Strengths and Weaknesses of Small Business Owners

Introduction

According to Wikipedia,   a small business varies widely around the world. Small businesses are normally privately owned corporations, partnerships, or sole proprietorships. What constitutes "small" in terms of government support and tax policy varies by country and by industry, ranging from fewer than 15 employees under the Australian Fair Work Act 2009, 50 employees in the European Union, and fewer than 500 employees to qualify for many U.S. Small Business Administration programs,

Externally (strengths)

Small businesses are more or less the same within the same industry when you look from the outside because they employ a similar way to operate a business.  

·         Business model: There are able to copy and imitate how other successful entities operate a business in a particular industry. They sell more or less the same products, using the same channel to reach consumers. They advertise where others do.  They have their own logo, a registered trademark, a website, and a Facebook present. For those workers that are in contact with customers, they wear a smart uniform.  Smart business owners choose cash term to do business transactions. 

Internally (weaknesses)

However, the weaknesses of small business owners cannot be noticed by an outsider.

Here are some of the shortfalls:

   

·         Hire their own people: Usually, it is family-owned. They hire their family members and relatives to work for them. They may not get the best people to run the business and their growth is restricted.  Worse still they may not be able to manage the business properly. 

·         No clear vision: They usually jump on the bandwagon and follow the current business trend. There is no creativity to differentiate their brand from others. Usually, there is no long-range planning.

·         No system in place: They do not do a budget or cash flow projection. There is no internal control such as stock. There are few written rules and regulations for staff to follow or operating procedures.

·         Not valuing the people who work for them: Staff get the minimum benefits from their owners. There is not much training or development, but they are the ones who are in close contact with customers. There is no clear career path and you don’t expect the owners to raise your pay without you asking for it because there is no staff evaluation or performance assessment.

Conclusion (the way to go forward)

If the owners are able to hire people more capable than themselves, they will prosper. They will definitely grow much faster with a proper management system. They will build a better brand in the marketplace if they care more about their workers.   


Related post:
7 Things to Consider Before You Start a Business of Your Own

7 Things to Consider Before You Start a Business of Your Own

Operating your own business is a great way to earn a living.  You are the boss and you can do it your way. There are a few things to look into in order to do it successfully:

     

1.       Business sense and plan: You have to come up with an idea and convert it into products or services.  You need a business plan to market your products or services. It has to be better than others to survive in this competitive world. Is your business viable? Will there be a demand for your goods or services?  Do things you are good at and enjoy doing. If you are good at cooking, do you want to start a restaurant business?

2.    Sufficient fund: Do an operating budget and forecast your revenue and estimate your expenses in relation to expected income. You need sufficient funds to carry out your business smoothly. How much capital do you need initially to equip your restaurant with furniture, kitchen equipment, and utensils?

3.     Positive ways to do your business:  On a day-to-day basis, do what is important.  Take action immediately as planned.  Think positive and be confident.  Be passionate about your business. Focus and avoid distractions.  Perseverance and persistence are important factors for a successful venture. Be alert to business trends and stay ahead by continuous learning. Work, make mistakes, and be wiser.  Be resourceful and creative to solve problems. Get help if necessary.

4.       Focus on the business, not the money: Pay attention to your business, your products, or services and how you can serve the customers better and the money will take care of itself.  Give what your customers want and you will get what you want eventually.

5.    Hardworking: Working smart is not enough, you have to operate your business on a regular basis and gain the trust of your customers over time.

6.    Be flexible: Review your business performance from month to month. Be sensitive to business conditions and adjust accordingly. 

7.       Location: Look for a place with a heavy flow of traffic. As in a food business, a corner shop lot is always good as a catering outlet. 

Get your business started, start small, learn and expand.


Related article:

7 Positive Ways to do Your Part-Time Business

10 Positive Attitudes to Get Things Done Productively

The key to get things done is to adopt the right mental attitude. When your thinking is right, you will act accordingly and do what is right.

1. Quality: Doing quality work is the main aim and the right attitude to get things done. It is not necessary to be perfect but go for excellence by doing the best you can. Provide value and substance in what you do.

 2. Integrity: Be honest and do what is right. Do not succumb to bribery or threats to do otherwise. You walk tall when your conscience is clear.

3. Be focused: You work with concentration when you like what you do and you enjoy the process of doing it. Develop an interest in what you do.

4. Learning: You may be competent, but you have to do continuous learning to stay up-to-date. To learn new ways of doing things is to be more effective and productive. It is the only way to stay ahead.

5. Innovation: Challenge yourself to do the usual things differently. To change is to seek improvement. It is an ongoing process.

6. Pride: Be confident of yourself and be proud of what you do. Feel good about your talents and expertise.

7. Avoid small staff and distractions: Stay organized and do what is important. Avoiding distractions and ignoring minor issues is an effective way to get things done productively.

8. Enthusiasm: Are you passionate about what you do? Are you interested in your work? Do you wake up in the morning and eager to get things done? You work with your heart and soul when you are enthusiastic about what you do.

