CFO Core Concerns Conference 2010
June 30, 2010
Thanks to my friend at HJMT, Lisa Gordon, I got an opportunity to attend the 2010 CFO Core Concerns conference in Baltimore MD June 27-29, 2010. This conference - a 3 day event - was designed by CFO Magazineto help and assist CFOs to identify and mitigate risks in today’s world, as well as take advantage of opportunities. The topics covered were broad - everything from traditional accounting issues (borrowing and debt) to more IT related topics. So you might ask yourself - why should I, as an entrepreneur, spend time with bean-counters and accountants?
Well one thing you’d find if you actually attended is that bean-counters and accountants and especially CFOs are pretty darn smart people - and not boring at all. They have to handle all sorts of impacts to their companies, evaluate risk, take advantage of opportunities, and in general protect the company and track and optimize it’s progress. This is not an easy task. They have to think like entrepreneurs - trying to get the best bang for the company’s buck, protect the company from catastrophic events, optimize it’s assets, investigate new opportunities for growth, decide when best to invest, and be sure that the company doesn’t run out of money in the process.
Equally interesting were the vendors that showed up for the conference - coming from every avenue of risk that the CFOs might be tackling from health care, to import/export regulations to cloud computing, to general IT support and everything in between. The core concerns identified as important at the conference were:
- Credit Markets/Interest rates
- Federal Government policies and regulation
- Health Care costs
- Managing IT Systems
- Federal Budget Deficit
- Accurately forecasting results
- Managing and obtaining working capital
- Consumer Demand
- Maintaining employee morale and productivity
- Financial regulation and changes in regulation
- Currency risks
- Cost of Fuel
- Margin Maintenance
“So what?” you say - why should I care, I’m just a lowly entrepreneur - most of these are things I don’t have to worry about. My answer is - you are wrong. Now you DO need to worry about some of these things within your own company. If you’re developing a music delivery platform and all of a sudden there is a court decision handed down, or a change in copyright regulation - you could find yourself holding a product that is both useless and suddenly illegal. If you don’t pay attention to patent law you might not have noticed that the supreme court allowed a business method patent to stand - strengthening the status of all business methods patents. Assessing these risk is an important part of your job as an entrepreneur. You must envision both the best case “hockey stick” scenarios and the worst case scenarios as well and develop measurement and contingency structures to be sure you don’t get in over your head.
More importantly though - every concern issued above is a problem looking for a solution. A problem that has been stated as CORE to a business’s ability to thrive and grow in today’s world. A problem that there is probably some funding to solve because CFOs who write the checks across the world share these concerns. It is a built in market, with specific desires and requirements, and an awesome potential for the right entrepreneur to create a solution and step into the fray.
You can check out the twitter history to see my CFOCore tweets from the event, that cover most of the main speakers, and check out the speakers and their topics for the event at CVent. As an entrepreneur I was fascinated by the issues that the various speakers raised. Frank Partnoy, a professor of Law and Finance at USD, covered how today’s recession and lead up to a crash were eerily similar to a time 79 years ago when Ivar Kreuger nearly brought the world economy to it’s knees. He pointed out the similarities - and the differences - to today and how that might affect the economy in the next few years. He also said that the Moody’s and other bond rating agencies were useless and should be replaced by cold hard facts. Moody’s rated many failing banks as “A” or better right up until they collapsed - proving that their predictions for an investments risks were practically useless.
Rita McGrath, a professor at Columbia University, gave an awesome talk on using Discovery Driven techniques to stimulate, encourage and foster innovation and growth within large companies. In discussing the topic with her after her speech I discovered she has a similar presentation that applies to entrepreneurs, and another that applies specifically to software development. Interestingly, she’d heard little of Agile Methodology, which her proposed tactic resembles.
Michael Hughes CIO At Large for C4si, was heard saying that the end of the company sysadmin could well be approaching - that cloud technologies could, and would, shift the burden of technical support off internal staffs and onto remote and outsourced solutions like no other technology before it. He also claimed that systems security wasn’t as big a deal as everyone made it out to be since most data was obsolete after 1 month anyway (I beg to differ with him on this point - maybe I misunderstood what he was saying).
