Successful Blog

How to cook with rocks

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I had an opportunity to chat with an internal leadership team for a major brand recently. Intrepreneurism is a strategic way of building teams and initiatives across departments, even within a heavily siloed corporate structure or hierarchy. That’s a lot of buzzwords for a weekend.

By sharing with them my experiences in building WWDF, I was able to help draw analogies between risk taking, building consensus and collaboration, even if you’re not launching your own business. It may be even more difficult to be a risk taker or ripple maker in a corporate environment, as one of the foundational strengths of a corporation is people and departments working within a singular vision.

Loose cannons and rabble rousers can upset the status quo and detract from forward motion in some instances.

That said, the parable of Stone Soup is applicable when building teams, regardless of whether or not you’re a bootstrapped start up or a megolithic behemoth. If you’re not familiar, the story of stone soup is based on the experiences of a hungry stranger, who, upon being told that there was nothing for him to eat in town, helped the villagers cook a pot of delicious stew (in spite of themselves and using ingredients provided by the aforesaid villagers).

Common elements to when building teams:

• Define a common task or goal
• Communicate the benefits of a successful outcome to all parties
• Help individuals identify their gifts or contributions
• Give them the opportunity to make a difference
• Share the credit and the glory

One of the questions after my presentation had to do with “dealing with difficult people.” It may seem Pollyanna of me, but my answer was to come to the table assuming that everyone wanted to be there. When operating from a perspective of contribution from the outset, you have the opportunity to set the tone for the entire initiative.

Cooking with rocks can be done. It’s all in your recipe. Have you ever experienced resourcefulness or a successful team-building venture? How did you do it?

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Molly Cantrell-Kraig is a woman with drive. Possessing an innate sense of purpose and a pragmatic, solution-based approach to empowering people, she fused these two traits in order to establish Women With Drive Foundation. Based upon its founder’s personal history, Women With Drive Foundation is a means through which Cantrell-Kraig may effect change on both a micro and macro level. By providing women with something as essential as personal transportation in order to transition them from poverty to prosperity, she, through Women With Drive Foundation, seeks to empower women to help them help themselves. Through this action, the individual applicant benefits, as does society as a whole. Follow Molly on twitter as @mckra1g or @WWDr1ve (Women With Drive).

Are You in Business to Succeed or Fail?

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Going into business  for yourself can certainly be viewed as a dicey proposition.

If you are currently employed under the watch of someone else, do you leave the salary, benefits, etc. to venture off on your own? If you do, is it in the back of your head that a high percentage of small businesses fail within the first five years? Lastly, do you have the required drive and available funds to make it through the toughest of times?

With a national unemployment rate of still more than 8 percent, it should not come as a surprise that many people are taking that chance, that chance where they can potentially make something out of nothing and turn a business profit.

As someone who has gone through a pair of corporate layoffs over the last six years, it has become more and more apparent to me that job security for the most part is a thing of the past.

Unlike many of our parents who worked for one company most of their lives, many of us today sport resumes that list a couple of employers, even a half dozen or more in many cases.

Starting your own business can be downright scary, however the rewards can be downright impressive. Yes, the financial rewards are important, but what about that feeling of satisfaction that you built something from nothing and made it work?

While there are courses and coaches that can help the prospective small business man or woman, there is really nothing better than those firsthand experiences.

Yes, you will hit some bumps in the road, perhaps many. Yes, you will question your decision to start a small business at 3 a.m. when your loved ones and neighbors are asleep. Yes, you will sometimes, many oftentimes, wonder if leaving that comfortable corporate check every two weeks was really worth it.

Being someone who has given more and more thought to starting his own content writing business in recent months, I can simply say that I would never discourage someone from pursuing their business dreams.

None of us can say with certainty what the small business climate will be like a year from now, let alone a few months down the road.

If you start a small business and it ends up not turning out the way you wanted, never forget the fact that you tried.

In the end, isn’t trying to succeed at whatever you choose what life is about in the first place?

Photo credit: ehow.com

Dave Thomas has more than 20 years’ experience as a writer, covering news, sports marketing, SEO, press releases, social media and more. You’ll find Dave at: http://www.examiner.com/news-in-san-diego/dave-thomas

 

Fitch Ratings: Corporate Bankruptcies to Double in 2012

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Given that 2011 was a difficult year for many in the business community, a recent report from Fitch Ratings will not exactly bestow confidence on many corporate heads.

Fitch recently reported that it expects the volume and size of corporate bankruptcies will double this year.

According to one bankruptcy attorney, “2011 wasn’t a huge restructuring year. A lot of companies found short-term fixes, but when things don’t get better you need a restructuring to find a long-term fix.”

The recent Fitch prediction notes that while restructuring is not a given to lead to bankruptcy, defaults among all corporate bonds will increase to approximately 3 percent over the next 12 months, an uptick from 1.4 percent last year and 1.3 percent in 2010.

Among the better-known companies to file for bankruptcy in 2011 were:

  • American Airlines – At the time of the filing, AA reported it was some $29.6 billion in debt and had $24.7 in assets;
  • Borders Group – At onetime the nation’s second-largest book retailer, the company filed for bankruptcy back in February, with Barnes & Noble reaping some of the benefits from its rival’s actions;
  • Integra Bank – The Indiana-based banker had operations in three states and reported assets of $2.42 billion;
  • PMI Group – The California-based private mortgage insurer was the nation’s third largest;
  • MF Global – This was the most notable Wall Street firm to go down since Lehman Brothers three years earlier.

Fitch believes going forward that businesses carrying a large amount of high-yield and low-grade CCC bonds will be at the greatest risk.

According to the ratings agency, middle market companies (anywhere from $200 million to $1 billion) are most apt to be candidates for bankruptcy given the fact that it is more difficult for them to track down ways of refinancing.

Lastly, Fitch expects the restaurant, retail and consumer products firms to have the worst showing over the next 12 months.

For those businesses, small or large that are looking to avoid a bankruptcy filing in 2012, keep a few factors in mind:

  • Have an ironclad investor strategy – While the first round of funding may be relatively easy to come by, where will the second, third and so on come from? Be sure you have a Plan B, Plan C etc. so that you are not left with gaping holes in your revenue stream;
  • Obtain a small business loan – Small business loans prove effective over more traditional means of obtaining capital. Along with a quick processing time, you can avoid the requirement of providing any form of collateral given the fact the loan is provided solely on the basis of your credit card sales history;
  • Know your limits – While many of us still have that “borrow today, pay back when we can” attitude, it can get a business owner in a heap of trouble. Make sure you know your financial limits as a business owner so that you can avoid digging yourself too big of a hole to climb out of.

No business owner ever wants to hear the ‘B’ word, but being prepared for it just in case is a sound business move.

Dave Thomas, who covers among other items starting a small business , writes extensively for Business.com, an online resource destination for businesses of all sizes to research, find, and compare the products and services they need to run their businesses.