 9. Be energetic: To work with energy and zest is to be fit and healthy. Regular exercise is the way to promote energy, alertness, and calm.

10. Create trust and authority: When you work diligently and get the right things done, you will, over time, gain trust and authority from others.

The secret of getting things done is to act! ~ Dante Alighieri

5 Ways to Achieve Greatness

Be not afraid of greatness: some are born great, some achieve greatness, and some have greatness thrust upon them. ~William Shakespeare

Successful and famous people are remembered for what they do for mankind. Here are some of them: Thomas Edison, Mother Teresa, Bill Gates, Helen Keller, Shakespeare, Beethoven, Alexander Graham Bell, Napoleon, George Washington, Columbus, Albert Einstein, Gandhi, Abraham Lincoln, and Louis Pasteur.

Do not worry about what you can do. You can do something in your own way to attain greatness. Here are the ways to do it:

1. Think possible: You are limited by what you think you can do. You never know what you can do until you do it. Don’t give excuses to yourself. Be positive and go ahead and do it.

2. Think big and aim high: Be ambitious and break out of your comfort zone. Go to uncharted territory. Go beyond what you can do to achieve greatness. Set a big goal and go for it.

3. Be clear: What can you do to contribute to society? What do you want others to remember you by? Think of something you want to do and it is meaningful to you and useful to others.

4. Be passionate be enthusiastic: Enjoy what you do and respond to events positively. Accept setbacks and failures as challenges. Be Focused. Do you work every day and be down-to-earth. Do what you should do and do not think of what you can get. When you give your best, the rest will take care of itself.

5. Perseverance: Achieving greatness is a continuous journey in life. There is no destination. Working consistently and persistently is the way to go. It is about working hard and working smart over a long period of time.

To achieve greatness is to reach your highest potential.

10 Productive Ways to Increase Traffic to Your Blog

TRAFFIC

According to Blogpulse, there are more than 165 million blogs on the Net. To attract readers to your blog, you need to do things productively and market your blog and content vigorously.

1. Blog about what you know: Write about things that you are interested in and passionate about. Write on subjects that you are knowledgeable about and good at. This is to develop and build your authority and trust over time as you write more and more articles.

2. Be productive and get ready articles in advance: How many articles do you have right now ready to be posted: one, two or seven? The more articles you have in hand the better it is. The most important thing is that you want to avoid interruption in your posting schedule. When you, as an example, post an article a day, you have to keep to your schedule even when you are not writing when you are on holiday or unwell. Another thing is that you do not want to meet a posting deadline and write your article in a hurry and under stress at the expense of quality. An article needs to be written in a few sessions from gathering ideas, writing the actual article and proofreading it.

3. Use Scoop.it to notify major social networking sites: An effective way to promote your article as soon as it is posted is to use scoop.it to notify major social networking sites such as Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn. According to Alexa, more than 46% of my traffic source is from Facebook (upstream site).

4. Join blog carnivals to get inbound links: When you have a new article posted, another productive thing to do is to submit your post and participate in relevant blog carnivals. You will gain new visitors to your site. Incidentally the more links you get from blog carnivals the higher will be your Technorati Authority Rank.

5. Submit original articles to article directories and do guest posting for more inbound link: There are two more ways to get more traffic to your site. Send you original articles to Ezinearticles with a link in each article to your site. Readers will read your articles and then follow the link and land on your site. The other effective way is to do guest posting on other sites and attract readers who have never been to your site.

6. Comments on other blogs and participate in forums: Constructive comments on other sites are a good way to attract the blog owners’ attention to visit your site. Taking part in forums to offer solutions to problems is also an effective way to get others to notice you and visit your site.

7. Post consistently and regularly to your site: To sustain blog traffic, you need to post articles consistently and regularly like operating a retail outlet. Business must go on in order to keep your customers.

8. Keep on learning about blogging tips: There are always new things to learn in the blogosphere. Keep learning to stay ahead and be ahead. Learn and employ methods that are effective to attract visitors to your sites.

9. Display your Traffic Rank and PageRank widgets: Your Traffic Rank and PageRank are good measurements of your popularity, authority and trust. The higher the ranking of your site, the more influential will be your site and the easier it is to attract visitors.

10. Blog directories: submit your blog to blog directories. It is another way to promote your blogs and get other bloggers to visit your site.

To stay productive, focus on activities that bring you the results.

10 Effective Ways to Create a Positive First Impression of your Blog

According to BlogPulse, there are more than 164 million blogs in the blogosphere. Therefore, a visitor only spends a few seconds to look at your blog and decide to stay or move on. In order to create a good first impression in such a short time and attract the attention of your readers, here are the most important things to create a positive first impression quickly:

1. Know your niche at a glance: A visitor must know at a glance what your blog is all about without thinking. Tell in just a few words what you are blogging about.

2. White background: Avoid dark background to turn people off. Your blog should be aesthetically pleasing to the eyes and use fonts that are easy to read.

