On-line reputations and why we should avoid politics

Posted on March 21, 2010 by Jon Stow

In Britain we are fast coming up on a General Election. This is leading to some people getting animated about policy, criticizing politicians they don’t like, and generally displaying their views on-line for all to see. Frankly some of us would rather not see it, especially in the more instant stuff such as Twitter.

In my view it is very unwise to flaunt one’s politics in public. I will admit freely that my business, taxation, is highly political, but if I do talk about the political element it is in the context of the reason for introducing a measure and not about the political philosophy.

It is very easy to get upset about someone’s political views. It may happen that we respect someone and that person’s skills and abilities and would trust them to do a job, so theoretically we should be willing to refer business. However, we are human beings who are sometimes influenced more by emotion than by logic. If we don’t like someone’s politics we may not refer him or her.

In the height of the last US Presidential campaign I un-followed on Twitter quite a number of the more strident individuals whom I thought had it wrong or whose views I found simply distasteful.

Some of you may know that I am a licensed radio amateur, a radio ham if you like. One thing we were all taught when we were studying for our Radio Amateur’s Examination (RAE), was that we should never talk on-air about religion or politics. I think that the on-line business environment is very similar. Those two subjects can upset people more than any other and falling out with our friends over these subjects can do no one any good..

I would recommend that if business people care about their on-line reputations they stay away from politics and do not make provocative comments about politicians, past or present. That way they keep on-side with their network. If they respect our privacy by not inflicting their politics on us, we can respect their private right to their views without anyone getting upset.

© Jon Stow 2010

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Is networking not for everyone?

Posted on March 17, 2010 by Jon Stow

It is the strangest thing, but there must be a lot of small business owners who simply do not get out to networking meetings. People do not like to get out of their comfort zones, but it seems an awful waste.

I went to an event this morning. It was not too early, so no one had to get up at the crack of dawn. It was a pleasure to meet one or two people whom I had not met before; new people to me and new people to the local networks. The majority of those there I had met before and some of them are in my quite close trusted network. They would be people I would be happy to help or whom I already have helped, or people who have helped me. A couple have become very good friends and I would never have met them in the ordinary course of business or social events. I know them because we have all made the effort to get out and meet new people.

All this is fine and proves that networking works and we can all get great rewards. However, the puzzle is that in a digital age and with so many people working from home or running small businesses on our high streets or industrial or business parks, there are not more. I do not suppose that the “missing” potential networkers simply do not go to the events I go to. We networkers go to quite a cross-section and in fact at one time or another have been to most of the networking groups around, whether they be BNI, the local Chamber of Commerce or one of our home-grown groups of which I run one.

My conclusion is that there are many people whom we are somehow missing who would be valuable resources for us, in that we could refer our network friends to them; they could benefit so much. I remember that when I was in BNI, a fine organisation, I took a lot of trouble to try to find people to come along to our visitors’ day. It was such hard work though and so few could be persuaded to come along. Those who visit my own group and join do it on their own initiative, though they may originally learn about the group from current members. The visitors understand the deal from meeting the excellent networkers I am fortunate to have. However, there must be a huge number of people sitting on their own working in their business and hoping for their best without tapping into the huge resources that networking brings. They may fail on their own. There is strength in numbers.

Some admittedly somewhat out-of-date figures (2004) said that

• 2,200,000 businesses had no employees (about 61% of SMEs).
• 1,450,000 businesses had an annual turnover of less than £50,000.
• 1,350,000 businesses had less than £10,000 worth of assets.

I believe there may be about 10% fewer businesses now, but plenty to go round.

Where are all these business owners? I love meeting my “same old faces”, my trusted network, but I am sure that we would all like to meet new people, expand our networks and tap into them as a resource, from which they would benefit. How can we get the message over? What do you think?

© Jon Stow 2010

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Why some people don’t want help

Posted on March 17, 2010 by Jon Stow

When we are out networking we tend to offer our help where we think it’s needed. I don’t mean by trying to sell; most of us know better than that. However generally we try to connect people, to make suggestions, to offer an introduction if we see that person’s business might have a synergy with another. We will not be turned down. Even if the suggestion does not come to fruition, most open networkers will give it a go.