Dennis Jacobe, Chief Economist at the Gallup Organization had a fascinating lecture on measurements of consumer demand, company confidence, and the attitude of the general public. He cited, for example, that while 95% of people favored small businesses and entrepreneurialism, 36% of the same group of people believed that socialism (which is antithetical to the aforementioned concepts) was a viable economic alternative for the United States. Consumer confidence has remained flat for over a year, and those with money have not yet tired of saving and begun spending. Jacobe claims that the recession is not ending but we are entering a long tail where there will be considerable volatility and only small organic growth in the marketplace.
Greg Schaffer, Director in charge of Cyber Security at the Department of Homeland Security came and talked to CFOs about the new, more dangerous, online world we now live in - stating that most company manufacturing and production infrastructure had little or no hacking or security protection - endangering the lives and the livelihoods of many major US Firms - as well as our overall global economy. He pressed CFOs to examine carefully their spends when it came to cyber security risks and evaluate them carefully.
We heard encouraging news on the technology front from Edwin Yuen, Microsoft and Hope Cochran, Clearwire on how broadband ip based 4g networks were coming from companies like clearwire, and that virtual technology had allowed some companies to consolidate from over 600 running servers to just 40 at tremendous cost savings.
We heard discouraging news on the health care front, with some analysts predicting 20-40% raises in health care insurance costs for companies witih under 100 employees over the next few years until 2014. Some said that these rate increases would disproportionately affect companies with under 100 employees. This will force many small businesses out of providing health care benefits and into the state-run pools, which may well not be up to the task prior to 2014 of absorbing so many subscribers, and may create two levels of care: one for the “have-nots” on the public funds and one for the “haves” that are in private insurance or are self paid. Most large companies that self insure were interested in creating wellness programs to be sure their rates stayed low - some claimed that could result in discrimination against overweight people, or those with chronic diseases prior to hiring.
We heard a fascinating panel discussion on risk management and how to plan for and mitigate everything from natural disasters, to cyberintrusion to key persons becoming ill. The panel had the Lizabeth Zlatkis, head of risk management for Hartford Insurance, who stated that you have to put most of your risk management eggs into the baskets of problems that would put your company out of business. While it’s good to have plans for smaller risks - you MUST have plans for the risks that can ruin your business.
We heard from the supply chain manager at OfficeMax, Ruben Slone, about how he used the downturn to implement a series of cost reductions and supply chain optimations that saved his company millions of miles of truck time, improving the environment and saving the company millions of dollars - using just a few simple changes. We heard from Ronald Jadin, the CFO of Grainger - one of the largest catalogs in the world - about how, despite the downturn they continued to grow by optimizing their relationships with customers and suppliers to meet their own needs and the needs of both. They cut turn time on inventory by 20 days in less than a year, while improving on-time delivery of product.
We heard from a career expert at Accenture and author of ”The Workforce of One”, David Smith, about how today’s consumer driven world is changing the expectations of employees - that they want their careers and their day to day jobs to be more like their experience outside work - customized to their needs and their desires.
If you read the above and thought to yourself - hey, I could come up with a solution that solves one of those problems (or even a part of one of those problems) then you probably have a pretty good seed of an idea for and entrepreneurial venture. The first thing that they teach you in “entrepreneur school” is that you must come up with a compelling solution to an entrenched and difficult problem or desire that people have. This conference was FULL of such problems and desires - and is a hotbed of ideas for an entrepreneur to live off.
For more information you may want to consider getting one of the books from the presentation authors. I’ve organized the books into an Amazon Store which you can visit by clicking the link. There is even a link there to subscribe to CFO Magazinewhich I highly recommend you do. So if this interests you - think to yourself - what convention can I attend and learn from that might be slightly outside my normal field and how can that enhance my ability to either run my company or come up with awesome sellable entrepreneurial ideas?
Retaining Young Talent event
April 8, 2010
Students Tackle “Bright Flight” in Upstate New York
Thursday, April 15, 2010 7 p.m.
