The Women Entrepreneurs Blog @ Simon

Sometimes Entrepreneurs Need to Make Tough Choices

by Marita Greenidge

In February 2009, I sat in a lecture room at Simon, listening to a presentation from Andrea Marron, founder of Studio 28 Couture. (I wrote about her some time before. You can take a read here.) During that presentation, Andrea told a story of how she had to turn down a “fabulous” business opportunity. Her reason? It wasn’t in line with her long term business goals.

10 months later, I found myself in a similar situation. The opportunity was great, but I turned it down. Like Andrea I refused to sacrifice my long term business goals. 

I was asked to play a significant role in managing a very successful enterprise. This company had a proven world class product, which customers loved! The owner wanted to expand, and there was need for a team of people to facilitate this objective. That’s where I came in; I was seen as someone who could assist in executing the owner’s strategy.

My eyes were ablaze with excitement. Wow, me, Marita Greenidge, being offered this chance? I was ready to have the contract drawn up and sign on the dotted line.

After that initial excitement subsided, reality struck and logical thoughts began to flow.

Concern #1

This company was not operating in an area I was extremely passionate about. I’m a strong believer in doing what you love; it turns work into play.

Concern #2

I recently started a marketing consulting company with the goal of redefining marketing within Barbados and the wider Caribbean. My goal, my company, would disappear if I accepted this proposal. The owner guaranteed that my company would survive. However I did not think it was realistically possible to build 2 excellent enterprises in divergent industries.

Concern #3

Time: Working with my main client, the Barbados Entrepreneurs’ Venture Capital Fund offers an amazing blend of my passions – marketing and entrepreneurship. I advise the Fund on marketing strategies, as well as assist entrepreneurs seeking investment, with developing strategic marketing plans. Furthermore, I was recently inducted into the executive management team, and now I assist with the application screening process and other management related duties. This, as you imagine, requires quite a bit of time. Add to that the fact that I teach at our local University and participate in some local volunteer programmes. Also, the Barbados Entrepreneurs’ Venture Capital Fund is not my only client! Unless I was able to add more hours to the day, pursuing this new opportunity would not have been possible.

With these concerns, I returned to the owner of the enterprise and explained why I had to turn down the opportunity.

As an entrepreneur, many opportunities will arise before you, and with each one you have to weigh the pros and cons of pursuing. Overall, if an opportunity does not add value to your long term goal, it’s not worth it. (Consider what happens when a company drifts away from its mission.) Just remember that as long as you refuse to sacrifice quality in whatever you do, more opportunities will arise, so letting a few that aren’t a good fit slid won’t doom you.

 
*Many thanks to my mother and my mentor, Winston Moore, for entertaining my long conversations as I sought to make a smart business decision. Thanks to Andrea Marron for sharing a valuable story in decision-making.

Recruiting Talented Employees

by Lauren Dixon

Even in a challenging economy, it is vital to attract, recruit, and retain talent. While you might hear and read about a glut of workers in the marketplace, demand is always steady for outstanding workers - you can never have enough talent in your workplace. 

Internal and external recruiting strategies can help to identify key talent.

Your top performers internally are often the ideal candidates for other positions in your organization, and promoting them helps to boost morale, build loyalty, and grow your organization from within. Internal job postings and word of mouth can also aid an internal recruiting effort.

If you need to bring in new talent from the outside, tactics to drive external recruitment are critical. Be sure to adhere to any legal guidelines such as offering equal employment opportunities as well as any applicable federal and state laws that apply to your company.

Area educational institutions are a wonderful source of new talent, as are recruiters and government and community-based programs. Posting your job on web-based employment sites, radio and TV, and ads in newspapers is another recruitment method. A referral or bonus program for existing employees is an ideal tactic, offering a way to build a broad talent pool and attract top performers who will best fit your company's culture.

Recruitment is really only half the battle - retention is the other important piece in attracting and keeping talented workers. Once you have hired an employee, your onboarding process is will ensure that your new hire is happy and ready to start building a successful career at your organization.

My Impression of First Impressions

by Alyssa Gruber

School began in July, and I have since completed two classes and almost thirteen days of orientation. (MS Marketing and Finance students were required to attend a separate summer orientation along with the standard two-week session for the MBAs in the fall.)

