording.

The problems then come when:

you want to go on holiday (no-one will ever understand your system like you do) your company grows (a manual / spreadsheet based system is great when there's 2 or 8 people to look after, try looking after 50-500 like this and see what a tax on your time it is) if like me - you sell your business (the time you even need to take to train someone else to do your system will be phenomenal)

I pride myself on embracing technology and using the power of its leverage - yet looking back there were certain areas within my business where we didn't implement the best technology for the job and I take total responsibility for that. Towards the end I recognized a need for it - but never took that step. There were many reasons I justified in my head not moving forward to embrace the best technology - the up front cost, how would I know the system would work perfectly, the time to input information into a new system, the current system works fine, will we be able to generate the same reports / with the same ease that we currently can, etc etc etc.

The sooner you implement new technology (after doing your research) the sooner you can overcome all those obstacles. Work out how much time it's taking you to do this job per week (in my case the main area that sticks out is sales peoples pays / commissions / bonuses), then multiply that out by a year at what YOU should be earning per hour, then add onto that how much time it would take you to train someone else (to your standards), and work out in months where your break even point is.

For example, say you do a job each fortnight that takes 4 hours, but would take you only 1 hour with the correct technology. That technology costs say $5,000. Even just looking at those simple figures, let's say your worth as an hourly rate (we'll just pluck out a figure) is $50 per hour. Each fortnight you're wasting $150 with your current system. In 33.3 fortnights - ie just over a year you'll have paid off this new system. Not only that, but your business will be more systematized and more saleable. This doesn't even take into consideration the opportunity you now have with that extra time to create additional income for your business through innovation or implementation that you never had time to before. The other great thing about a professional system - they're usually pretty easy to learn, meaning that you'll probably get back that extra one hour of your time too.

Technology is a great form of leverage - another form is delegation. Whether you're a sales person, a manager, an employee, a business owner - you can use some form of leverage to increase your productiveness and your businesses bottom line.

As a sales person - is it time to look at a personal assistant to do those tasks which make you no money but still need to be done (photocopying, photography, entering database details, key cutting, creating marketing material) With technology you can even look at a virtual assistant - or simply a casual / part time assistant until you're ready to take the next step. Maybe it's time to look towards a professional design company to increase the effectiveness of your marketing and personal image.

As a manager - what tasks will you just not let go of? I hear managers so often say - it'll take me more time to explain it than just to do it myself. Well that's probably well and true for the first time, maybe the second and third times as well - but that's the great thing about most people - they'll pick up something eventually if they're trained appropriately. There's a great quote that says - don't let perfect get in the way of good. The person you delegate to may not do it as perfectly as you - but what else can you accomplish that will eclipse that if you just had the time?

As an employee - is everything you do systematized? Do you have a back up for each of your jobs so that when you're away you don't come back to a whole pile of work? Don't think you need to wait for your boss or manager to implement these structures - use some initiative and start this yourself.

As a business owner - what technology are you holding off on getting that will take your business to the next level? For me - this is one of the big mistakes I can see that I missed out on in one area of my last business. A big lesson learned for me and a mistake I'll try not to repeat in the future.