3. Allow a visitor to get what he or she wants easily and immediately: Don’t make a visitor think what to do next in order to read one of your posts. It has to be there right in front of the visitor. It is also important that your articles are written in bullets points and with keywords highlighted. Avoid putting ads inside an article. Don’t make a reader scroll to many pages to read one post just for your own purposes. Readers come first.

4. Your “About” and “Contact” pages: It should be above the fold so that a visitor can get to know more about you easily and contact you if necessary. Your photo should be in the “About” page.

5. Fewer ads: When you put ads everywhere, It is an indication that you are more interested in yourself to make money rather than looking after the interest of the readers. In the end, you don’t get what you want because you don’t give the readers what they want.

6. Easy to navigate: Make it very easy for visitors to go about your blog and attract them to stay longer.

7. No pop-ups: Do not interrupt and distract a visitor reading your article by trying to get their e-mail address with a pop-up. Readers will willingly subscribe to your RSS feed or give you their email addresses when they find your site interesting.

8. Provide a list of your popular posts: This is the way to attract a visitor to stay longer with more interesting posts to read.

9. Interact: It is essential to accept comments from visitors so that you can get ideas from them and build rapport.

10. Social media: Are there links to allow readers to connect and communicate with you easily at your Facebook and Twitter pages?

What are the other effective ways to create a positive first impression of your blog to visitors?

7 Positive Ways to Deal with Failures

Success is ninety-nine percent failure. ~Soichiro Honda

Failures in life are inevitable. We can’t always make the right move. What can you do when you encounter failures? Deal with them positively:

1. Don’t blame others: Accept a failure as your own doing. If you blame others, you will not look at yourself critically and identify your own mistakes. Be courageous to accept it; people will respect you for your truthfulness and sincerity.

2. Analyze: Do a post mortem and find out what actually has gone wrong. Is it possible to avoid it? Find out how you can work smarter to avoid making the same mistakes.

3. Learn valuable lessons: React to every failure as a valuable lesson to be learnt. Meeting failures are better than inaction. There is no progress without trying.

Failure is instructive. The person who really thinks learns quite as much from his failures as from his successes. ~John Dewey

4. Do it another way: You will be a lot wiser and avoid making mistakes that you have made in the past. You will do things differently and the chances are that you will be more likely to be successful.

Remember the two benefits of failure. First, if you do fail, you learn what doesn't work; and second, the failure gives you the opportunity to try a new approach. ~Roger Von Oech

Failure is simply the opportunity to begin again, this time more intelligently. ~Henry Ford


5. Be Optimistic: Do not allow failures to dampen your spirits and avoid negative emotions such as fear, anxiety, anger, anguish, and disappointment. Failures are not the end of the world. Bounce back and be hopeful that things will eventually work out alright.


Success is not final, failure is not fatal: it is the courage to continue that counts. ~Winston Churchill

6. Failures are the stepping stones to success: To fail is to learn and improve. To succeed is to keep trying.

You always pass failure on the way to success. ~Mickey Rooney

7. Don’t dwell on failures: Don’t allow failures to hold you back. Start a new day with a new beginning. Go ahead in life confidently.

There is no failure except in no longer trying. ~Elbert Hubbard


It's fine to celebrate success but it is more important to heed the lessons of failure. ~Bill Gates

7 Advantages to Continue Working When You Retire

According to an article, As First Baby Boomers Retire, Many Facing Personal Finance Disasters, more than 10,000 baby boomers a day have turned 65 since January 2011, a pattern that will continue for the next 19 years. However, 60% of baby boomers don’t have enough for retirement. What can you do to fortify your financial independence and make ends meet? The only viable solution is to continue working. There are several benefits when you delay your retirement:

1. Work longer, less time to retire: When you continue to work, you trade off your retirement years. It means you will need less money to spend when you finally retire.

2. A Source of income: There is a source of income when you work. It means you can continue to live the usual lifestyle without dipping into your retirement fund.

3. More savings: When you work, part of your income will go to save as budgeted. The longer you work, the more you will save and the more interest you will be able to earn and accumulate. This will be a new source of a fund when you do retire.

4. Less retirement fund is required: Since you have shortened your retirement years, you will need fewer funds for your retirement and you also have additional funds to cushion future inflation.

5. Meaningful life: Work gives you meaning in life when you enjoy what you do. You are confident of yourself and look at life with a brighter perspective.

6. Happiness: You feel good about yourself because you are leading useful life-giving useful services and at the same time you are self-supporting.

7. Better health: A change in lifestyle may be bad for your health. There will be emptiness if you do not fill your time with useful things to do. When you work, your mind is working and alert. More likely than not, your working life will be good for your health mentally and physically.

It is a blessing when you have reached your retirement age and you still can hold on to a job that you like and enjoy because the unemployment rate in America is still very high today at 9.2 in June 2011

10 Positive Words to Motivate You (Part 5)

Here are 10 more words to inspire you to live life positively:

1. Joy: To get joy out of life is to live in the moment totally, do what you like, and enjoy what you do. Do not allow the past to come into the picture and do not think of the future. To be in the present is the greatest joy you can get.

There is joy in work. There is no happiness except in the realization that we have accomplished something. ~Henry Ford

2. Kindness: When you are good to others, you feel good yourself. Look for the good in others and pay a compliment. Smile at people you meet. These small gestures light up the life of others and delight your life as well.

Kind words do not cost much. Yet they accomplish much. ~Blaise Pascal

A laugh, to be joyous, must flow from a joyous heart, for without kindness, there can be no true joy. Thomas Carlyle

3. Knowledge: It is essential to possess the knowledge, but it is more important to apply what you know to what you do. The aim is to be more productive.

Today knowledge has power. It controls access to opportunity and advancement.
~Peter Drucker

4. Learning: To be ahead and to stay ahead, you have to learn continuously. Life is changing and you have to make changes with time or you will be left behind.

The purpose of learning is growth, and our minds, unlike our bodies, can continue growing as we continue to live. ~Mortimer Adler

Learning is like rowing upstream: not to advance is to drop back. ~Chinese Proverb

5. Life: You create your own life. First, you create the life you want in your mind and then you live the life you have conceived in your mind. The most important thing is to think positively so that you will live life with confidence and full of hope.

The purpose of life is a life of purpose. ~Robert Byrne

Life is the sum of all your choices. ~Albert Camus



6. Listening: To listen is to appreciate, show interest and respect the person speaking to you. The key is to listen carefully and avoid misunderstanding. Observe body language for additional clues.

We have two ears and one mouth so that we can listen twice as much as we speak. ~Epictetus

The most important thing in communication is to hear what isn't being said. ~Peter F. Drucker

7. Longevity: It is good to live longer, but it is even better to be fit, healthy, and financially independent to enjoy a long life.

If you ask what is the single most important key to longevity, I would have to say it is avoiding worry, stress, and tension. And if you didn't ask me, I'd still have to say it. ~George Burns

8. Love: Love is positive emotion; it gives you peace of mind and a good feeling inside out with many health benefits.

Being deeply loved by someone gives you strength while loving someone deeply gives you courage. ~Lao Tzu

Let us always meet each other with a smile, for the smile is the beginning of love.
~Mother Teresa

Love is life. And if you miss love, you miss life. ~Leo Buscaglia

9. Luck: I must say that you create your own luck by how much you have prepared yourself to be lucky Work fervently on the things that you believe in and luck will follow you.

The only thing that overcomes hard luck is hard work. ~Harry Golden

10. Motivation: Be inspired and be motivated to work hard and smart. Success can only be attained by exerting great effort over a long period of time. You will not treasure things that you can get easily and without working for them. You will only enjoy the fruit of your labor.

Desire is the key to motivation, but it's the determination and commitment to an unrelenting pursuit of your goal - a commitment to excellence - that will enable you to attain the success you seek. ~Mario Andretti

The words of truth are simple. ~Aeschylus

10 Positive words to Motivate You (Part 1)
10 Positive words to Motivate You (Part 2)
10 Positive words to Motivate You (Part 3)
10 Positive words to Motivate You (Part 4)
10 Positive Words to Motivate You (Part 6 and Final)

7 Effective Ways to be Successful

Always bear in mind that your own resolution to succeed is more important than any other.
~Abraham Lincoln

My son has just been admitted to a polytechnic in Singapore. I believe and I have confidence in him that he will graduate with flying colors because he has the 7 ingredients to achieve his main aim:

1. Know clearly what you want: My son is inspired by the world of IT. He is thrilled and excited by the rapid advancement of technologies. It is his passion. He is deeply interested and he aspires to achieve greatness in the field of computer science. Do you know what you want in life? Discover your inspiration and aspiration. Find out what you are good at and go for it.

Success is the progressive realization of predetermined, worthwhile, personal goals.
~Paul J. Meyer

2. Aim high: My son wants to be admitted to a prestigious university in Singapore after getting his diploma in IT. Aim high to achieve attainable goals with determination. A goal that can be gained without much effort is not worthwhile and meaningful. You will only treasure and appreciate success by working hard, excerpting great effort, encountering difficulties, and working for a long time.

3. Work on it every day: He attends classes, takes great pain to do his assignments, and works seriously because he is keeping his goal in view. Have you got the plan and are you working on it every day? It is the daily effort that leads to your weekly, monthly, and yearly goals.

Success is dependent on effort. ~Sophocles

Success is simple. Do what's right, the right way, at the right time. ~Arnold H. Glasow

4. Making progress: He has obtained high grades in all his assignments and tests. He is getting the desired results. He is doing things right. In fact, he wants to be the top student in the course that he is pursuing. What you can conceive and believe, you can achieve. Do you measure your performance from time to time? Are you making progress? Do you need to make changes in order to be on the right track?

5. A healthy lifestyle: We have reminded him to eat healthily, avoid junk food and sugary drinks. He needs energy by eating nutritious food. He also needs to exercise more often, sleep early and sufficiently and take breaks during the day. A fit and healthy body are essential to study or work energetically with a calm mind and concentration.