Alumni and Advancement Center
300 East River Road
Rochester, NY
In November 2009, students from the University of Rochester, Cornell University, and Syracuse University gathered for a weekend-long collaborative brainstorming session called “Work/Play/Stay//Mitigating Bright Flight: How to Retain Graduates in the Upstate Region.”. Join University alumni, parents, and friends April 15th at the University of Rochester for an enlightening evening with the Rochester students and faculty who participated in that session. There will be a panel presentation, a video, and a discussion about the “bright flight” issue and potential solutions.
Acording to U.S. census data analyses by the New York Times and the Brookings Institution, the population of young adults in upstate New York has been declining at an unprecedented rate. Between 1990 and 2004, the number of 25-to 34-year-old residents in the 52-county upstate region declined by more than 25 percent. In the Buffalo, Rochester, Syracuse, and Binghamton areas, the decline was more than 30 percent. The rates of emigration were found to be highest among college graduates and termed “bright flight.”
What implications do these trends have on the well-being of upstate communities? What can be done to mitigate this exodus? Please join us in a discussion of the causes and possible solutions to the “bright flight” phenomenon.
Following the program, enjoy a reception sponsored by the Office of Alumni Relations.
Admission is free. Advance reservations are required. Special thanks goes to High Tech Rochester for its support of this event!
To Register:
Online: www.rochester.edu/alumnievents
Phone: 877.MELIORA (877.635.4672) toll free or 585.273.5888
Penfield Robotics Team 1511 Rolling Thunder owns Beantown
March 30, 2010
Penfield Robotics Team 1511 Rolling Thunder goes to Beantown - and proves that Rochester can innovate too!
Boston, MA, Sunday, March 28, 2010: The Penfield Robotics Team 1511 “Rolling Thunder” competed this past weekend in the Boston Regional Robotics competition. This team, which had already won the Engineering Inspiration award in the local Finger Lakes Regional in early March, proved to their competitors from Boston and throughout the Northeast that Rochester is a hotbed of innovation and student achievement. The team brought home the competition’s most coveted award (the Chairman’s award) and placed second overall in the robot competition qualifying again as a finalist for the International competition in Atlanta. The team won honors for the “Coopetition bonus - tying with the team seeded first overall in the competition by competing in the matches with the highest total scores. The team won an honorable mention in the Safety Award competition, and one team member, PHS Junior Crystal Vongnaphone, was selected as one of two students at the Regional to be a finalist for the new Dean’s List award - an award for excellence in student performance. Crystal is one of just over 100 Dean’s List finalists worldwide.
The Chairman’s Award represents the spirit of FIRST. It honors the team that, in the judges’ estimation, best represents a model for other teams to emulate, and which embodies the goals and purpose of FIRST. It remains FIRST’s most prestigious award, and qualifies the team to compete internationally in Atlanta for the International Chairman’s Award. The Judges at this year’s event in Boston had one recommendation for improvement: Clone Yourselves!
The Boston Regional was held on the Boston University campus in the Agannis Arena. Over 50 teams from that region and across the Northeast competed. Over 50 team members, mentors and parents travelled to Boston for the event. With, over 40 Penfield high school student team members-the students, their parents, team alumni, and 26 active teachers and mentors dedicate thousands of hours of time to the team. They work together year round, on top of building a competitive robot in 6 weeks. Significant accomplishments for Team 1511 included hundreds of hours of community service, robotics demos, outreach, recruiting, finding sponsors, FIRST Lego League help and assistance, helping rookie teams, helping out other teams at competitions, and even helping start FLL teams in other countries like the Bahamas. The presenters showed a map with Team 1511 “Thunderbolts” marking all the teams they had helped throughout the US and the world. The team was judged against 53 other teams who attended the Boston Regional, including teams from New York, Massachusetts, New Jersey, England, Brazil, Connecticut, and Maine (More info at www.bostonfirst.org). To qualify the team submitted an essay, a video presentation and 3 team members presented to a judging panel (http://bit.ly/b7eXBk ). This is the 3rd Chairman’s award for the team (the last one being in 2009 when they won the Chesapeake Regional Chairman’s Award). The team can only submit an award application at one regional each year. Penfield Robotics team has an impressive record of over 26 trophies in 6 years, 3 Regional Chairman’s awards and the team won an International Judges Award in Atlanta in 2009.