It is difficult to switch off our general helpful natures, and if we meet business people who are not experienced networkers, or in our leisure time, we will still offer help where we can. As networkers we tend to know more people, so we are in a position to do so; we ourselves may even be able to help.

The strange thing is that sometimes we will just be turned down flat. Some people will not want their territory invaded; many people are private, both about their business and their personal lives.

We do not need our enthusiasm to get in the way and stop us feeling their emotion. We need to learn to back off and let them deal with their affairs in their own way, and we must not take it personally. It may be their loss, but it takes all sorts. We must respect their wishes.

© Jon Stow 2010

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Networking and knowing when to say “thank you”

Posted on March 13, 2010 by Jon Stow

My grandfather always said giving was a selfish act, because we took pleasure in making the gift or helping someone else. I am sure he was right. Giving does give me a nice warm feeling inside as it must for most people

We all know that to be successful networkers we should give, and give unconditionally, and in business networking we give in order to build trust. We benefit later on from referrals and recommendations, sometimes years later. In the meantime we take pleasure in the giving.

None of that is new. We know all that. So if someone asks for help, we spend time in helping and take quite a lot of trouble, and we get not even the most perfunctory thanks from the recipient, how do we feel? We gave unconditionally. We expected nothing, did we? Well, we would like to know that we had been of assistance, but if we receive no thanks it is harder for us to trust the person we helped. Perhaps that person just uses and takes from people. We hate to judge the person but we are left not knowing,

Saying “thank you” is so important.

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Economists with the truth

Posted on March 9, 2010 by Jon Stow

I went to an interesting meeting last night. Two out of the three speakers were economists. It is often said that there are as many opinions of economic issues as there are economists. There were two opinions of the economy from the two speakers, but really it was all about a difference in attitude.

The first speaker, a lady, did not want to be attributed so we will only say that she in connected to a well-known Old Lady who lives in Threadneedle Street. Her view of the current economic climate in the South East is that things haven’t been so bad, the economy is on the up and eventually everything will be all right even though the UK economy has contracted by 6.1%

All fine and dandy. She says she speaks to lots of businesses north of the Thames and that is her general impression. Funnily enough I also speak to a lot of businesses in my local area, which is specifically South Essex, so much smaller. I get a somewhat less optimistic view of the situation as it is.

I could hardly wait to be disappointed by the second economist, Mark Pragnell of the Thames Gateway South Essex Partnership (TGSEP) . However I was pleasantly surprised both by his honesty and his attitude. Yes, the economy had contracted by 6.1%. He thought that South Essex had been very badly hit by losses of jobs both in London and locally, possibly worse than in the South East as a whole. He might have had a vested in talking up his view as the Old Lady’s representative had, but he didn’t. What he did say that there was a huge opportunity for growth in the area, that we had a skilled workforce ready to go, and we had attractive lower housing costs and we have industrial units and warehouses which can be rented very cheaply (poor landlords) but potentially profitable for many.

I hope I have not misquoted too much. I was not able to make notes, but my general impression after hearing the first speaker was that I was now listening to someone saying “yes, things have really been bad, but we have the chance to really make hay and bounce back quickly.” Really it is all about attitude and realism and not towing the line of officialdom notwithstanding that TGSEP is very much an institution of local government in the area. Well done, Mark!

If we wait for our businesses to improve they may eventually, but it is likely they won’t. If we are positive, proactive, make plans and exploit the opportunities that are out there our future is in our hands and we know we are not hostages to fortune. Seize the day! Carpe diem.

© Jon Stow 2010

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Why we need to retain our business ambition

Posted on March 5, 2010 by Jon Stow
Kennedy Space Center.
Image via Wikipedia

We have all had ambitions. We grow up with them, and in order to move our lives and businesses forward we need to keep them.

Of course I don’t mean that we need to keep the same ambitions. As we grow older we tend to recognise our particular skills and deficiencies and adjust our ideas to take these into account.

I was fairly conventional when I was a child in wanting to be either an engine driver or an astronaut. Indeed I fully expected to be going to the moon well into my teens, and might have got there as a tourist years ago if the US space program had not lost its way then as it has once again. Richard Branson might help me out yet. Still, some are more focussed than I was. I remember that my best friend when I was nine or ten wanted to be chartered accountant. I don’t think he ever qualified as one, though I believe he is a successful financial journalist. Money must have interested him in one way or another all these years.