Much of orientation was run by the CMC (Career Management Center) staff, who provided my classmates and I with a great deal of information and knowledge regarding various career paths as they relate to our individual likes, skills, and personality types. As for as the job search itself, we learned techniques for formatting resumes, drafting cover letters, and communicating during interviews.

The detail and thoroughness of these career classes opened my eyes to the number of factors associated with peoples’ capacity to survive and thrive in the business world. It’s scary to think of how a single grammatical error in an email to a potential employer could cost a person a job opportunity.

A topic that was highly emphasized and particularly caught my attention was on the importance of first impressions. Like it or not, first impressions are real, and they are often used in making assessments about others.

According to Malcolm Gladwell, author of Blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinking, the human brain takes two seconds to form an opinion of someone. He explains, “Snap judgments are, first of all, enormously quick: they rely on the thinnest slices of experience … they are also unconscious.” (p. 50)

That’s a nice little fact, but why bother teaching us about what’s beyond our control? To induce paranoia and self-doubt?

Studies done on the role of first impressions in the work place offer insight for ways to maximize one’s image in order to be attractively perceived.

Be punctual, have a firm handshake, make eye contact, and show interest. But politeness and tact only go so far.

Appearance is probably the largest contributor to the first impression process.

So, I guess all I have to do is dress well for people to like me, right?

Unfortunately, it’s not that simple. Dressing “well” falls under a broad spectrum, dependent on peoples’ preferences. However, business attire is relatively consistent, and wearing appropriate clothing for formal meetings is not easy to mess up.

I’m left with the assumption that physical features mainly influence first impressions, and since impressionistic judgments are generally subconscious, there’s not a lot that people can do to change them.

While first impressions may sometimes yield accurate judgments, people must realize that they can be misleading and hurtful as well.

Here are my views on how to deal with first impressions:

• Don’t focus on conforming strictly to the norm, and realize that you can’t impress everyone.  Be yourself, and understand that many people who count will like you and accept you for who you are.
  
• Rejection sucks, but a bad attitude is worse. Understand that people have their reasons for not wanting to establish a relationship with you, whatever those reasons may be. Let it go and move on. You know yourself better than anyone does, and as long as you take pride in your own accomplishments and aptitude, don’t get caught up in what a random stranger thinks of you based on a single encounter.
  
• Always keep an open mind. Whether you are looking to hire an employee or pick team members, remember to give them the benefit of the doubt. There’s more to a person than what meets the eye, and in some cases, the most amazing qualities of all can only be revealed through patience and time. The biggest treasures may be buried the deepest!
  
• A first impression is only a brief indicator of one’s personality and virtues. Stuff happens, and bad days are inevitable. A lousy first impression is no excuse for demonstrating second-rate behavior. Treat others as you wish to be treated.

Employees vs. Contractors - What's the Difference?

by Victoria Reynolds
 

Whether a person is an independent contractor or an employee generally depends on the amount of control exercised by the employer over the work being done. Dictating how a job is to be done or limiting the actions of the worker may establish an employer-employee relationship.

An independent contractor:

·       Operates under a business name

·       Has his/her own employees 

·       Maintains a separate business checking account

·       Advertises his/her business' services

·       Invoices for work done

·       Has more than one client

·       Has own tools and sets own hours 

·       Keeps business records 

An employee:

·       Performs duties dictated or controlled by others

·       Is given training for work to be done

·       Works for only one employer

The Internal Revenue Service relies on the facts in each case. It does not recognize the validity of any written agreement between the parties. Anyone can get a ruling from the IRS by completing Form SS-8.

For most small businesses, independent contractors should not be considered as substitutes for regular employees. Government agencies generally find that people in the work force are legally employees for tax purposes; the cost of being wrong, remitting unpaid payroll taxes, interest, and penalties can be very high.

Managing the actions of employees is a critical component of running a business. Knowing what to do with regards to hiring, motivating, directing, reprimanding, and even firing an employee is information a business owner should know. And don’t be shy!  Ask for help.

