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MY
APOLOGY |
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We work hard here to provide an informative
newsletter each month, and we try to keep a little humor in
it with the hope of bringing a smile to your face. It
was brought to my attention that in the April edition we had
a joke that can be offensive to some people.
I offer my most sincere apology to anyone who
was offended and wish to assure you we will work harder to
make certain this type of joke is not sent out again.
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INTERNET USE IN
THE uNITED STATES |
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Nearly 150 Million Adult Americans Use
Internet, Survey Says
Thursday,
April 27, 2006
NEW YORK — The U.S. online population has hit an all-time
high: 73 percent of adults, or 147 million, now use the
Internet.
The figures represent an increase from 66 percent, or 133
million adults, in January 2005, according to the
Pew
Internet and American Life Project.
But only 42 percent of all adults, or 84 million, have the
home
high-speed connections important for viewing
video and treating the Internet as an always-on reference.
Looking only at home Internet users, 62 percent have
broadband.
In a report Wednesday, Pew noted that Internet use still
varies with age and income.
Eighty-eight percent of adults under 30
go online,
compared with 32 percent for those age 65 and older.
Only 53 percent of adults in households earning less than
$30,000 a year use the Internet, compared with 91 percent in
households with annual income exceeding $75,000.
The telephone-based survey of 4,001 adults, conducted Feb.
15-April 6, has a margin of sampling error of plus or minus
2 percentage points.
Part of what
this means to the local business owner is you should be
cautious about the web company that wants to sell you Flash
or other web site designs that require broadband to view.
This is especially important if selling to consumers is part
of your business model. Remember, only 42% of adults
have broadband access.
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BRANDING - continued |
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This month we need to visit the non-look
aspects of branding, the part of branding so many people
avoid for one reason or another, or just don't think about
it.
How you do business, how you operate it, how
you treat customers and how you treat your employees defines
your brand as much or more as the look of your materials.
Many people get into business so they can "call the shots"
and make those tough decisions. Unfortunately, a high
percentage of these risk-taking people start their business
without any definition of how they will operate their
business so when things happen, a customer gets upset or an
employee does something inappropriate, there is no plan or
process to deal with the challenge.
No Plan - No Consistency!
We look at branding in two ways. First
is the Visible Branding which is what most
people recognize as the logo, the colors, the letterhead,
envelopes, business cards, flyers, web site and so forth.
This is the easy one to develop. The second one,
Operational Branding, is the most difficult
because a person has to spend time and energy reflecting on
this, writing it down, and thinking through what happens
if...
Operational Branding is how you
operate your business, day to day, regardless of whether the
situation is comfortable or uncomfortable. The first
step in defining your Operational Brand is to write a
Mission Statement for your company. Now comes the
difficult part; if you want to write a Mission Statement for
your company, you must first write one for YOU. Most
people start a business to support their personal
preferences of how to do business. It is a fact that a
business will reflect a business owner's personal values,
thoughts and philosophies, yet so many people don't do the
work to define and understand this fact.
Please take a minute and
study this graphic
that shows the process of developing your personal Mission
Statement and how it connects to your business Mission
Statement. Next month we will delve deeper
into the Operational Branding process.
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Advocacy Saves Small Business $6.6 Billion In FY 2005 |
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For Release: April 20, 2006
Contact: John McDowell, (202) 205-6941
john.mcdowell@sba.gov
SBA Number:
06-11 ADVO
Result Of The Voice Of Small Business Heard In Washington
WASHINGTON,
D.C. –
The Office of Advocacy, the "small business watchdog" of the
government, saved small business over $6.6 billion in fiscal
year 2005. By working with federal agencies to implement the
Regulatory Flexibility Act (RFA), Advocacy ensured the voice
of small business was heard in the regulatory process. That
effort resulted in rules which met their regulatory goals
while at the same time lessening the burden on small
business compared with the original proposals.
"The Office
of Advocacy is proud to live up to its reputation as a
fighter for American small business," said Chief Counsel for
Advocacy Thomas M.
Sullivan.
"When the voice of small business is heard in the regulatory
process better decisions are made and better rules are
written. By working closely with small business owners,
their representatives, and with federal agencies our staff
showed that one-size-fits-all rules are not the best
solution. Our cost savings show that many times original
proposed rules can impose unintended costs on America’s
innovative, job-creating small businesses."
The $6.6
billion in foregone regulatory cost savings by small
business are outlined in the Report on the Regulatory
Flexibility Act, FY 2005,
( http://www.sba.gov/advo/laws/flex/05regflx.pdf)
released today by the Office of Advocacy.
The report
also highlights other Advocacy accomplishments in RFA
compliance and compliance with President Bush’s Executive
Order 13272, which mandates additional agency actions to
limit the impact of proposed rules on small business. These
accomplishments include:
- An
additional $966 million in annual recurring savings for
small entities.
-
Twenty-one agency training seminars focusing on how to
comply with the RFA and EO 13272.
- Two dozen
comment letters submitted to agencies by Advocacy, outlining
how compliance with the RFA would result in better rules and
reduce burdens on small business.
Advocacy
research shows that the smallest of businesses annually
spend
$7,647 per
employee to comply with all federal regulations. That is 45
percent more than the $5,282 per employee spent by firms
with 500 employees or more.
The Office
of Advocacy, the "small business watchdog" of the
government, examines the role and status of small business
in the economy and independently represents the views of
small business to federal agencies, Congress, and the
President. It is the source for small business statistics
presented in user-friendly formats and it funds research
into small business issues.
