Management

Drastic times call for drastic measures.  With so much uncertainty surrounding our economy, it is time for all small business owners to take a deep look at their business and figure out where they can “trim the fat”.

In most cases, if you REALLY look closely at what you are paying for and the benefit you are receiving, you will be surprised at how much you can cut back.  Most of us get lazy and start paying for luxuries through our business because we think we need them or just because we can.

Well, times have changed.  If your bottom line is shrinking, it is time to take action NOW!  Don’t wait for the economy to turn around.  Take this opportunity to really trim the excess fat and create a more efficient business.  Then, instead of just surviving in this economy, you will thrive in it.  And then, once the economy does turn back around, you will be that much better off.

Now, I know this is hard to do.  I have been doing it in my own business - and it is HARD.  Change is never easy; it’s easier to just continue on the path that we are on and hope that we will still make it to our destination.  Unfortunately, by not ADAPTING to our current economy, it’s comparable to following a road map from the year 1980 - chances are, the roads have changed and if you are looking at the wrong map, you are going to get LOST! read more

Hospitals like Saint Barnabas Medical Center in Livingson, New Jersey and New York Presbyterian Hospital in New York City have added the study of literature into residency programs. This broader approach to medicine has made residents into better doctors by encouraging fresh thinking, fostering greater empathy, and lowering of barriers between doctors and patients.

According to this New York Times article, more and more schools over the last fifteen years have included the reading of Virginia Woolf and Leo Tolstoy in medical school. They call it “narrative medicine.” But this is the first time hospitals are trying this approach in residency programs.

For example, for over a year at Saint Barnabus Medical Center, a doctor named Richard S. Panush has been incorporating literary discussions into his internal medicine residents’ daily rounds. This includes a daily routine in which he and his colleagues discuss poetry, short stories, and essays with their residents in the context of their patients. As a result, they
found significantly better scores on patient evaluations of residents and of quality of life.

Another example: Columbia University’s College of Physicians and Surgeons found that doctors interacting with literature were more willing to adopt another person’s perspective, sometimes after just four one-hour workshops.

A second-year resident at Saint Barnabas, Dr. Benjamin Kaplan, had this to say about the effects of the program on his fellow residents, “Their management of patients changed. They remembered to do things that I don’t think they would have otherwise done, like always talking to the family, gently touching patients, and continually explaining the course of treatment and what the doctors are thinking so patients know.”

If “narrative medicine” can make better doctors, perhaps “narrative management” can make you and your staff better business people too. The first book that I’d recommend is If You Want to Write: A Book about Art, Independence and Spirit by Brenda Ueland. If you substitute the verb for whatever you do (for example, “program”) for the word “write,” you’ll see how it can apply. I am willing to bet that it will help you build a better business, so check it out.

I agree with John Jantsch’s statement “The current state of economic affairs cries out for leaders.” (Lead for Selfish Reasons, October 27, 2008.)

How could a political leader take charge and walk on the correct path if the country looks like it is divided into separate parts instead of being integrated into a whole map with independent states that are united? I think you could see that division in an historical perspective and look back what happened eight years ago. Here is an eloquent example by Robert Tracinski from his article, The Two Americas: read more

When it comes to politics, I’m pretty quiet.  In fact, few people typically know which way I “lean”.  And that’s OK with me.  When I find myself in conversations with people on the matter, I tend to contribute more by listening.  And frankly, I can generally see my conversation partner’s perspective on it.

I mean what platform is “correct?”  Who has the “best” political model? Republicans? Democrats? Independents?  Well, I believe it’s subjective and depends upon the context.  Each typically comes along with salient points.  This is not to say I don’t stand for one thing.  I do…and I always encourage active participation in the process.

But when you truly reflect on the impact an election has on your life and business…I invite you to consider how it compares to the effect you (and your management team) have on it.  My guess is that your active participation and control of the business dwarfs the trickle down effects of a change in political leadership.

We’ve just gone through an exciting time in our nation’s history.  Some consider this to be a “new beginning”.  I think that’s wonderful.  If it helps to spur healthy change, I’m all for it.  But if you believe that new political leadership is going to drastically change your business and life, I’m afraid you’re going to be disappointed.  The universal truth is that real change takes place from within. read more

As much as I love Thanksgiving, it’s a rough holiday for cartooning.

Christmas gives you all sorts of stuff to play with: Santa, elves, reindeer, trees… Halloween is almost as good: pumpkins, monsters, candy, costumes . . .

But Thanksgiving is pretty much just turkey, so I do what I always do when I’m at a loss - I make a list of everything I can think of related to my topic.

One of the things that’s different about Thanksgiving is the lack of a consistent date. Sure, it’s the fourth Thursday of November, but it’s not, say, October 31, or July 4. And that sort of vague scheduling got me thinking about my own schedule, and the cartoon above came into focus.

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About the Author: Mark Anderson’s cartoons appear in publications including The Wall Street Journal and Harvard Business Review. Anderson is the creator of the popular cartoon website, Andertoons.com, where he licenses his cartoons for presentations, newsletters and other projects. He blogs at Andertoons Cartoon blog.

Mark is part of the Small Business Trends Expert Network.

How do you talk to your employees honestly about company finances and plans?

It’s hard to be a business owner with people counting on you when you have worries of your own and aren’t sure what is appropriate to share. As an employee, it is also hard to be in the dark when it comes to your employer’s plans and wonder if layoffs are looming or your job is changing.

Good communication, while sounding like motherhood and apple pie, is the key. Here are 5 tips for how to communicate with your employees when your business is going through difficult times:

Tip #1: Don’t treat your employees like mushrooms, by keeping them in the dark — talk to them.

In the absence of information, employees will make up their own. I guarantee it.

In small businesses, especially, employees are much closer to what’s going on in the business. They will know if sales are slowing because they are dealing with orders each day. There are fewer departments and layers of management to obscure the company’s real condition. They also read the same newspapers, watch the same TV news, perhaps follow the same industry trade publications as you, the owner, do. So don’t think no news will be interpreted as good news.

It’s a fine line to know when is the right time to discuss the company’s finances with employees. You don’t want to alarm anyone unnecessarily but you also don’t want them jumping to the wrong conclusions because they aren’t getting information from you.

If you are tracking your numbers closely and regularly, you will know when you’re trending downward and have to take action. Especially in startups, read more

The current state of economic affairs cries out for leaders.

But, not necessarily for the anointed, elected or self-professed type. In fact, not even the hired and titled type.

Now more than ever you need to lead - not for fame and fortune though, but because of who you will need to become in order to do so. You see, taking the task to lead isn’t particularly noble or altruistic, done authentically, it’s a selfish objective accomplished through selfless actions.

People, and by that I might mean those in your family, church, school, association, product group or company, are hungry to connect with something authentic, and few things feel more authentic than leadership driven from a passion to become better and, in doing so, make those who follow better.

• True leadership is an inside job. It requires you to focus on yourself, on being the true yourself that connects to a higher purpose and then goes to work on purpose. By higher, I don’t necessarily mean spiritual or religious, I mean authentic - something that drives you past your fear, to a place where you make decisions about the actions you take for the good of the cause.
• True leadership requires that you live a story. Your higher cause, the thing that drives you to work on yourself, needs a simple manta. A story you tell yourself, and then others, and that is passed throughout the cause, likely becoming on it’s own something larger than you first created. It’s the rallying cry for the troops.
• True leadership takes dogged determination. Oh, others will try to talk you out of lifting yourself up because you may ask them to raise their game, you might shine a light that allows other to shine as well, but you will encounter those who want you to stay in the dark with them. You may need to say “this is how we do it here” several thousand times before you believe it so thoroughly no one can doubt you.

But in the end, the lead you take is equal to the lead you make. (apologies to Lennon/McCartney)

John Jantsch is a marketing and digital technology coach and author of Duct Tape Marketing.

It seems like a century ago now, but before the folks on Capitol Hill were yelling about financial markets and exotic investment instruments, they were yelling about skyrocketing energy costs.

Remember that?

One of the ideas that has been floated to help small businesses (and homeowners) reduce their energy costs as well as their carbon footprint is to install their own renewables-based energy systems. And, according
to a recently released report called “Freeing
the Grid 2008″ by the Network for New Energy Choices, many states have policies in place that provide incentives for them to do so.

These aren’t the standard tax-based incentives (although those exist at both the state and federal levels, too). Instead, state governments have laws on their books that combine permitting individual systems to connect to the grid with requiring energy companies to pay for electricity that is privately generated and fed back into the grid. “Freeing the Grid” rates all 50 states on their version of these policies. read more