**SBA's participation in this blog does not constitute an endorsement of the William E. Simon Graduate School of Business Administration or any other person or entity. SBA's programs and services are provided to the public on a non-discriminatory basis.

When Business Gets Personal

by Judy Seil

Know your audience, know your customers, know your employees. It sounds like simple advice, but it could prove to be extremely helpful in both establishing and strengthening your business relationships and also expanding your firm and customer base.

Who doesn't like to walk into a restaurant, store or office and be recognized and greeted by name? Have you ever been in a situation in which you were trying to decide where to dine or shop, and you opted for the place with higher quality service rather than the one with cheaper prices? On many occasions, it's common for people to value service over cost.

Sometimes it doesn't come down to the cost of the product or service; a special personal touch may be the pivotal factor in securing business from a potential customer.

With that in mind, encourage your employees to be attentive and solicitous to your customers. Make sure to let your customers know that they are important to you if you want your business to be important to them.

In today's world of email, voice mail, texting, and twittering, the personal touch can be lost. Certainly dropping a quick note is efficient for setting up a meeting, but I can guarantee you a phone call or hand written note to your customer will be appreciated.

"A customer is the most important visitor on our premises, he is not dependent on us. We are dependent on him. He is not an interruption in our work. He is the purpose of it. He is not an outsider in our business. He is part of it. We are not doing him a favor by serving him. He is doing us a favor by giving us an opportunity to do so." Mahatma Gandhi

Technical Skills Are Overrated

  I know, I am always talking about my experiences with the school magazine, but running this small publication has taught me so much. And yes, I am about to share with you another one of the lessons I learned.

It was really Dennis’ post that got me thinking. He advised that an entrepreneur should “hire the right people”. Hmmm… what are the right people???

Before I came to business school, I thought hiring the right people meant hiring persons who had the right technical skills to accomplish the job. A few business classes and several magazine productions later, I am very sure this is not all it takes.

On the quest for a new employee, it is true that you want someone who has the technical ability required for the job. However, I’ve found that this alone is a poor basis for hiring. I’ve discovered that one's inherent characteristics, such as passion, reliability and the commitment to producing quality work, ultimately outweigh a seemingly perfect resume or list of acquired skills. (Though I must admit that the trade-off is harder the more high tech your business is.)

While people with such characteristics might not have the complete set of ideal skills you’re looking for, they’re willing to learn what they need to know in order to complete the job on a high quality level.

They care about what they produce and demand excellence of themselves in all tasks undertaken. If they say they’re going to do something, you can expect it will be done by the specified deadline. A big bonus is that driven and eager people tend to be highly ethical.

On the flip side, consider the person who has all the ability in the world but lacks that zeal; he/she is unreliable and cares about doing what needs to be done to a “satisfactory” level.

This person has ability but is not utilizing it to his or her full potential. By employing apathetic people, you waste time and energy motivating them to produce results.

Furthermore, such people are toxic to a team, especially when other team members take pride in their work, and these people are just scraping by on “satisfactory”.

The advice of this humble business school magazine editor?

Don’t only look at skill sets. Balance out your hiring standards, and consider peoples' personalities. Make sure they are intellectually competent. If they are, they can most likely be trained in the areas that need improvement.

And if they truly embody the qualities I mentioned earlier, they will approach that training with fervor and produce excellent results. We like excellent results, right?

It’s not about you!

There I sat writing an email inviting first year students at Simon to apply for leadership positions at WATS, the school magazine. Several members of my current team (including myself) do have to leave Simon so it’s probably a pretty good idea to find someone to fill our shoes.

I was going to be very thorough – I described the positions, the responsibilities, listed deadlines and application requirements. Of course I was done right? Nope! I sent the outline to my trusted Deputy Editor, Diana, for her insight and she asked one very simple, but important, question – why should I join WATS?? In all the fancy sections of my application notice I forgot to tell people why joining the WATS team would be beneficial to them, especially since running WATS is a lot of work and you don’t get paid.

There is a very useful point here – it’s not about you.

When you are trying to find the best people to fill your positions you need to clearly state what’s in the deal for them. The benefits of your company may be clearly obvious to you, but that may not be so to the average potential applicant. Outlaying these benefits is essential for entrepreneurs who may not have the funds to pay great employees huge sums, or a creative website that highlights the benefits of the company.

