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The basic phases of successful management are well known to be planning, organizing, directing coordinating and controlling. In addition to personal contact with subordinate managers, the senior manager often needs to convene business meetings to insure that these phases of successful management are being fulfilled. The failure to follow these basic tenets of good management have often doomed a project to failure or in the worst case have resulted in the separation of the manager from employment. A manager may have several projects in various phases of the management cycle or perhaps only one project in a particular phase.

In any case the business meeting is a critically important tool for successful management, yet business meetings have a way of being strung out and time consuming affairs that often lead nowhere, accomplish nothing and steal productive time from those in attendance. It is incumbent on the leader of the business meeting to properly prepare an agenda and determine if the topics to be discussed are simply for the purpose of acquiring information, require a decision or are to assign responsibilities for action. It is also important to place a time limit on the discussions in the meeting otherwise the purpose of the meeting can become confusing or result in editorializing by participants that serves no useful purpose. Keeping the meeting on course and within time limits may require a manager to assert their authority for the benefit of all.

The use of visual aids to reinforce information received or disseminated greatly enhances the objectives and is a powerful tool that can be used in the meeting. Power point presentations, graphs or a simple charts that highlight key points are important for success and serve to reinforce the objectives of the meeting. It is also important to keep notes of important points decided during the course of the meeting and then distribute them to attendees as soon as possible after the meeting to insure that everyone understands their individual responsibilities and comprehends the impact of any decisions.

Often a business meeting is convened to update a manager on the status of a particular project. The perceptive manager thanks participants for their information and insures that deadlines and specific responsibilities where appropriate are assigned and understood. It is particularly important at the end of the meeting for the convening manager to review what has been accomplished by reminding participants of their specific responsibilities as well as any deadlines that have been assigned. This is important even if notes have been kept and the intention is to provide participants with a complete record of the important aspects of the meeting. Armed with this information, the successful business manager is better prepared to lead.



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So is this difference in style just a perception or is it based on any evidence?

We are aware of the animal studies than show the differences in behaviour between males and females that have characterised females as being more nurturing and of males classically exhibiting aggressive, dominant “A” type behaviour – but how far do these results transfer across to management roles in organisations?

We also know that there are differences in some physical performance aspects of men and women which have to be taken account – especially in occupations where physical strength and stamina is important e g The Army, The Fire Brigade

When we look at some of the more sophisticated Psychometric tests measuring personality characteristics such as 16pf, we do know that there are some gender differences which are significant enough for us to use different norm tables for men or women in order to normalise any comparative results.

So if we accept that there are some gender based differences in managerial style and approach should we then provide different forms of management development training for man and women?

I think that the answer is probably no – because there are other factors that are even more important to consider when we look at the role of a manager, their styles, approaches and when we consider the people that they are managing or dealing with as customers and clients.

The sorts of factors that are more important to consider are these:-

• What are the gender types and likely responses of the customer set for your product or service?

• How good at your managers at understanding personality differences and gender styles in this customer set? Can they deal effectively with diverse types?

• What makes a successful manager in your business from a competency point of view?

• What are the different learning styles of your participants on any training programme and how well are you delivering your programme to reach and appeal to these different styles of activist, pragmatist, reflector etc?

• What is the culture and style of your organisation that you are looking to reinforce and encourage – whether it is adopted my male or female managers is less relevant.

In conclusion whilst accepting that differences do exist in the styles of individual managers, there is a broad spectrum of styles and approaches produced by individual differences rather than by simple gender stereotyping and that there are other factors outlined above which are more significant.



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Everyone arrives at a website that has management education information. Some help manage businesses. Some teach small business owners how to succeed. Others are communities. At first the new business owner passes these by. The day will come when all business owners stop and consider joining one of these groups. Unfortunately, if that day doesn’t come, the business owner statistically reduces their chances of success.

Management education is the key to small business success. But, according to some statistics only 36 per cent of small business owners take any professional development advice, courses, or read books. This could explain why most small businesses will go under in the first five years.

Too many small businesses are poorly funded with insufficient working capital to allow stable, controllable growth. The business owner’s lack of education and development leave them unable to manage their time and money effectively.

Compare this to large companies where all managers typically receive professional development training on a quarterly or yearly basis. In fact, many large corporations now run their own ‘in house’ Internet based schools. The correlation between education and success has been proven time and again.