The teams major sponsor is Harris RF Communications, and many of its 23 mentors are Harris Engineers, led by Larry Lewis the engineering team lead mentor. Other local sponsors include: Comella Orthodontics, Simcona Electronics, Schuler-Haas Electric, S & W Technologies, Penfield Hess, OS-Cubed, Inc., Debbie Supply, Drelick’s Welding, VanBortel Machines, Family First Federal Credit union, Huther Painting, IC2S, International Art Acquisitions, Maxie’s Ice Cream, National Fire Adjustment Company, Park Dental, STEM Robotics, Penfield HS Student Council, Drake Environmental, Town and Country Travel, Penfield HS PTSA and many smaller sponsors.
FIRST (which stands For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology) is an international organization that promotes leadership and engineering in the elementary through high school environment by encouraging a cooperative team effort between professional engineers, teachers and parents. More information about FIRST can be found at www.usfirst.org .
The team has many pictures available from the Boston Regional and other events at http://rollingthunder.smugmug.com . More information about Rolling Thunder can be found on our award winning website at www.penfieldrobotics.com .
As usual the reaction from local press was Ho Hum - not worth mentioning. Sigh.
RIT 48 - create an entrepreneurial business in 48 hours
March 14, 2010
Starting this Friday RIT students will have the opportunity to create an entrepreneurial web-based business in 48 hours. RIT 48 has selected this blog author to be a judge for this highly competitive and interesting competition. So what is RIT48? They are glad you asked: RIT48 aims to bring together students from various disciplines to pitch, plan, develop and launch a web startup in one weekend— or, as the name suggests, 48 hours. An intense, energy fueled, entrepreneurial event, RIT48 was designed to showcase the innovative and creative spirit of RIT students while offering the opportunity to learn and meet new people. Always had a cool idea for a web startup but never the time or resources to make it happen? RIT48 is for you. You can form a team, develop your idea, and launch a web startup to the world in a mere 48 hours. We’ll bring the coffee.
The competition is open to Alumi, Students and Faculty, but all development of the website or business plan must be completed during the 48 hours of the competition.
I’m excited to say I’ve been selected to judge this awesome event and I’m really looking forward to working with my fellow Judges - Susan Beebe (SM expert), Aaron Newman (SM2/Techrigy), and Liz Lawley (Director of the Lab for Social Computing at RIT) on this task. The top winning team will receive $600. Here is the schedule for the 2 days:
Friday (9AM-All Night): Introductions, Planning, Developing
Saturday (10am-7pm): Testing, Tweaking, Refining, Presenting
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Good luck to the team members and may the best team win!
The Entrepreneur’s Network begins recruiting 9th class
February 15, 2010
The Entrepreneurs Network is now accepting applications for Class IX
Eligibility
Candidates should be Founders, Senior Executives, CEO’s or hold a controlling position in an early stage technology, life science, and/or scalable high-revenue potential firms with business operations primarily in Upstate New York.
Who Should Apply
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Early Stage Technology Firms
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Life Science Firms
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Serial Entrepreneurs
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Scalable Businesses (Up to $50 million)
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Businesses Undergoing a Leadership Transition
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Family-owned Businesses
Application
TEN is now accepting applications for Class IX. Please submit an application form, a brief non-confidential executive summary (maximum length 3 pages) describing your business, and a summary of your professional background for review and acceptance into the next four-month program. Class size is limited to 20 participants per class to allow for maximum interaction.
Cost
Approved applicants will be charged a one-time processing fee of $350.00.
“Class IX” is a member-only 4-month program comprised of the following boot camps:
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March 4-5, 2010 |
Entrepreneurship Boot Camp featuring Derby Management, Boston, MA |
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April 8-9, 2010 |
Building Block Boot Camp featuring Upstate experts and funding sources |
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May 6-7, 2010 |
Sales Effectiveness Boot Camp featuring Derby Management, Boston, MA |
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June 3, 2010 and June 17, 2010 |
Investor Presentation Boot Camp featuring Upstate experts and funding sources |
To apply for Class IX, Submit an on-line application: online application.
Apply Today!