Remember people act to maximize their utility, which, beyond me dropping in some economic jargon, simply means that individuals do what they perceive as being in their best interest. They want to know that if they join you, it’s going to help them in some way – be it offering the opportunity to do that job they always wanted to do, add relevant content to their resume or gain experience in an area they think might be useful for their career. There are many things, but you need to let them know.

As you are trying to grab great people in this tumultuous economy, which apparently economists think will start to recover in September (we’ll see how true that one is), don’t forget to give them a reason to join the company.

And remember you don’t want just anyone who needs a job; you want someone that will do the job well. To get those kinds of people you need great incentives. Take a look at a short post I found on Seth Godin’s blog which states that it’s harder to hire great people in a tough economy. Wait -- hasn’t everyone else been telling you it’s easy because there are so many people floating around without jobs? Think quality, instead of quantity. Read the post and tell me what you think.

The Layoff Payoff

Have you been laid off from your job, or are you worried your position is subject to elimination?
If you answered, “Yes” to either question then you may be in luck.

For the open-minded and optimistic, an occupational “break” could be the catalyst for a rewarding, fulfilling, and exciting new career. It is time to control your fate instead of depending on employers who are caught up in their own game of survival. With a positive attitude and the will to succeed, you have the power to thrive in the recession and attain financial independence by capitalizing on your personal skills, talents, and interests.

So, fill up those half-empty glasses, ladies, because recess is over and it’s back to the drawing board! 

Word is that lousy job market conditions have already prompted laid-off workers nationwide to turn to their entrepreneurial instincts for salvation. A recent New York Times article cites this phenomenon as broached by Economists to be a natural reaction to withstand a slumping economy. Mark V. Cannice, executive director of the entrepreneurship program at the University of San Francisco, proposes that “…the large-scale downsizing from major companies will release a lot of new entrepreneurial talent and ideas — scientists, engineers, business folks now looking to do other things.” (Richtel and Wortham)

Let others’ accomplishments and stories encourage you, and check out how 29 people found their firing inspiring and profited from starting their own businesses.

Ready for more good news? There is no better period than the present to assume an entrepreneurial endeavor — even if it is recession induced. The advancement of computer technology makes everything from devising a business plan to marketing and distributing products and or services easy and affordable. 

Be sure to research thoroughly before undertaking your venture. Running a business is a big responsibility and planning is crucial for longevity and prosperity. There are countless resources and tools on the web that will help with your startup and maintenance processes. 

Tip of the Week - Hire Great People

During this economy, if there is one positive aspect, it is the abundance of very qualified people willing to work in a new start up or emerging enterprise. The key to building a successful organization is to hire great people. While that may sound trite, or obvious, it isn't.

I often wonder why companies don't spend more time hiring the right people. The right people are positive thinkers, upbeat, ethical and are of good character with an internal stake in the success of the organization. Our Dean at the Simon School, Mark Zupan recently distributed a copy the best seller: Good to Great by Jim Collins. I thought the book was wonderful because as a business owner, what I knew intuitively about hiring great people was reinforced by the many examples Collins offers in his text. A good portion of the book is devoted to leadership and the people equation.

Successful business owners recognize that their most important asset is not people but the right people. Take advantage of the downturn in the economy and if you are hiring use this opportunity to find the very best talent you can in the marketplace. They are out there; abundant, loyal and willing to work hard just for the opportunity. The recession could be viewed as an opportunity - an opportunity to engage the right people.

Ask the Entrepreneurs: Three Tips from My Father

[Note: Students in the Entrepreneurship program at Simon have submitted a number of questions and we encourage you to ask yours via the form on our Home/About page. We'll have one or more of our bloggers offer their takes — which should provide starting points for your thinking and more discussion.]

Question: What do you think are the 3 most critical skills a new business owner must have and why?

I will pass along the business advice that has served me well over the last 20 years. Now, understand that this advice came from my father who owned a trucking business for 40 years. He didn’t go to college … never took a business course, but Thomas Dixon was hugely successful in life in so many ways!

Here’s his advice: