Something to do with those business cards you collected

I was interrupted last week at a networking group meeting by someone who wanted to commend something to the group. Positive interruptions that enhance your message are always very welcome! He said it had been a really useful exercise to go through all the business cards he had collected over a couple years after reading the NRG workbook on developing your business networking plan.

He had separated these cards into the four categories suggested in the workbook. He uses Outlook to manage his contacts so he then created these categories in Outlook. He entered the details of any new contacts into his Outlook Address Book and then put all his contacts into those categories. This means he can now manage the interactions he has with his network more effectively. He can also see, at a glance, who he needs to focus his networking activity with.

The four categories of contacts are your Outer Network, your Resource Network, your Inner Network and your Advocate Network.

Your Outer Network is made up of the people that you have met, but have no real connection with. You don't know what you could do for them, but it is useful to have a record of where and when you met. You paths may well cross again and you make that connection.

Your Resource Network is made up of the people that you have met and you know them well enough to recognise they have a particular skill or offer a valuable service. You don’t want to spend more time in developing a relationship with them, but they are useful to introduce to other contacts when appropriate.

Your Inner Network is made up of the people that you have met, have had some sort of follow up and are building a relationship. They share a similar target market to you and probably provide a service that is complementary to yours. We will call them your Inner Network & it is spending time with these people that starts to make networking really work. One really efficient way of doing this is to ensure you belong to the same networking groups.

Your Advocate Network is the small group of people you would go out of your way to find introductions and referrals for. The people you advocate are the people you have already developed a relationship with and you know, like, rate and trust them. It is spending time doing things for these people where you get the highest networking returns.

Successful networkers have up to 30 people in their Inner Network & about 6 Advocates. Do you know who these people are for you?

Good Networking!
Dave Clarke

Baby Boomer Entrepreneur, Do You Want A Worthless Business?

If you are like most entrepreneurs, you are building your business primarily to give yourself a job. This is true not only for baby boomer entrepreneurs, but entrepreneurs of all ages. If you are currently, or hope to be, one of the owners of the 23 million businesses in the U.S., and don't want to explore being able to build a business you can sell to someone else, this book is not for you.

However, if you want to maximize your options, this is the book you seek. If you want to be the 1 out of 100 business owners who have something of value that someone else would want to buy, this could be the book for you. If you are tired of the typical chaos of small business or you are tired of the business practices that make most service businesses unsellable, you may want to look over the shoulder of Alex Stapleton, the owner of the business discussed in this book. Learn why building a sell-able business might be your best option.

Following Alex through this fictional account as he learns how to build systems and a management team will expose you to new options. Even if you are already a fan of E-Myth's Michael Gerber, you will gain new insights on how to “work on your business and not just in it”. Through his story, author John Warrilow shares the benefit of much experience in actually doing what he teaches you to do in the book. You will learn what to do, how to do it, why to do it, when to do it, and how to handle situations with conflicting priorities. He even gives you an “8 Step Model For Selling Your Business” in the recap of what you should learn.

As baby boomers, a new business may be the best bet for a comfortable retirement. If you are already a baby boomer entrepreneur looking to downsize and form a different business, this book may help you. If your goal is to get freedom with your time, I recommend you take a look. You might even only want to sleep better knowing that you could sell your business if you want to do so.

READ Built To Sell if you want to know:
1. How long it will take you to prepare your business for sale.
2. How to find prospective buyers.
3. How to avoid being taken advantage of by your advisers or your prospective buyers.
4. How to reward your management team for helping you build a sell-able business and make them willing to stay with the business when you leave.

If you are a baby boomer entrepreneur, you will be delighted to learn how to turn your business into one you can sell. Of course, this is true for entrepreneurs of all ages.

For more videos and more information, see my Squidoo Lense: Baby Boomer Entrepreneur, Do You Want A Worthless Business?

Shallie Bey

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The secret to getting results when networking for business

I interviewed Chartered Accountant, Douglas Shanks, last week about generating results from business networking. When talking about referrals Douglas said "The secret to getting referrals is giving referrals so focus on what you can give".

That simple sentence contains the essence of a successful approach to building your network. Obviously you will want to benefit from the relationships you build with others and you want them to advocate and refer you when they can. This short podcast explains the importance of advocating others in your network first.

Listen here:

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Good Networking!
Dave Clarke

Are you networking or building your network

In conversation with a couple of people last week I asked if they thought there was a difference between networking and building your network. They answered that when they started formal networking they were recently out of corporate life and they thought networking was all about finding people to do business with directly. This meant they went around attending lots of meetings and finding loads of new people. They did training courses on elevator pitches, talking to strangers and working the room. They didn't generate any business, but they didn't give up.

They realised through their experiences that effective networking was not a one touch contact sport but about building a network as the one real asset of a small business or independent professional. It became important to find groups of like minded people to replace the things they took for granted in Corporate Life. They are now building relationships with people they have things in common with by sharing business, support and knowledge.

I believe that building the right network for you and your business is vital. If you start with that premise it gives you the real reason for networking and your whole approach changes your focus from you to the people you meet.

Good Networking!
Dave Clarke

The missing ingredient in business networking

I spent a day at the start of this week with some colleagues and associates in a regular monthly meeting for the leaders of our NRG Business Groups. The focus of the day is all about how we can help each other build our respective businesses through the collective power of our shared networks. The meeting is facilitated to keep our overall objectives in mind whilst enjoying it and the social element is an essential part of the mix. Our discussions and interactions are primarily about building business, but they are also about supporting each other and sharing ideas, knowledge and best practice.

Someone pointed out to me that the overall experience was very similar to many business and networking meetings. There was, however, one big difference. We were focused on an ongoing strategy for helping to build each others business rather than just networking for the sake of it.

For many people the missing ingredient in their networking is focus. They have a general idea, but no specific reasons why they are doing it. Without that focus it can be difficult to work out where to network, who to network with, when to do it, what it is really all about and how to go about it.

Maybe the title of this post should be the 6 missing ingredients...

If you know anyone who could do with some help with how to build their network in a strategic way then please share this free download to help them work on the four key steps to building business through networking - http://bit.ly/NRGpdf

Good Networking!
Dave Clarke

Do business networks collaborate or compete?

"Avoid the competition" was a comment from Courtney Sperlazza in response to my post entitled What is the right approach in business networking? She went on to explain:

"I don't mean to avoid your competitors. What I mean is, avoid the concept of competition. You can work collaboratively with anyone. Even if you're in similar industries, there is something the other guy can do that you can't do and vice versa. Some of us call those things opportunities!"

One of the first steps we encourage in our advocacy model to how business networking really works is to clarify your target market. This is not so you can sell to them at networking events. It is so you can work out who else deals with them and so who you should be networking with to create those opportunities for each other. Real networking is a collaborative activity where you get to build a sustainable route to market for the long term. As I have written before it is not the face to face equivalent of cold calling.

Imagine my surprise this morning when I received a note that said that someone could not attend a meeting of one of our groups because they were a member of a competing network!

Doesn't that miss the point of networks being places to collaborate?

The best example for the networks to set is to collaborate with other networks.

Good Networking!
Dave Clarke

Can you do too much networking?

Someone raised the possibility that they may be doing too much networking on the 4networking business forum last week. So can you spend too much time networking?

There are many people who spend too much time attending networking groups & events because they are not really networking. They are really engaged in the face to face equivalent of cold calling. They attend loads of meetings & broadcast loudly, but don't listen. They meet as many people as they can, but never have any time for others. Their idea of following up is to add you to their database. I could go on, but you know who they are. They don't really engage, share or build long term mutually beneficial business relationships.

There are some people who are networking with the best intentions, but don't give themselves enough time for following up. They may need to improve the balance of their networking time and do more one to one interactions between larger meetings.

Those people that 'get' how networking really works invest their time in building relationships with other people they have things in common with. They know that it takes time and you have to know, like, rate and trust someone before you will advocate them. They know this time is worth it as one 'Advocate' is worth far more than lots of one off transactions. They attend meetings to strengthen existing relationships and build some new ones. They get to share business, support, knowledge and have fun doing it too. This sort of networking is legitimate and necessary work time stuff and you probably don't have the time to do enough of it.

Good Networking!
Dave Clarke

Week 12: Project Management

1. Explain the triple constraint and its importance in project management.

The triple constraint is the framework for evaluating the competing demands of cost, time and scope. The relationship between these variables is such that if any one of the three factors changes, at least one other factor is likely to be affected. For example, increasing the scope of a project may result in an increase in time and/or cost. It is important consideration of project management as all projects are limited in some way by these three interdependent constraints. A project manager must make intelligent trade-offs between time, cost and scope.

(Above: http://projectmanagementblog.globalknowledge.com/2009/06/01/triple-constraints-model)

2. Describe the two primary diagrams most frequently used in project planning.

PERT (Program Evaluation and Review Technique) chart is a graphical network model that depicts a project's tasks and the relationships between those tasks. PERT charts frequently display a project's critical path; the critical path is a path from the start to the finish that passes through all the tasks that are critical to completing the project in the shortest amount of time.

(Above: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pert)

Gantt chart is a simple bar chart that depicts project tasks against a calendar, with tasks listed vertically and the project's time frame listed horizontally.