About The Entrepreneurs Network The Entrepreneurs Network-TEN - is an innovative program designed to provide Upstate entrepreneurs significant hands-on exposure to, and interaction with, national and regional business experts and funding sources. TEN has an exclusive, members-only class consisting of boot camps on securing equity investments and traditional financing, effective sales and marketing strategies, leadership and business strategy for today’s competitive environment. TEN augments its program activities with “Lunch and Learn” and other special events to offer training, educating and networking to connect entrepreneurs, established firms, academic institutions and investment resources to advance the regional economy.
About County of Monroe Industrial Development Agency COMIDA’s goal is to promote, encourage, attract and develop job and recreational opportunities and economically sound commerce and industry throughout Monroe County. COMIDA’s projects generate a 4 to 1 benefit to incentive ratio. They do not lend money nor guarantee loans. Assistance is provided though incentives.
About High Tech Rochesteris a non-profit economic development organization driving growth in the Rochester/Finger Lakes region through the Creation, Mentoring, and Incubation of high-tech start-up businesses, and through advanced consulting services provided to small manufacturing firms through its NYSTAR-funded Regional Technology Development Center.
20 questions to determine if you’re cut out to be an Entrepreneur…
February 13, 2010
I was directed by my friend Pierpaulo Frigerio to this post by Dr. Isenberg at Babson College with the provocative 20 questions to help you determine if you’re cut out to be an entrepreneur. As with many of the talks I give to young entrepreneurs Isenberg believes that money is not and cannot be a motivating factor in becoming an Entrepreneur. His 20 questions come from some of the same sources as the book I frequently recommend to young entrepreneurs and would-be consultants: E-Myth revisited. In E-Myth we discover the 4 quadrants of the employer/employee grid - from working a job to true entrepreneur.
Gerber in E-Myth finds that you can be an employee, a consultant, a “lifestyle” business owner or a true entrepreneur. Isenberg refines that down to the characteristics that designate you a true entrepreneur. Most people are not suited to entrepreneurial lifestyle - it’s very different than the other 3 quadrants and requires a high degree of passion, work ethic, creativity and willingness to fail. Isenberg feels it’s not about money or risk - it’s about the excitement of making a difference in the world. I agree,
U of R Degree Program Trains Students to Turn Patents into Products
January 27, 2010
Like many top research universities, the University of Rochester files dozens of patents each year, but a large number of them end up sitting in a file somewhere on campus perhaps never to be applied in the real world. I recently interviewed Natalie Antal at the U of R to discuss a new program to address this issue. U of R administrators have created a new graduate program designed to put the college’s vast collection of intellectual property to use in medical devices, consumer electronics and a variety of other applications instead of leaving them to collect dust.
The Technical Entrepreneurship and Management (TEAM) program asks students to look through the archives of available patents, find ones that can be turned into profitable technologies, and then develop businesses around them.
Sifting through the University’s roughly 400 (391 at the moment) unused patents, picking one, and drawing up an effective business plan around it is a central task for students working toward the new Master of Science degree.
This approach to teaching innovation allows students the chance to use real technologies and gives them an opportunity to start profitable companies. The novel program is being put to the test as a pilot program this year.
The program is designed for students that have a bachelor’s degree in a technical field. Program participants take interdisciplinary graduate level engineering courses from theHajim School of Engineering and Applied Sciences as well as business courses from the Simon Graduate School of Business.
One of the program’s founders, Vice Provost for Entrepreneurship Duncan Moore, has started a few companies of his own during his tenure at Rochester using technology that he helped develop. Moore believes that, although attitudes have begun to change, many academics aren’t comfortable in industry, making it difficult for potentially job-creating technologies that are incubated in universities to enter the marketplace.
Local engineers need to learn to start their own companies, especially in Rochester, where traditional, large, high-tech companies are struggling and engineering jobs are leaving the city, according to Moore. “I believe we have a very strong obligation to encourage engineers to think like businesspeople, both morally and for the health of the University,” Moore said.
In addition to creating local jobs and teaching students entrepreneurship, the University has a financial incentive for using some of its dormant patents, according to Jack Fraser, deputy director of the school’s Office of Technology Transfer, who is responsible for licensing the University’s patents. It costs the University roughly $15,000 in lawyers’ fees on average to file a patent, and when the patents sit unused that money is not recouped, Fraser said.
When a technology is licensed, the company that licenses it pays the University for the privilege, usually in the form of royalties. That money is then split between the University and the inventor.
Four students make up the pilot class for the TEAM program, which began this year. The University hopes to expand it to a class of 20 students for the academic year beginning fall 2010.
For more information contact Natalie Antal at natalie.antal@rochester.edu 585-276-4511
RIT presents serial entrepreneur and investor Terry Matthews
December 10, 2009
‘Serial Entrepreneur’ Terry Matthews to Speak at RIT Dec. 11
Matthews to offer his secrets on how to launch successful businesses
Terry Matthews, the founder of more than 60 telecommunications, information technology and software companies, will discuss how to create successful new ventures during a 3 p.m. talk on Friday December 11th at Rochester Institute of Technology’s B. Thomas Golisano College of Computing and Information Sciences Auditorium.
The event is free and open to the public.
Matthews is the chairman of Wesley Clover, a private equity firm that describes itself as being in the business of building businesses. Matthews and his team at Wesley Clover utilize their extensive experiences in the technology realm to identify gaps in the marketplace and launch new enterprises to fill them. Wesley Clover reaches out to either recent college graduates or those at the tail end of their academic career to lead the charge, offering training and mentoring along the way.
In the past two years, seven recent RIT graduates have formed companies for Wesley Clover.
“Terry Matthews is what I call a serial entrepreneur,” says Richard DeMartino, director of RIT’s Albert J. Simone Center for Innovation and Entrepreneurship. “His passion is empowering and coaching young entrepreneurs in building businesses. The insight he will offer in his presentation will be invaluable for anyone looking to launch their own business.”
Abby gets it wrong….
December 5, 2009
In her December 5th, 2009 column famous columnist Dear Abby (aka Jeanne Phillips) gets a letter from a reader who has come into some money which would give her a “cushion” to use while she tries to build her own business (basically it would cover a year’s worth of her income). The letter writer goes on to say that she’s dreamed of being an entrepreneur all her life but in the past has not had the opportunity that this inheritance has given her. Her friends and family are telling her she’s “crazy” and will end up “blowing her inheritance” on this dream because small businesses are destined to fail. To any of you who are entrepreneurs you are already laughing. She’s just going through what every single entrepreneur on the planet has been through. But the real problem comes with Dear Abby’s reply.
Abby’s (aka Jeanne Phillips) sage recommendation (which she obviously didn’t ask any REAL entrepreneur’s about) is to write up a business plan (ok so far) and present it to a bank and ask for a loan. Supposedly if the bank says “yes” to the loan then the idea is a sound one. Does anyone else see the silly irrationality of this “test” to see if the business idea is valid? No? Well let me spell it out. The bank will either say yes or no - based on it’s own interests - not the validity of the business plan:
- YES - ok, rule number one - bank’s will only loan you money when you don’t need it. So if they say “YES” to loaning money on this plan it will be for one reason only - that this young lady already has enough money and assets to act as collateral against the loan they are giving. They know that any bet on an entrepreneurial venture is a long shot - so they won’t loan her any money she can’t already cover. They’ll ask her to put her home equity, personal assets and everything else up against the loan and then will only loan her a portion of that total. As a test for whether this is a “good idea” this fails miserably.
- NO - this is the most likely answer. Banks don’t take “angel capital” style risks. You could walk in with the full business plan for Facebook(before Facebook was created) and they would say “that’s a nice idea. Where’s your income stream or other collateral that we can hold in case your silly idea fails? Your booked A/R? Your history of past performance? Oh you don’t have any? Sorry no luck.” This poor woman would walk away thinking she can’t be an entrepreneur because the most fiscally conservative organization you can find won’t invest in her.
So if Abby’s foolish advice is NOT the route to take - what should this woman do? Well the first thing she needs to do is that business plan - she needs to fully flesh out her business idea and examine it critically. She needs to bounce it off other entrepreneurs, and preferably get an experienced entrepreneur mentor (Try SCORE, or social media to connect to one) or gather a board of directors made up of other business owners she knows together to review the plan before she spends her effort and cash on it. Just because she has a dream does not mean she has a marketable idea. If there are startup resources (say a Springstage Blog) in her area she should go to them to help connect her with others who have been down the road she wants to take.
