Can Small Businesses Survive This Recession?
Tougher times are expected for small and medium sized business. Business failures are expected to rise by a staggering 50% which means that failed businesses could peak around 32,400 in 2010; this would be the highest level recorded since 1992. The Federation of small businesses said that they had recorded a dramatic increase of 214% in the amount of calls to their legal advice line on redundancies from concerned small businesses in the fourth quarter of last year.
Their members are concerned about jobs and how to hold on to jobs; small businesses are usually the last businesses to make employees redundant. The calls are asking how to make employees redundant, how do I do it, what action should I take, this is extremely worrying when it is thought that 32,400 business may go bust. On average each small business employees approximately 5 members of staff; this means that 150,000 people could lose their jobs from small businesses this year.
The federation of small businesses is the voice of small and medium-sized businesses in the UK; they have over 215,000 members, who employ more than 1.3 million people with a combined turnover of £10billion. The federation of small businesses are proposing a five point plan. They believe that small business can help to get us out of this recession if the government were to give small businesses more contracts, the government improves employment paperwork, government improves access to traineeships or apprenticeships and improves the position of the banks giving money to small businesses. This will rely on the bank mangers releasing and relaxing the money supply to small businesses and not having a knee jerk reaction to this recession. As quoted by Stephen Alambritis.
This government under Gordon Brown and Alistair Darling need to realise that small businesses are the back bone of the economy and that they need to ensure that this recession is as short as possible. To do this they need to spend copious amounts of money to implement a massive job creation programme to keep unemployment down and taxation revenues up. Then hopefully we may ride out this recession!
It’s not just a case of the government supporting the Banks and the Car industry; we need more far reaching initiatives for employment across the economy. The recent incentive released by the government was to assist employers recruiting people who had been unemployed for six months or more. This initiative is flawed as the government will provide £2,500 to employers for training any new recruits as long as the new employee has been unemployed for more than six months. So now employers may be tempted to only recruit people who have been unemployed for six months or more for the additional money that is available.
Gordon Brown and Alistair Darling should look across the pond to Barack Obama’s newest policy to create 3 million new jobs in America. This initiative is expected to cost some $850 billion to implement along with other help offered to their car industry and the banking sector.
Benefits of the Referral Process With a Unique Small Business Financing Program
This unique small business financing program offers many benefits, and not just to small business owners. This program allows referrals, and this can help you make a nice sum simply for referring small business owners to the program. The referral program is a situation where everyone involved wins, and there are no losers. This program requires no credit checks, tax returns, or any of the other documentation that is usually required. It is one of the best available small business financing options, and the referral program means that you can earn extra money simply by telling other small business owners about this fantastic program.
Referrals are paid for by the lender to help identify other small business owners who could benefit from this program. Many small business owners have networks of other small business owners, who may belong to the same trade groups or associations. In addition, many of us know people who own a small business and could really use financing right now to help in these tough economic conditions. The referral process is very easy, and takes almost no time at all. Anyone you refer will put your name as the referral source on the paperwork, and when your referral qualifies for the financing then you are paid a referral fee. You get money simply for helping an acquaintance or friend get the money they need for their small business. This financing program is risk free, because the processing fee is completely refundable if you are not one hundred percent satisfied with the amount of financing offered.
The referral program offered by this financing opportunity means you can help out any small business owner you know or meet, and benefit from it. The extra income you can make from referrals can really come in handy, especially with the slow economy and financial crisis that is raging. The best part is that this small business financing program sells itself, because of all the benefits offered and the fact that there are no disadvantages. You do not not to push to sell the benefits of this financing program, once small business owners realize the enormous potential and the ease and convenience offered. Financing is critical for any small business to grow and expand, and the financial crisis has made getting this financing extremely difficult from banks and other traditional lenders.
This new and unique small business financing program is a lifeline to small business who need financing but do not meet the perfect credit and documentation requirements that are needed in the current climate. The referral program means that you can get the small business financing you need plus earn some for telling people about the program you use. Unlike all the other financing options, this program is very flexible, and requires a small amount of documentation. Bad credit is okay and can still get approval. This program has helped many small businesses get back on their feet by providing the financing needed. The fact that you can earn money for telling people about this fabulous financing program is just another benefit, for a program that has many.
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Business Letter Writing Application © – Try it Now!
‘Grammar’ is one of the most problematic issues in writing and Business Letter Writing Application was developed in order to help us better deal with it. English writing is a process that involves with several steps: pre-writing, drafting, revising, and editing. The following article will show you how you can easily transform your English writing accurate, rich, and professional.