(Above: http://support.sas.com/rnd/app/or/pm/gantt.html)

3. Identify the three primary areas a project manager must focus on managing to ensure success.

A project manager must focus on managing people, communications and change to ensure success.

4. Outline two reasons why projects fail and two reasons why projects succeed.

Two reasons why projects fail:

• Scope creep: the projects grows beyond its intended size resulting in time delays and increased costs.
• Poor planning: a failure to properly plan can be detrimental to the success of a project. Good planning uses tools such as a project plan (a formal document that manages and controls project execution), Gnatt charts and PERT charts.

Two reasons why projects succeed:

• Change management: A project managers ability to anticipate and react appropriately to change will better position a project for success.
• Communication: good communication is essential for the success of a project. A project manager should distribute timely, accurate and meaningful information regarding project objectives that involve time, cost and scope and quality, and the status of each.

Week 10: Customer Relationship Management and Business Intelligence

1. What is your understanding of CRM?

Customer Relationship Management has become an integral component of modern business, it involves the managing of all aspects of customer interactions with an organisation with the intention of increasing good customers and increasing profitability (it costs less to retain loyal customers than find new ones).

2. Compare operational and analytical customer relationship management.

Operational CRM is transactional, used day-to-day to record the types of things that directly happen with customers (e.g. call made, problem lodged). It is a short-term tool.

Analytical CRM is strategic, based on the concept of data mining in that it searches for patterns and trends. Supports back-office operations, and inlcudes all systems that do not deal directly with customers. It is a long-term tool.3. Describe and differentiate the CRM technologies used by marketing departments and sales departments.

The CRM technologies used by marketing departments are campaign management (which includes information such as costs, target audience, return on investment) and opportunity management.

The CRM technologies used by sales departments are used to coordinate the sales process, by helping salespeople organise their jobs, calendars, contacts, appointments, meetings and multimedia presentations. Essentially, it allows for the streamlining of the sales process.

4. How could a sales department use operational CRM technologies?

A sales department can use CRM technologies for a number of things:

• List generators, e.g. to find information a particular customers in a particular demographic.
• Campaign management.
• To know when and what to up-sell and cross-sell.

5. Describe business intelligence and its value to business.

Business intelligence refers to technologies that provide access to data for strategic decision making. It is a long-term tool that supports decision making. It is valuable to a business as it allows managers to find patterns and trends, and better respond to change in the dynamic business environment.

6. Explain the problem associated with business intelligence. Describe the solution to this business problem.

The problem associated with business intelligence is that businesses are data rich but information poor. The solution to this problem is business intelligence, which allows for better decision making and reduces latency.

7. What are two possible outcomes a company could get from using data mining?

Two benefits a business could get from data mining are:

• Better use of resources.
• More sales through being able to better market products based on the intelligence gained by data mining.

Week 9: Operations Management and the Supply Chain

1. Define the term operations management.

Operations Management is the management of the processes that transform inputs into outputs (goods and services); processes are efficient and productive in producing outputs.

2. Explain operations management's role in business.

Operations management is responsible for managing the core processes used to manufacture goods and produce services. Its role is varied, typical activities include forecasting, capacity planning, scheduling, managing inventory, assuring quality, motivating and training employees and locating facilities.

3. Describe the correlation between operations management and information technology.

There is a strong correlation between operations management (OM) and information technology, so much so that modern OM's could not do their jobs without IT. OM information systems allow managers to work out what resources will be needed and in what amounts, when the resources will be required, where the work will be performed, how resources will be allocated and who will perform the work.

4. Explain supply chain management and its role in business.

Supply chain management involves the management of information flows between an among stages in a supply chain to maximise total supply chain effectiveness and profitability. Supply chain management is important to a business as it allows it to become more efficient in its production of goods and services (better at turning inputs into outputs).

5. List and describe the five components of a typical supply chain.

The five components of a typical supply chain are:

• Supplier: supplies the raw materials (inputs).
• Manufacturer: turns raw materials into products (outputs).
• Distributor: obtains the products form the manufacturer in bulk and sells to retailers.
• Retailer: retailers sell the products to the customer.
• Customer: the customer is the end party in the supply chain.

E-commerce may lead to dis-intermediation, which would remove components from the supply chain (e.g. the distributor and retailer).

6. Define the relationship between information technology and the supply chain.

Information technology plays a significant role in the supply chain; it is relied on to make accurate decision regarding each step of the supply chain. Without IT businesses would be overcasting or undercasting. IT facilitates JIT (Just In Time) stock management systems. IT allows managers to know where specific stock is in the supply chain and can predict how much will be needed int he future.