Not all types of education are equal. Not all training venues are equal.

Where To Seek Advice

The net is a viable source of free information. Some good, most bad. The best rule of thumb is to follow the success rates. Find a website that offers advice. Then, check them out. Do they own a company? Are there employees? Can you find a business location? Phone the company, ask a few questions.

Do you really want to take advice from a business that has not reached a level of success where they need office space, staff, or even a business phone? The next step is to Google the guru’s and company’s name. You want to see hundreds of references to that company, proving that they are successful and respected by other people in the industry.

Types of Education

There are several types of business management education the small business owner needs.

BUSINESS MANAGEMENT skills are needed to learn how to increase productivity, manage time, keep projects on track, and understand business law. A business manager can take this type of education free on the net, by reading books, and by hiring a life coach.

College courses will probably not afford the information needed by buying a ‘get started’ or ‘how we succeeded’ package from a proven success.

CRISIS MANAGEMENT is an art more than a science. All business owners need to take crisis management courses. The confidence that you can handle an emergency effectively and efficiently is often enough to help the business owner ride out the most traumatic down turn, or devastating situation.

PROJECT MANAGEMENT is the ability to bring together all types of people, and resources. The objective is to create a time table, and a budget, that includes contingencies for emergencies and problems. The objective is to make sure that projects are finished before their deadlines.

ACCOUNTING is vital, even if the business owner never plans to take charge of their own bookkeeping. Millions of business owners have been robbed, and even ended up in jail for tax fraud, because they could not read a general journal.

No one can create effective cash flow charts and projections without first understanding how to manage a set of books. A small business owner may use one of the bookkeeping programs that ‘does it all.’ However, without a basic understanding of accounting procedures the numbers mean nothing.

Learning the basics of accounting will help the business owner translate their balance sheet into a business building, success creating, management tool.

COMMUNICATION STYLES teaches business managers how to get their point across without causing problems. Most clients are lost by someone who does not understand the basic concept of ‘communication styles.’

MARKETING can be the most confusing, and yet most powerful tool in a business owner’s arsenal. It is the one thing that will help them know the difference between an opportunity and a scam. Without a basic understanding of the concepts of marketing, it will be almost impossible to start a business without buying a ‘get started’ or ‘how to succeed’ kit from a business management success and mentor.



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Do you want to be the best manager around and earn the respect you deserve?

Do you want to motivate your staff, increase their productivity and be a super-successful manager?

Of course you do. I mean, who wouldn’t?

Well this is what it takes.

Top successful managers never overlook this fact: loyal, productive employees are one of your biggest assets. From corporate cubicles to the factory floor, it’s the collective skills and efforts of YOUR staff that keep your operation going. Thus, mastering the art of employee motivation techniques is crucial to maintaining a work environment that is good for both the company and the employees.

You can easily set the right tone in the workplace by learning to respond to a basic need we all share… which is to be respected and valued.

Respect Everyone wants to be treated with respect. And as a company owner or manager, your words, body language, even your ****** expressions can make a huge difference in how employees perceive your opinion of them. For instance, extending common courtesies such as a “Good morning” or a nod as you pass workers in the hallway says to them that they are not invisible to you. Other demonstrations of respect could include asking employees for suggestions to improve operations and/or management. It’s another way of saying, “I respect and value your opinions.” Even offering constructive criticism, in private, to a worker who may have missed the mark says, “I respect you enough not to embarrass you in front of your co-workers…”

Recognition Two powerful words are important in employee motivation… “Great Job!”. By recognising the work of others, you motivate them to keep working. You’ll find that regularly giving verbal or written praise for a job well done goes a long way in making employees feel appreciated. If workers feel that they play an important part in the company by the work they provide, then they are much more likely to seek ways to improve their performance.

Reward While cash incentives are a sure way to put a smile on an employee’s face, there are other creative ways to motivate employees through “thoughtful” gestures. For individual rewards, how about gift certificates for DVD rentals, music CD purchases, theme park tickets or “Dinner for 2″? For group or departmental appreciations, consider a “Leave Work 30 Minutes Early Next Friday” reward. Or once-a-month, provide treats in honour of those celebrating birthdays in that calendar month. You are limited only by your imagination and budget.

Placing respect, recognition and reward at the heart of your employee motivation efforts will serve to boost morale, increase productivity and positively affect the company’s bottom-line.