6. A positive mindset: My son is cheerful and friendly. He takes responsibility for what he does. He makes mistakes, but he reacts positively. In life, the things that are happening to you are not important but it is imperative that you react with a positive mindset. Solving problems instead of dwelling on them is the right attitude.

7. Getting connected: He has a great social supporting system. He has a mentor, a university graduate, and a teacher, who supports and inspires him greatly. It is important to be connected to the right people to get ideas and to synergize and achieve greater success in life.

If you want to achieve things in life, you've just got to do them, and if you're talented and smart, you'll succeed. ~Juliana Hatfield

Related post: How To Be More Successful

To Blog Is To Give and Receive

For it is in giving that we receive. ~ St. Francis of Assisi


Blogging is like banking, there is no withdrawal without deposit and in life, you cannot get what you want without giving others what they want.

Give (Action)

The way to give is to provide a quality site by writing quality and relevant articles for the consumption of readers. Optimize your site and use the right keywords in your articles to facilitate search engines to locate relevant articles of yours:

1. Accurate information: Research the subject well and get the facts right. The key is to provide readers with accurate and precise information.

2. Each article stands by itself: Each article is unique or it provides additional insight into the same topics in addition to previous articles. It is to avoid writing duplicating, overlapping or redundant articles.

3. Meticulous: Take good care of grammar, spelling and punctuation in every article. Make it easy for the readers to read by not inserting ads in the middle of your articles. Use simple language, short paragraphs, simple words and in bullets points.

4. Be original: Write refreshing ideas, look at a subject with a different perspective and give an old subject with a new twist. Be creative.

5. Comprehensive coverage of a subject: Cover a subject in full and if necessary link to other relevant articles to support your story for the benefits of your readers.

6. Provide valuable tips and solutions to problems: Provide useful tips that readers can implement right away and make their life easier. The reader will also appreciate when you can supply workable solutions to their problems.

7. Consistent and persistent: Write regularly and write within your niche to build trust from readers and gain authority on the subject that you are writing about over time.


Receive (Results)

When you give quality content from your site, you will receive more traffic to your site and achieve popularity. You will also get more following, trust, authority and earnings:

1. PageRank: Having or getting higher PageRank is an indication of the relevance and value of your pages. Advertisers pay you according to the PageRank on your site. The higher the PageRank, the more you will be paid.

2. Traffic Rank: In the blogosphere, there is a viral effect when you get noticed. There will be more and more visitors coming to your site. Your traffic Rank will go up.

3. Technorati Authority Rank: When you keep your blog active and current, your site will attract more inward links and you will gain Technorati Authority.

4. Subscribers and followers: When your content is good, there will be more RSS and email subscribers of your articles. You will also get more Twitter and site followers

5. Positive comments: When you write and touch people’s heart, they will be compelled to share their views with you. You will also receive valuable ideas from your readers.

6. Positive reviews: When people are impressed by what you have written, they will write favorable reviews of your site. Positive reviews excite more visitors to your site. What others have said is more impactful than your own words.

7. AdSense and other income: It is more likely for you to generate a lucrative income when your blog is in demand and popular.

Give to the world the best you have and the best will come back to you. ~ Madelin Bridges

10 Effective Ways to be Ahead and Stay Ahead

The secret of getting ahead is getting started. ~Agatha Christie

Getting ahead is doing the right things every day. What can you do to be ahead and stay ahead? Here are the tips:

1. Be prepared: To get ahead is to plan ahead. To plan ahead is to anticipate and take proactive action. It is important to foresee what lies on the horizon because the future is where you spend all of your time. You may have taken the wrong moves, but it is better than standing still and waste valuable time. Making mistakes is getting valuable lessons to move on in life much wiser.

Think ahead. Don't let day-to-day operations drive out planning ~Donald Rumsfeld.

2. Language skills: In a multi-racial country like Malaysia, it is important to master a few languages so that you can communicate with different races effectively. It is also essential to write well and to be a good presenter. Language is an important tool to get ahead.

3. Be energetic: Do you give others the impression that you are full of energy? Create an image for people that they can rely on you to get things done. Develop energy by getting fit and healthy. Exercise daily and follow a healthy diet are the right things to do. Sleep well and take breaks while at work are the smart way to go.

4. Learn and be sure of facts: Keep learning and doing research to get the facts right. To be authoritative is to be knowledgeable and know what you are talking about.

5. Be productive: One way to differentiate yourself is to do more than what others expect. Build the trust of others and develop your own brand in the field of your expertise.

6. Review: Spend a little time every day to review your performance. Are you doing better than before? Do you get the right things done for the day? What were the challenges encountered? What can you do to improve your productivity?

7. Be an expert: Be competent in what you do. Be a leader and provide solutions to problems. Get others to follow you because you have the answers.

8. Be creative: Creating new ideas to get things done is the way to be ahead of the competition. People are looking for new and refreshing creations. Keep your creative juice flowing and stay ahead.

To stay ahead, you must have your next idea waiting in the wings. ~Rosabeth Moss Kanter

9. Change: To get ahead and stay ahead, you have to make constant changes with the changing time. Do things differently to get the results you want. To be progressive is to keep pace with technological advancement.

10. People skills: Be interested in the people around you. You have to help others to get what they want before you can get them to help you to get what you want. Listen more and talk less to understand the person talking to you. Listen patiently and maintain eye contact. Ask questions and get ideas. Paying attention while listening is to show that you appreciate and respect the person talking to you. To get ahead you need to get others to be on your side.


While you are working ahead, remember to live fully in the present to enjoy what you do.

Related article:
10 Tips to Start Ahead and Stay Ahead to Achieve Your Goals

Are you Living Your Life Effectively like Managing a Business

According To Henri Fayol, one of the most influential contributors to modern concepts of management, to manage is to forecast and plan, to organize, to command, to co-ordinate, and to control. The same concepts can be equally applicable to managing your life effectively:

1. Plan

Business: It is about forecasting future conditions and setting objectives, developing means to attain objectives, setting long and short-term plans, establishing policies and standards to follow.

Personal: You will assess your personal strengths and weaknesses, identify your aspiration and interests, and set goals. You design short and long-term goals to achieve your long-term objectives. You will capitalize on your strengths and employ the most effective ways to reach your goals. Your goals should cover your career, family, finance, health, and relationships which are all about your life.

2. Organize

Business: Fayol’s theory is about allocating work among people and determining their responsibilities.

Personal: At a different time you play different roles such as manager, father, husband, and friend. Your aim is to perform effectively according to the role you play.

3. Command

Business: This is the exercising of centralized authority and leadership

Personal: On a personal level, you are to take initiative and be disciplined to work on your plan daily to reach your objectives. You are your own boss to make things happen. Adopt an attitude of doing it now.

4. Co-ordinate

Business: This is to ensure that work is carried out efficiently and cost-effectively towards a common objective.

Personal: You are to ensure that your daily life is smooth going by using such a tool as a to-do list to carry out the tasks for the day. You will be productive by doing those things that matter to you the most and ignore small staff.

5. Control

Business: This is to ensure plans have been carried out and to check deviations against the established goals.

Personal: At regular intervals, you review your performance. Are you progressing according to plan? Do you need to make changes because of the changing situations? Celebrate when you are making headway according to your plan.

A man sooner or later discovers that he is the master gardener of his soul, the director of his life. ~James Allen

7 Productive Things to Do Online

The number one benefit of information technology is that it empowers people to do what they want to do. It lets people be creative. It lets people be productive. It lets people learn things they didn`t think they could learn before, and so in a sense, it is all about potential. ~ Steve Ballmer

There are many things to do online which you can’t do offline.

1. Blogging: Start a blog and post your unique articles and be heard by more people than you can imagine. It is assumed that your site is search engine optimized. There is no other way to reach such a wide audience.

2. Looking for information and doing research: The fastest and the easiest way to learn new things is to search the Net. Just type in the keywords of the things that you are looking for and you will get pages and pages of related articles.

3. Banking: There is no need to go to the bank to transfer funds or sending money to loved ones far away. On the Net, you can check your account balances, print your statements and there are many more financial transactions that you can do.

4. Networking: Getting to know others and getting connected are the things that you can do easily on the Net. When you get connected with the right people, you are presented with ample opportunities.

5. Instant communication: By using Skype you can talk or make video calls to people far away instantly. Most of the time email is the most effective way to communicate, like sending instructions and homework to students.

6. Breaking news: The fastest way to know about the latest news, such as the earthquake in Japan recently, is to go online. Precious lives can be saved by an early warning system in case of a natural disaster.

7. Getting things done: Nowadays, the processing of an application is done online and the fees are to be paid online by credit card as well. There is no other way to do it. You can make travel arrangements and hotel bookings instantly and securely online. Doing business and marketing on the net is the norm.

What are the things that you do online?

10 Effective Ways to Promote Yourself

This is a competitive world and people are too busy to take note of you. Therefore, it is in your own interest to promote yourself. Promoting yourself is to build your reputation, get trust from others. It is also to let others know you are there so that you can get ahead and grow your career.

1. Keep your boss posted: You may be a competent worker, but don’t just work quietly. You must keep your boss informed regularly about your work in progress. When your boss is aware of what you do, it is easier for him or her to decide in your favor when there is a promotion or a career-enhancing assignment.

2. Learn something new and share: After you have attended a course or a seminar, prepare a summary of what you have learnt and pass a copy to your boss and circulate it to your co-workers as well.

3. Update your profile at social networking sites: Your profile at the social networking sites such as Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn needs to be updated constantly. Highlight your achievements, courses taken, or movements in your career.

4. Write articles: One effective way to promote yourself is to project an image of authority in the field of your expertise by writing articles of your niche. Build a blog and start writing and inform others through your social networking sites whenever you publish a new article.

5. Contribute ideas: Contributing original and unique ideas at work is a great way to impress others and create a positive image of yourself.

6. Offer solutions to problems: Similarly, taking an initiative to solve problems at the workplace is another marvelous idea to create a positives self-image.

7. Networking offline: Get to know more people in your industry and introduce yourself. Give your business card when you meet someone so that your new acquaintance will know what you do for a living.

8. Publicity: Volunteering to do public speaking and engaging in media interviews are some of the sure ways to let others take note of you and remember you.

9. Obtain testimonials: What others say about you is more convincing than what you tell the world about yourself. Collect and keep appreciation and thank you letters. Provide links to other blogs that say a positive thing about what you have written. These are proof of what you are capable of.

10. Showcase your accomplishments: Nobody knows what you have achieved. It is up to you to keep others informed of your successes in a subtle way.

To establish oneself in the world, one does all one can to seem established there already. ~
Francois de La Rochefoucauld

10 P’s To Be Successful

Success is a Journey, Not a Destination

The more P’s you adopt, the more successful you will be. Find out how many P’s you have got.

1. Productive: Productivity is the product of efficiency and effectiveness. It means doing the right thing and doing it right at the right time. The other plus factor is getting more important things done in less time.

Once you get into the habit of work, you can be more productive in the things you want to do. ~Adrian Grenier


2. Passion: Are you enthusiastic about what you do? You are inspired by your dreams and passion. You are energetic about the things that you are interested to do. Find your passion and be successful.

Follow your passion, and success will follow you. ~Terri Guillemets

3. Positive: Possibilities are about positive thinking. Positive thinking, in turn, brews a positive attitude. A positive attitude develops into positive habits.

The only difference between a good day and a bad day is your attitude. ~Dennis S. Brown

4. People skills: The secret of human relationships is to be interested in others.
Helping others to get what they want will, in turn, help you to get what you want in life. There is no withdrawal without a deposit.

Courage means to keep working a relationship, to continue seeking solutions to difficult problems, and to stay focused during stressful periods. ~Denis Waitley


5. Personal development: Be interested to develop in all areas of your life such as your health, work, family, relationships, and personal finance. Read consistently and regularly. Learn new things to stimulate and enrich your mind. When you live, you continue to learn and stay young.

Be not afraid of growing slowly; be afraid only of standing still. ~Chinese Proverb

6. Physical fitness: The only way to live life fully is to be fit and energetic. The way to maintain a robust lifestyle is to move your body every day. To obtain energy you have to expend energy.

Happiness lies first of all in health. ~George William Curtis


7. Play: Remember the saying: all work and no play makes Jack a dull boy? You need a balanced life. The most wonderful thing is that when you work hard, you will play hard because you truly deserve it and there is no guilt feeling.

When you play, play hard; when you work, don't play at all ~Theodore Roosevelt


8. Prepared: To organize and to plan is to be prepared. Live an orderly life to avoid stress, last-minute rush, and frustration.

To be prepared is half the victory. ~Miguel de Cervantes
Think ahead. Don't let day-to-day operations drive out planning. ~Donald Rumsfeld


9. Patient: One of the benefits of patience is that you make a better decision because you do not act in haste. To reach your goals you also need patience. To understand other people, all the more, you need patience and attention. Patience is a virtue though you get instant gratification in this age of technological advancements.

Have patience. All things are difficult before they become easy. ~Saadi


10. Perseverance: When you know you are on the right track, just carry on until you reach your goals. Do not be discouraged by setbacks and problems along the way and be willing to go for the long haul. There is no overnight success.

Patience and perseverance have a magical effect before which difficulties disappear and obstacles vanish. ~ John Quincy Adams


Which are the most important P’s for your success?

How to be more Successful

Follow your dreams, work hard, practice, and persevere. Make sure you eat a variety of foods, get plenty of exercise and maintain a healthy lifestyle. ~Sasha Cohen

Success can be anything. It can be getting a straight-A in an examination for a student. It can be a promotion for someone from a junior level to that of an executive. It can be publishing the first book for a writer. However, success principles are the same. You need to spend a long time, put in extra effort and hard work to get what you want in life. Here are the 7 ingredients to achieve success:

1. Be clear about your goals: You will form mental images of what you want to be when you are very sure of what you want in life. It is usually something that you are passionate about. You will conceive ideas, make a plan, and set goals to turn your dreams into reality. Goal setting is a powerful way to focus your mind and energy because you have established a direction and a purpose. You channel your energy productively as you are motivated by what you can accomplish when your goals are realized.

Don't aim for success if you want it; just do what you love and believe in, and it will come naturally. ~David Frost

2. Be prepared: Be willing to put in the daily effort to do what is required of you. Learn as much as you can so that you can continue to improve yourself. Aim for the best of what you want to be and be excellent in what you do. When you are prepared you are ready.

One secret of success in life is for a man to be ready for his opportunity when it comes. ~Benjamin Disraeli

3. Be fit: Physical fitness is essential to sustain your energy in the long haul. Health and fitness promote calmness and allow you to work with concentration. Productivity is what you get.