Quick overview
Automatic proofreading solutions such as the following Business Letter Writing Application are designed to ensure that your English writing matches the basic grammar and punctuation rules. It automatically identifies and corrects any writing errors. Many of these NLP solutions (Natural Language Processing) quickly analyze your content by using advanced algorithms, and then ‘fix’ it according to their internal ‘correct text’ DB. In most cases these solutions enables us to do the following: grammar check, misspelling and typos correction, and suggesting proper punctuation.
Advantages
Let’s summarize the main benefits and advantages:
* Saves us time spent on grammar guides.
* Saving on proofreading and editing costs such as hiring proofreading services or professional editors.
* Improving our inter-personal communication skills.
* Improving our word choices with synonyms, adjectives, and adverbs suited to our text.
* Improving the image we want to project through our writing.
There are probably many other benefits that are not covered here, as this exciting program constantly changes, bringing us new ideas and additional solutions that help us on improving our English writing.
Quick summary
There is no doubt that Business Letter Writing Application is a great way to enhance our writing capabilities and improve our written based communication. Can we completely trust this technology to fix our writing in 100%? Probably not, but it certainly helps us on identifying basic writing problems before we do. We can only expect this technology to further develop itself, simply because writing is one of the most important tools that help us fulfill our daily assignments.
Management Planning – Boeing’s Future on Track
Management Planning – Boeing’s Future On Track
Researched and Authored by: Michael J. Spindler of Local Music Hits
The Boeing Corporation has a unique organizational structure which consists of essentially two business solutions that are tied together via nine levels of corporate functions. The two businesses are Commercial Airlines and Integrated Defense Systems. From the top to bottom, the corporate functions that govern this corporate machine are, Business Development and Strategy, Communications, Engineering, Operations and Technology, Finance/Shared Services Group/Boeing Capital Corp., Human Resources/Administration, International, Law, Office of Internal Governance, and Public Policy. For a company that employs over 150,000 people across 71 countries, this can be a daunting task, and it all begins with and ends with Business Development and Strategy.
The driving force behind the Boeing Corporation is of course the stakeholders, which include: Customers, Employees, Shareholders, and Communities. The management model used to direct the companies planning and focus is simple but effective method for planning, acting, analyzing, and reinforcing methods that produce results. These are driven by Boeings aptitude to encourage growth and leadership from within the organization. By making employees share in both the successes and failures of the company, Boeing in turn receives: committed, performance-driven management at all levels. This is achieved primarily by preparing employees through education throughout the organization and then to apply knowledge as defined by the following model.
1. Define financial objectives, while producing high quality innovative products, and minimizing the impact to communities and the environment.
2. The Initiative Toolkit – Customer Satisfaction and Growth in productivity are always in a state of balance and realignment.
a. Growth in customer satisfaction.
b. Growth in productivity, advancing processes and technology while remaining competitive.
3. Financial Performance – This is the stage in which the company evaluates how economic profits are affected by decisions in the previous step of maintaining or fostering greater customer satisfaction and growth in productivity. It is in this stage that an analysis is done to compare the original financial objectives and how these two areas are impacting the goals of the company.
4. Delivered Results – Stock Price and Performance to Plan
a. Stock Price – An evaluation of how previous action, corrections, and implementation, have affected the stock price of Boeing.
b. Performance to Plan – This is where employee accountability is accounted for and the impact that it has had on the Financial Performance that has either enhanced or degraded to original vision set forth in the Financial Objectives set by executive staff.
5. The last step is in how the plan has been executed and how that impacts all parties with a vested interest with the company. This includes employees, customers, shareholders, and the numerous communities that are directly impacted by the economic security a company this size will have on the region. (Boeing Corporation, 2007)
The Boeing Corporate headquarters, based in Chicago Illinois, is where the previously outlined model is implemented, analyzed and altered according to needs and changes. The primary focus includes Growth Strategies in the global market, financial goals and performance, leadership development, and of course ethics and compliance. It is also a depot so to speak where sharing best practices, technologies and productivity improvements are pooled. This is a critical area as it is of tremendous value in determining the course of the company and identifying areas of that could use improvement.
Factors that influence the company’s strategic, tactical, operational, and contingency planning include innovation, profitability, and environmental concerns. Of course there are numerous other issues to consider that have an affect on how business is focused. In consideration of short duration of this paper, these three have been chosen as the focal points.
As Boeing is the industry leader in commercial and military aircraft, as well as launch platforms and satellite technology. Great care and continued education of employees at all levels is encouraged to help the company creatively resolve technical barriers that may stand in the way of pushing technology forward. Considerations to take into account are capitol investments, human resources and time. The products that could be developed need to be assessed for marketability, feasibility, and cost effectiveness. The base question is always, will investment into these specific products open doors for profits, and if so, what time frame could the business expect to see a return. Of course there is a myriad of question as to if the product aligns with current visions in place, and is in line with the direction of the industry that the company is focused on.
The products that Boeing selects directly impact the profitability of the company. Concerns once again are into research and development, and durations between innovation and returns on investments. Boeing currently has three major areas of focus in business. The commercial airline and the integrated defense systems compose of 97 percent of the total earnings for Boeing. While 70 percent of the airline manufacturing is to foreign sales, the balance and cross over of technology developed in one division and applied to the other help to keep Boeing profitable and competitive in this industry.
“One of Boeing’s many strengths is the company’s deep commitment to involving customers in all phases of planning and operation.” (AQA, ) It is the customer that Boeing is here to serve. Boeing’s ability, to bring a product of highly complex systems customized for airline and aerospace industries, is what makes planning and operations that much more multifaceted. This flexibility provides an environment where pushing technology to a new level is customer driven. We would still be flying in biplanes if it were not for the industry serving the customers needs. The customers’ needs are to provide services to their own customers with these improved technologies that give them an edge in the market niche. Of the bigger customers the United States government, a direct correlation can be drawn through how technology developed for military use, can be applied to the commercial airline business to make for a safer airline industry. These improvements translate into a burst of consumer confidence as air travel has become safer over the years. This ability of engineers, designers, and customers working to achieve a common goal is one that requires great leadership at every level of the organization.
In regards to environmental concerns, air traffic makes up only a small percentage of the air pollution produced by the world. However, as fuel costs rise, and clean air has become a priority. Boeing has “improved airplane fuel efficiency by 70% over the past 40 years, with a corresponding reduction in CO2 emissions. Current models also are 75% quieter than airplanes 40 years ago” (BC, 2007). Not only does this improve Boeing’s corporate image to the world, but efficiency means lower costs to the final people involved, the consumers. Without whom, Boeing would not have a purpose to exist.
References – Do Not Strip Article References
AQA (). BOEINGBoeing (formerly McDonnell Douglas Helicopter Systems). Retrieved November 1, 2007, from http://www.arizona-excellence.com/Member_Profiles/Boeing.html
Boeing Corporation (2007, October). The Boeing Company. Retrieved November 01, 2007, from http://www.boeing.com/companyoffices/aboutus/overview/powerpoint/boeing_overview.ppt
Researched and Authored by: Michael J. Spindler of Local Music Hits
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About the Author: Michael J. Spindler Michael has a multitude of interests, from Local Music Bands, Arts, Psychology, Sociology, Business Techniques and many more… As time goes by, most of my articles will focus on the world of Local Music. But at this time, I would like to share with you my other varied interest.
Expand Your Business through Strategic Partnerships
If your bank is giving you grief over your business cash options, but you need the money to expand then seek out a strategic partnership. If you want to have more to offer your customers, but you don’t want to go through a product development cycle, then seek out a strategic partnership. If you want to take your company from a small local stage to a national or an international stage, you must seek out strategic partnerships. Strategic partnerships are not about giving up control of your company. It’s about expanding it to the biggest it can be with the most support possible.
New Financing Options
Strategic partners can be venture capitalists who want to take your small idea and make it big. It can be about silent partners who will offer cash backing for a share in revenue or stock. Having more than one person who is helping to grow the business offers more alternatives for cash financing when the banks decide to say “no.”
Increase Your Offerings
Seek out businesses with complementary offering and create a strategic partnership to promote each other’s products for a share of the profit. This will make your business appear bigger, attract more clients, and offer you new ways to make money, even when it’s not your product that you are selling.
Expand Nationally or Internationally
Taking a small company and growing to a larger geographic area is a very complex undertaking. You need to have strategic partners willing to grow your distribution system. If you are taking it internationally, you also need to have partnerships with people who know the customs and traditions in the new country so that they can help you with exporting and repackaging. You can also do this as a strategic partnership with a larger company that already has established a network of distributors and just wants to add some of your product line to their offerings.