It can be tempting at times for a business owner to contemplate competing based on price – that is, offering a product or service at a price lower than their competition. The net result of this is hoped to be a quick influx of customers who will take advantage of the lower price, and then [...]
I belong to a small network of businesses each of which provides similar and related services, though it is rare for any of us to compete directly with one another. This allows us to forward projects and clients to each other with little risk of losing the client. A few days ago, the owner of [...]
I was reading the expose in the Wall Street Journal on how Facebook applications have been discovered to be sharing more information about the users of those applications than people may have realized. This is not the first time, and I suspect not the last time, that the giant social networking site will be criticized [...]
I’m much too young to remember this, but there was a time when a man’s word was as good as done. A handshake was worth more than a contract written by a team of top lawyers. This was mentioned in the play Jersey Boys when Frankie Valli and Bob Gaudio seal a deal with a [...]
When working with small companies, and in particular, when it is an individual doing the work, there is often a significant amount of work that is done informally. An email is sent, responded to, some phone calls exchanged, and the work begins. The terms may or may not be clear to everyone involved, the expectations [...]
If you watch a movie involving aircraft carriers, you may have noticed this. On the carrier, the crew are wearing different colored jackets. Some of the crew are wearing blue, others yellow, others gray. Watching more closely, you’ll notice that each crew member interacts almost exclusively with other crew members wearing the same colored jacket [...]
Time spent on dealing with process is wasteful, and yet, many companies find that they spend more time with the process than they do with actual work. Make sure you’re not one of those companies!
Elie Kochman is the author of Advice for Small Business Owners and the founder of Optimal Upgrade Consulting. Using his experience working in the corporate world along with his exposure to the world of small businesses, he writes these articles to assist others avoiding common pitfalls of growing a business. His experience in the corporate world, building his own business, and working directly with other growing businesses has given him some perspective on the trials and pains of running a business.
