Finance Advice
Advice News: Epoch: the end of one era – the start of the next
This month marks a major shift in my business life: I’m changing from a solo consultant to joining the full-time workforce. Yes, I’ve been seduced by the Dark Side. They have cookies.
Rebusiness, Andrew Ballard, and this blog will still remain, however from here on in, I’ll be a little more selective in the clients and projects I take on out of ‘work’.
I thought that after 11 years of business in this mode, I’d go back through my archives and tease out some revealing insights from my records, to give you a brief glimpse into the life of a solo consultant.
So sit back, relax, and help me unravel some of the deepest and darkest secrets (??) of the solo entrepreneur. I’ll bring the cookies.
Advice: Good, fast, cheap: pick any two.
I’m sure it started as an MBA-level diagram at either Harvard or Yale, but I first saw it on a t-shirt of all things – a triangle with the words ‘Good’, ‘Fast’, ‘Cheap’ at the corners, and the phrase ‘Pick any 2′ underneath.
It’s an intriguing proposition that not only holds up pretty darn well under scrutiny, but also gives us in the world of business a chance to pause for a minute, and figure out where we are on the diagram – and where we’d like to be.
Thinking it through, there’s three obvious combinations, and a few other less obvious possibilities. Let me walk you through them, and try to find out where you sit…
Advice: The Cashflow Crunch: Who, what, when and how to survive one
So what really is cashflow? Why is it so important? And how the heck is my business going to survive this trend? Important questions – and if you don’t already know the answers, then it’s vital for your business that you read on…
Advice: Plan A: How to write a good business plan.
A business plan should never be an anchor or a dead weight dragging your business down – and it should never be an onerous task to put one together.
The good news is that there are 3 wildly different types of business plans – each one focussing on a different business purpose – and one of these types of plans should suit your needs perfectly, without undue effort.
Advice: Starting Something New – A ‘How To’ Guide
It all starts here: with the tiny seed of an idea. Perhaps it’s extending your current business into a market of a competitor; perhaps your ‘something new’ is to find a synergistic product or service that you can promote alongside your current range, but that cross-sell each other, and boost your total sales figures.
Advice: Cheap but not nasty: open source software
The following list highlights a range of different genres of software and applications, giving some of the leading options of commercial software and/or commercial web site/web application offerings.
Advice: Good Cop/Bad Cop: outsourcing your Accounts Dept.
When you’re running a small business, it’s hard enough job to separate your working life from your personal life – but when you add to that equation the constant task of invoicing and chasing up debtors, it might be time to call in a Bad Cop.