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Enterprise

Thursday 26th July 2007

We have to stop meeting like this

Workers in the UK attend almost eight face-to-face meetings per month, according to recent research. Bert van der Zwan of web conferencing company WebEx argues that much of this time could be better spent. Read More

Wednesday 8th November 2006

Blood from a stone

It would be unfeasible to run any enterprise of scale without extending and accepting credit. Trade credit is actually a crucial source of funding for companies and is on average ‘twice the size’ of bank credit, according to the Credit Management Research Centre (CMRC). Read More

Thursday 12th October 2006

Dealing with disaster

It’s understandable that the day-to-day concerns for an owner-manager will be to keep customers happy, while also seeking opportunities to grow the business. Quite often, a disaster recovery plan will be at the lower end of a ‘to do’ list. Besides, when it comes to a business disaster, that sort of thing always happens to somebody else. Read More

Wednesday 23rd August 2006

Dealing with stress: My way

I don’t know how many of you watched Colin Montgomerie’s dreadful second shot at the 18th in the recent US Open for what should have been his first major title, but those who did would recognise this as Monty’s ultimate pressure moment or, in more common parlance, ‘stress’. Read More

Wednesday 19th July 2006

Bootstrap your way to riches

Internet companies in early 2000 could raise capital in just two meetings and the deal would be closed in six weeks. Their track record was appalling. Bootstrapping would have led to sounder businesses as failures were not caused so much by the state of market but because basic good business practices were thrown out of the window in a desperate search for growth. Read More

Monday 17th July 2006

The magnificent obsession

Obsessiveness plays a big part in momentum management. You can build a successful company, one that gives you a very good lifestyle, by working very hard for a few years. But if you are really going to blast your way through, being obsessed is probably essential. Read More

Friday 2nd June 2006

Winning the race for growth

I always remember sitting in a railway carriage on a very crowded train and next to me were two very serious-looking businessmen. One was American – obviously the boss – and they were talking about how many millions of tins of baked beans they were going to produce for next year’s budget. The US guy was pressing hard for growth of about 15 per cent, the UK guy, inflation plus five per cent. Read More

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