We need one or more ambitions throughout our working lives simply as motivation. Otherwise we will simply make the old mistake of doing the same thing; I will avoid the cliché. If we do not try to change, we will not get better and our businesses will not get better.

Of course it is not sensible to be unrealistic. I will never be an astronaut, more’s the pity, and I will never travel the galaxy in a star ship, unless of course I am abducted by aliens, and that would be a poor ambition. I do need a marketing plan and I do need to implement it and ask my network on a professional basis how I can grow my business further and go to the next level.

Ambition is no bad thing even when we get old. Maybe I will join the one-hundred-year-old parachute jumpers one day, but for now, let me have a successful growing business to pay for my eventual retirement and of course the parachute school in a few decades time.

© Jon Stow 2010

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How I use Twitter

Posted on March 1, 2010 by Jon Stow

I love Twitter. Many people blog about it, but a networking friend of mine is struggling to understand how she may benefit, and this is what I have told her.

I use Twitter:

• to stay in touch with as many as possible of my on-line and off-line network with whom I had had contact already when I started a year and a half ago.
• to find new connections and interesting people.
• the above would include people in my own business or allied businesses in tax and accountancy, and across borders too.
• to keep up with the latest news, by which I mean news in general, social media news and news in my own business area
• to have a bit of fun with people I know or have met through Twitter.
• to follow the exploits of celebrities of interest to me
• to find blogs of interest from a professional point of view or of general interest including those related to social media
• to draw people to my own blogs and hope they find them interesting

I use tools to manage my contacts in groups and Twitter lists, because no one can do anything more than dip in now and again to the main “All Friends” Twitter stream. The main tools I use are TweetDeck which is desktop based and HootSuite, which is web browser based. That way I can see what my closer contacts are saying all the time and we can have conversations and help each other. In the beginning it does need a bit of work, but after that one can just dip in and out, a few minutes a day, or however long one wishes, and can use the various phone apps to stay in touch when out and about.

Twitter is the cement or glue which binds my larger network together. It has vastly increased the number of people I feel I know at least a little, and there are more people to whom I could give referrals. I have reconnected with people with whom I had lost contact.

Above all, Twitter involves conversation and being part of the conversation, and it has brought me business too. Of course, depending on your current business and situation it may not be of benefit, but I would feel that spending just a little time on Twitter was an investment for the future,

Follow me on Twitter @JonStow

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Why we need to be courageous in business

Posted on February 28, 2010 by Jon Stow

Sometimes we need to be brave in business. A week or so ago I wrote about how we sometimes need to show courage in our business and take some hard decisions.

We all have fears of the unknown, of measures we have not taken before. Sometimes we need to spend a little money as an investment to take our businesses forward. It is hard in this environment to spend money on the unknown, so the answer must be to spend it with experts in their field about whom we have heard good things. Then we will have more certainty that advice and services we buy in will be effective and increase our revenue stream and perhaps reduce our costs. The need is to increase our margins.

I woke up the other morning determined to take action, and indeed I have by asking for an outside opinion on what I am doing; taking my own advice. I am taking my own medicine as promised and ignoring the voices at the back with their shrill warnings.

A more illustrious commentator than I is recommending we all take the plunge and I was pleased to see that I am in good company.

Spring is coming in the Northern Hemisphere. It is time for a clean out to make our businesses spick and span. If you live south of the equator you can probably find another reason to launch yourself into action.

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Family cooking trouble in your business?

Posted on February 18, 2010 by Jon Stow

Last night my wife happened to switch the TV over to an edition of “Ramsay’s Kitchen Nightmares”, featuring a restaurant in New Jersey. I didn’t take too much notice at first, thinking it was just another cooking programme. Whilst I am interested in food and cooking, we have an awful lot of shows involving food and chefs. However not many minutes passed before the TV had my full attention.