If a man achieves victory over this body, who in the world can exercise power over him? He who rules himself rules over the whole world. ~Vinoba Bhave

4. Be enthusiastic: When you love what you do and you stay fit and energetic, you will work wholeheartedly and mindfully to do the tasks for the day. To be successful is to work with zest.

Nothing great was ever achieved without enthusiasm. ~Ralph Waldo Emerson

5. Be Creative: Be resourceful to create original ideas, don’t follow the crowd. Establish and build your own brand to differential yourself. Be outstanding and be a winner.

Creativity is merely a plus name for regular activity. Any activity becomes creative when the doer cares about doing it right, or better. ~John Updike

6. Be Persevered: Success is meaningless if it can be attained without great effort. Real success is about working with your blood, sweat, and tears for many years and encountering setbacks, failures, and obstacles.


In order to succeed, you must fail, so that you know what not to do the next time. ~Anthony J. D'Angelo

7. Be lucky: When you are ready and you tell the world what you want, you will be lucky to receive many opportunities.


Those who have succeeded at anything and don't mention luck are kidding themselves. ~Larry King



The secret of success is constancy to purpose. ~ Benjamin Disraeli

Related article: How to be successful

Are You Blogging Productively?

Are you making progress as a blogger? Are you getting what you want from your blog? Answer the following questions to find out how productive you are in blogging:

1.       Are you posting articles regularly and consistently within your niche?

 What is your posting schedule? Do you post an article a day, three times a week or once a week? Be consistent so that readers are not turned off.  Are your articles written within your niche? Readers expect to read what you have promised to them.  

2.       Are you getting more traffic?

 Is your site getting more visitors directly, from referring links and keywords of your articles?  Are you getting more page views and unique visitors? An upward trend of your site visitors means you are doing something right.

3.       Are you getting more subscribers?

 More RSS and email subscribers of your articles mean what you have written are what they are looking for. 

4.       Are you getting more Twitter followers?

 More followers mean they are interested in what you do. They follow and see what you do next.

5.       Are you getting more “Like” and “+1” for your articles?

Do you have “Like” and “+1” buttons at the end of each article? ” Likes” and “+1” mean people find your articles interesting and stimulating. 

6.       Are you getting more Technorati Authority?

To get Technorati Authority, your blog needs to stay active and current because only fresh links to your blog are counted. The moment when your blog is without new links your authority will drop.   

7.       Are you getting PageRank?

You do not find PageRank on all popular blogs. It’s good to have it because it means your pages are valuable to Google and it is more than just relevant links to your site or pages.   

8.       Are you getting more blog followers?

Blog followers, like Twitter followers, “Like” and “+1”, enjoy what you blog about and they are taking an interest in what you are going to write about. 

9.       Are you getting more comments?

Comments mean readers are keen to interact with you and share their views. You get to know the readers’ thoughts and reaction. They find your articles thought-provoking.     

10.   Are you getting more earnings?

Are you making decent money from AdSense?  The more page views you can get for your site, the more money you will earn.

11.   Are you getting a positive blog review? 

A positive review is like getting thumbs up for your blog. The writer appreciates what you do and he or she recommend your blog to others.

Are you happy and satisfied with the performance of your blog? Are you getting what you have expected and hope for? What can you do to be more productive?

How to be productive

Once you get into the habit of work, you can be more productive in the things you want to do. ~Adrian Grenier


To be productive is to produce results. How can you follow the ways of successful people and produce satisfying results?

1. Fill a need: Something needs to be done, but nobody ever figures out how to go about it. You come along and create a great idea to fill the need. There will be a demand for what you can do. By selling your products or services you become rich and famous.

2. Solve a problem: You notice a problem and you have a wonderful idea to overcome it. You differentiate yourself and stand out with your unique and original idea.

3. Positive mindset: a positive mindset is to work without fear and hesitation. There is no negativity to interfere with what you do at the moment. Positive thinking produces positive results. Productivity is what you get.

4. Passion: To be passionate is to love what you do. To be productive is to work hard and smart.

Passion is energy. Feel the power that comes from focusing on what excites you.
~Oprah Winfrey

5. Work on a clear goal: To focus is to work on the most important thing. It brings results and satisfaction and gets you nearer to your goals.

6. Seek Improvement: If you don’t fail it means you don’t try hard enough if you do fail it is a learning experience. To be productive is to do things differently and learn from your failures and move on much wiser. The only failure is to stop trying.

Our greatest glory is in never failing, but in rising up every time we fail. ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

7. Be inspired: What is your aspiration? There is something you enjoy doing and you work with your heart and soul. Concentration and attention are productive ways to get things done.

8. Be organized: The objective of getting organized is to accomplish what you want to get done. It is to be achieved in the shortest possible time. Advance planning is the way to get organized. Productivity is achieved by doing things in an orderly manner.

9. Taking breaks: Your productivity diminishes when you continue to work non-stop. Taking breaks from time to time is to regain your energy and sustain your concentration when you resume work.

10. Aim to simplify: Get rid of unnecessary paperwork and simplify procedures to get the same or even better results.



The least productive people are usually the ones who are most in favor of holding meetings. ~Thomas Sowell