For more
information and a full copy of the report, visit the Office
of Advocacy website at
www.sba.gov/advo.
###
The Office
of Advocacy of the U.S. Small Business Administration (SBA)
is an independent voice for small business within the
federal government. The presidentially appointed Chief
Counsel for Advocacy advances the views, concerns, and
interests of small business before Congress, the White
House, federal agencies, federal courts, and state policy
makers. For more information, visit
www.sba.gov/advo,
or call (202) 205-6533.
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WHO NOT THE DO |
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After years of research and observation I've seen so many
companies hire people who don't fit their business culture.
A recent study by Leadership IQ states "46% of newly
hired employees will fail within the first 18 months.
Only 19% will be successful and the remaining 35% will fall
somewhere in the mediocre center".
The study goes on to say
"Contrary to popular belief, technical skills are not the
primary reason new hires fail. Instead, poor
interpersonal skills dominate the list". These
all-important skills were missed in the interviewing
process.
The study followed 5,247
hiring managers from 312 different businesses and
organizations and approximately 20,000 hired employees so it
is not some remote group of people involved.
Part of this issue is that
interviewers tend to use technical skill evaluations and
interviews because they are easy. Unfortunately, like
most easy things in life, the real benefit comes if there is
work involved. In the following months you will be
reading more about the "Who Not The Do" which is my
title for it is more important of who you are than what you
do to make your business a success. We will address
many of the behavior traits that make businesses work or
fail.
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SMALL
BUSINESS CONTINUES TO DRIVE OUR JOBS |
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The Office of Advocacy funded U.S. Census Bureau
data tracking firm births, closures and job creation
by firm size for 2002 to 2003 has been updated.
The data show 612,296 firm births and 540,648 firm
closures during the period. Firms with fewer than
20 employees added 1.6 million net new jobs, firms
with 20 to 499 employees added 400,000 net new jobs
and firms with 500 or more employees lost 1 million
net jobs.
Should you need further information, please feel
free to contact Brian Headd at (202) 205-6533 or
advocacy@sba.gov.
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TECH
CORNER |
As promised last month, here are some
"Did You Know" items for Outlook.
Outlook has a
pretty cool task – or “to-do list” – feature.
You can create a task and assign it to someone else via
email.
You can create recurring tasks.
Did you know that you can set reminders
on any task and as long as Outlook is open, you’ll
receive a pop up reminder?
When the reminder pops up did you know
you can set it for “snooze” and be reminded again?
One of the
coolest features of Outlook is the Notes section…
Similar to the little yellow stickies found on and
around most of our desks, you can use this for personal
or miscellaneous information, like a list of your
favorite wines, or movie titles that someone
recommends.
You can also enter data with a live url
link which will take you to that web site. Like online
banking url with my username and password stored on the
same Note record.
Outlook
Archiving
Outlook has an archiving system that can be
customized to perform at whatever frequency you’d like.
This will take all your old messages and
calendar items and store them in a different location
within your system to free-up space with your Outlook
folders.
You can refer to the archived items
easily and any time you need to.
We would like to thank Barb at TeamBTS for providing
the articles each month. To learn more about
TeamBTS just visit their web site at
www.TeamBTS.com.
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some
smiles |
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RAILROADS
DOES THE STATEMENT, "WE'VE ALWAYS DONE IT THAT WAY..."
RING ANY BELLS...?
The US standard railroad gauge (distance between the rails)
is 4 feet, 8.5 inches. That's an exceedingly odd number.
Why was that gauge used?
Because that's the way they built them in England, and
English expatriates built the US Railroads.
Why did the English build them like that?
Because the first rail lines were built by the same people
who built the pre-railroad tramways, and that's the gauge
they used.
Why did "they" use that gauge then?
Because the people who built the tramways used the same jigs
and tools that they used for building wagons, which used
that wheel spacing.
Okay! Why did the wagons have that particular odd wheel
spacing?
Well, if they tried to use any other spacing, the wagon
wheels would break on some of the old, long distance roads
in England, because that's the spacing of the wheel ruts.
So who built those old rutted roads?
Imperial Rome built the first long distance roads in Europe
(and England) for their legions. The roads have been used
ever since.
And the ruts in the roads?
Roman war chariots formed the initial ruts, which everyone
else had to match for fear of destroying their wagon wheels.
Since the chariots were made for Imperial Rome, they were
all alike in the matter of wheel spacing.
The United States standard railroad gauge of 4 feet, 8.5
inches is derived from the original specifications for an
Imperial Roman war chariot. And bureaucracies live forever.
So the next time you are handed a spec and told we have
always done it that way and wonder what horse's ass came up
with that, you may be exactly right, because the Imperial
Roman war chariots were made just wide enough to accommodate
the back ends of two war horses.
Now the twist to the story...
When you see a Space Shuttle sitting on its launch pad,
there are two big booster rockets attached to the sides of
the main fuel tank. These are solid rocket boosters, or SRBs.
The SRBs are made by Thiokol at their factory in Utah. The
engineers who designed the SRBs would have preferred to make
them a bit fatter, but the SRBs had to be shipped by train
from the factory to the launch site.
The railroad line from the factory happens to run through a
tunnel in the mountains. The SRBs had to fit through that
tunnel. The tunnel is slightly wider than the railroad
track, and the railroad track, as you now know, is about as
wide as two horses' behinds.
So, a major Space Shuttle design feature of what is arguably
the world's most advanced transportation system was
determined over two thousand years ago by the width of a
horse.
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GregG@BusinessResourceSystems.com
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