The restaurant was run like many other tired family businesses where one dominant personality makes all the decisions, and typically is resistant to change. In a sense there is one with the power of a decision maker who simply doesn’t make decisions. It was the old story of “if you do what you’ve always done…”

The restaurant was in the sort of place where they could expect many drop-in patrons. It was not a gourmet restaurant, yet it had a very extensive menu. The whole place needed a cosmetic makeover too. It was simply not delivering what the customers would want, and with its tawdry decoration looked distinctly unattractive. Therefore it wasn’t making any money.

To cut a long story short, Mr. Ramsay gave the restaurant owners the medicine he has had to take for his own restaurants which he has managed to keep open (some have closed). Apart from having the place painted, he simplified the menu drastically, reducing the number of dishes available and bringing back more basic dishes such as the sidelined husband’s meatloaf (his wife is the non-decision-maker in question).

If we try to do too much in a small business we fail many of our customers and clients. In the restaurant they were cooking a large number of dishes badly, because there were too many to watch all the time and properly cook to order. By having fewer dishes, they could prepare them more quickly and watch them better, they reduced waste and above all they put the dishes in front of the customers more quickly. Not only was the food fresher and better, but they had improved customer service at a stroke.

So often, small businesses try to be all things to all men and women and fall short. It is much better to deliver what we are good at quickly. Customers and clients will appreciate that, and if we have a good network then we can reach out and find most products and services we cannot offer but our network can. Our clientele will thank us and respect us for that too, and they may even refer and recommend us.

This is a world of instant gratification. People do not like to wait when they lead such busy lives. If we are small we deliver what we are best at doing. If we were Amazon or Walmart we could deliver everything from a plasma TV to a microwaveable hot water bottle, without the friendly personal touch, but as we can offer a personalised service to order we should concentrate on that.

Whilst Gordon Ramsay’s show is a sort of reality TV, he should be congratulated on his insight and from having learned from his own mistakes. He sets an example for others in his acumen if not in politeness. Of course sometimes we do need to get our point over forcefully.

Well done, Gordon! You teach a good business lesson.

© Jon Stow 2010

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Why we should not always take the easy way in business

Posted on February 15, 2010 by Jon Stow

If you are as lucky as I am, you will enjoy your work and running your own business. We have at least some control of our destiny even given the trials and tribulations of the economic downturn. However, I was reminded the other day by a non-business story I heard that because we are happy with something we do or want to do, that does not mean that we have the right approach.

A couple I know have a perceived issue with the husband’s elderly parents who live in a rural village a couple of hundred miles from our friends. The son and daughter-in-law both work full-time in the Big City and live during the working week in their apartment in town. They have a house in the country which they use at weekends. They do not often manage to make time to visit the needy pensioners; maybe only three or four times a year.

Because the senior citizens have slight mobility problems and poor health, our busy pair suggested that they sell up and move to somewhere near their own country home so that they could be “on call” in case they were needed. Of course they would only be able to visit for an hour or so at weekends because work commitments in the City would keep them away from Monday to Friday.

The whole problem with this plan is that it is not a solution. What the old couple need is to have proper support provided at home through the social services or “meals on wheels” and at least someone dropping in every day to see they were all right. They need to feel they still have their independence. They do not need to be uprooted from the village they have lived in for so many years and taken away from their friends and neighbours. The plan is just to make the slightly younger generation feel better in that they have done something, but it would be the wrong thing and inadequate in terms of support even if the seniors agreed to the move.

There is a risk in business that we take what seems the easy way out in a similar vein. We avoid some marketing which makes us uncomfortable, some allow their fears of networking to prevent them from getting out, and many of us keep picking up and servicing the same sort of unprofitable clients and customers because we are used to doing it and we do not have to get out of our comfort zone. We may even be tempted by these “Get Rich Quick” schemes with which we are assailed via email and the post.

Well, sometimes what may make us feel better in the short-term is simply not good for us. By gritting our teeth now and maybe doing something which goes against the grain (as long as it doesn’t hurt anyone else) we can be happier in the longer term. If we make the changes we have feared to make our business better, we will be happier down the line.

When I was a small boy (this dates me) the doctor sometimes prescribed some horrible pink medicine which came in a bottle with a cork. It tasted nasty but it made me better. Have you got that pink stuff in a bottle on your business shelf? Find a spoon and take the medicine. You won’t regret it.

© Jon Stow 2010

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