What You Can Learn from the Failures of the Pharaohs

If you want to walk the shortest path to frustration and failure, short-change training. No one in the world today, even the Egyptians themselves, really know how to build a pyramid like they did during the glory days of the Egyptian pharaohs. Why? Because they had a lousy training program. The pharaohs: Didn’t document their…

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Getting Back into Business After Your Previous Company Closes Down

The Small Business Administration reports that 34 percent of small businesses will fail in their first two years. Furthermore, according to the same source, as much as 50 percent of businesses fail during their first year. There’s no hiding the fact that the business landscape is cutthroat and unforgiving. Nevertheless, starting and running a business…

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Capitalizing on “All the Old, Familiar Places”

There’s nothing as charming as a town square or the village green. My teenage son plays the clarinet in a concert band that performs in area beach towns. One performance takes place in a town square on a main street, surrounded by small businesses. As band members set up their instruments and the audience sets…

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6 Simple Ways to Prevent Hacking While on Public Wi-Fi

Public, free wireless networks are a symbol of the Internet’s power. The freedom of free internet spreads knowledge and information everywhere without any cost. But it doesn’t mean that you are protected at all times on a public wireless network. It’s easy to steal someone’s username and password and to see what they’re doing on…

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Elevator Speech Part 2: Why You?

In my post Elevator Speech Part 1: the Market Story I suggested that all business owners should be able to describe their businesses well in a single measured minute. The formal elevator speech is a reference to grad-level business plan contests, but I say it’s a good exercise for all business owners. What do you say when…

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Digital Payment Processing: What You Need to Know

Take a look at any research released around the world these days on consumer preferences. When it comes to payments, you’ll see that debit and credit cards (along with other non-cash methods such as PayPal) tend to make the top of the list consistently. Source: 2015 U.S. Consumer Payment Choice Study, TSYS Customers like the convenience of…

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How to Enhance Your Employees’ Collaboration Through Team Spirit

Creating and sustaining a cooperative and collaborative environment should be the top priority for managers. You can build effective teams with employees that identify with their company’s goals and vision, especially when they know that they will feel satisfied and receive a reward after completing a project. Those managers who have to handle their in-house…

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5 Small Business Errors and How to Avoid Them

Many small businesses fail because they make certain basic errors. Hard work and a great business idea will not save a company if it makes one of these mistakes. This article reviews five key small business errors and explains how to avoid making them. Small business owners face many challenges. Hard work and perseverance are…

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Is Cold Calling Dead?

In reality, this title is just clickbait. It’s certain to draw all sorts of attention with pundits on either side of the issue. Inevitably each shaping their “pro” or “con” arguments based on what they are trying to sell. And every time we get into this discussion, we immediately dive in taking and defending positions…

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4 Leadership Behaviors That Build High Performance Work Environments

Focusing on the small fixes will not put out the fire. Instead, this approach only takes up your time and leads to your company losing sight of larger, more important issues. Successful companies understand that achieving success is about addressing larger culture issues within the organization. Getting your organizational culture right is what leads to…

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