In addition she needs to approach this venture with some reality checks in mind:
- The likelihood of successfully starting a business and maintaining your marriage without your spouse’s full buy-in is vanishingly small. Starting a business will affect everyone in her immediate family. She needs to have their support, help and understanding to succeed. It may actually come down to “which is more important - your dream or your marriage”. Better to decide that before she starts the business.
- Does she want to build a business as a consultant, a lifestyle business, or an asset that she will eventually resell, or retire from and will provide her with long term wealth. Those are different routes, with different risks and rewards. She should choose which she’s going for on purpose.
- She should read a couple of excellent books*. I’ll make some specific suggestions here, but I’m sure my readers can recommend others.
- She should start with E-Myth Revisted (Michael Gerber) to wrap her brain around the concept of exactly what kind of business she wants to start, and what the differences are between business types.
- Purple Cow (Seth Godin) - What about her business idea makes it unique and special. Why would people buy from her? How will she convince her potential customers of the uniqueness of her idea or proposed service?
- How to win friends and influence people (Dale Carnegie) - this book, written over 60 years ago - still applies today. She must live this concept to succeed in business. Does she already? or is there still work to do?
- Think and grow rich(Napolean Hill) - does she already adopt the positive mental attitude she will need to succeed? Building a business is very hard work, and you must be willing to commit to it inside your head before you even start working on it. She need self confidence that borders on egomania or the world will beat her down.
- Rich Dad Poor Dad (Robert Kiyosaki) - does she understand the difference between a “good” and “bad” investment?
- Executive EQ(Robert Cooper/Ayman Sawaf) and Now Discover your Strengths (Marcus Buckingham/Donald Clifton)- she should take a personality profile check and fully understand her strengths and weaknesses as a person. No two people are the same, and there is no “magic formula” for being a good entrepreneur - but if you understand where your weaknesses are you can hire to compensate, and if you know where your strengths are you can create a business role for yourself that takes advantage of those strengths.
- She should examine her own motivations for starting a business and do a reality check with real business owners about whether they are realistic. Think you’re going to do it so you can “set your own hours”? Think again - most small business owners work more hours than their employees during the startup phase. There are many other myths about entrepreneurship that she should examine and debunk before proceeding on.
- She should be prepared to fail. Boundaries need to be set for how much to invest, what the final endplan might look like if the business does not succeed, and how she will protect her personal assets as much as possible. The reality is that most successful entrepreneurs have a few failed business ventures under their belt before they hit one out of the ballpark. If you fail - fail in a recoverable way.
Finally though - she should not be dissuaded by nay-sayers. Whether it’s friends and relatives or the bank - if entrepreneurship is in her blood, she’ll never be satisfied until she tries it to see if it’s really for her. Success will depend on preparation, having the right business advisors around you, having a great idea, hiring the right people to implement it for you, and supporting those people with the proper investment in marketing and sales.
* Full disclosure - if you purchase books through these links Amazon pays me some miniscule commission on them. Don’t feel obligated - it’s just easier for me to organize them all in one place this way.
Rochester Works and NYS DOL hold entrepreneur workshop
October 5, 2009
A Free Workshop for Entrepreneurs: How to Turn an Interest into a Business
Wednesday, October 21 2009
9:00 AM - 11:00 AM
Sponsored by
RochesterWorks!
255 North Goodman Street
Rochester, NY 14607
So you want to start a business?
RochesterWorks is pleased to partner with the New York State Small Business Development Center (SBDC) at SUNY Brockport for this exciting interactive discussion. Learn about how you can turn your interest or hobby into a business and become your own boss.
Topics to be discussed will include:
- Is there a need?
- Who will buy it?
- Why Should they Buy it from You?
- Obtaining a DBA
- Your Responsibilities as an Employer
- Licensing and Regulations
- Business Plan Basics
- How to Pay for it All
Location: The RochesterWorks! Career Center is located at 255 North Goodman Street, at the corner of College Avenue, across from Village Gate. Parking is free. Space is Limited.
For more information or to RSVP contact:
Ann Marie Walker
Career Services Advisor-Workshop Specialist
RochesterWorks, Inc.
585-258-3541
awalker@rochesterworks.org