 



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All companies that are in the position of billing their customers and waiting to be paid have a similiar problem. Making sure their customers pay the bill. And sometimes getting them to pay the bill can be harder than getting the job done for them was. On top of everything else you need to balance the objective of getting paid with maintaining your customer relationships.

Accounts receivable are money owed to your company by other companies who have purchased goods or services from you on credit. Realistically maintaining low accounts receivable is a difficult task, and yet plays such a vital role in the overall success of your company. And successfully managing your accounts receivable can be a great boon to your company while the reverse will probably be true if you neglect them.

There is a great deal to know about collecting overdue accounts. And there really is no right or wrong way to go about it. Because regardless of how big or small your organization may be there is one factor that is more important than anyhing else you might hear. Consistency is number one. Because if your not consistent then the money won’t always flow in regularly.

Many factors go into people paying their bills late. For one they might not have the money at the moment. But other things that are legitimate do happen. One common cause is the department you do work for does not turn the bill into accounting. Bills often get misplaced which does sound like my dog ate my homework but it’s true. Often accounting departments have their own system that prioritizes who gets paid first. And some make it a standard practice to pay the little guy late. Because they think you need them more than they need you.

Larger companies can in many cases be very hard to deal with and if you do business with them regularly that has to be considered. It’s not about asking them to pay you just how you go about doing it. Fortunately, there are some things you can do that can make managing accounts receivable effective, although still not easy or always pleasant.

As I said be consistent. Check your aging reports daily. Even if you have someone responsible for doing the actual collecting you need to be aware of their progress or lack there of on a daily basis. Most people do not like doing collections and consequently they may end up neglecting it. Treat your accounts receivable as a use it or lose it asset, because that is exactly what it is.

Accounts receivables do not improve with age. As soon as an account approach’s or exceed’s the terms agreed on they need to be contacted. And if at first you don’t succeed in reaching them try again. Every day if necessary until you reach them. Once you get ahold of them be cordial and explain the situation. You’ll often find that the person on the other end of the phone doesn’t know anything about your bill because it was never submitted. So ripping off their head over the phone will do you no good and only cause that person to be unwilling to help you.

When dealing with delinquent accounts you need allies not enemies. Just make sure to document everything. Contact names, phone numbers, contact dates and times. past due bills, who the bill was originally issued to. Everything that might help collecting on a bill now or in the future. Put together a comprehensive file on the accounting practices of each company you do business with. You do not want to have to duplicate your work later on another bill. When done well, accounts receivable management can make a big difference for any business.

Experience shows that the likelihood of collecting receivables decreases the older they get. A good way to improve cash flow is to make the entire company aware of the importance of accounts receivable, and to make collections. Having your sales staff informed on the status of an account can help as that account is their meal ticket. It behooves them to help collect a bill if their able. Once you’ve developed your receivable collecting practices stick with them.

For most companies, collecting accounts receivable is the largest single headache. No one really likes to do it. But past due accounts receivables can be one of the most damaging drains on your cash flow. And the further you get behind the more you compound the problem. If you haven’t already then it’s time to develop a sound process to track and collect accounts receivable. The life of your business may depend on it.



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Success online is not really as difficult as most people think. Success online is not the ability to successfully imitate someone else. Success online demands an arduous commitment to success. Success online is all about accessibility and there’s no better way to become findable than strategic use of blogging.

Success online is all about “location” too. One faucet of success online is all about creating more links back to your own web site through articles. For some online business success is not making a living at doing what they most enjoy. Doing what you enjoy will enrich your life and your wallet, just ask any millionaire.

Online opportunity and online work is, at the moment, at its zenith. Online success isn’t something that happens with the snap of your fingers or that happens just because you think it should. Online learning and success requires the ability to work independently.

Success online is not easier than a brick and mortar business, but it can be a lot more profitable. Success, or probably any other success in your life, takes commitment and a desire. For every one success online is a matter of taking action. Success online is a combination of image and using the right formula to successfully attract and retain customers.

When you think about all the things that you need to do to successfully manage a business, selling your products and services has to be a priority during the planning process. So making sure you can easily get your products and services in the hands of your identified target market with ease should be part of your regular planning and best practices.

If you are a freelancer or company offering services or are looking for help from others in order to help get something done then you should visit some of the online project posting and bidding websites. If you have been searching for a new way to bring attention to the products or services you are offering, then you might consider a blog.

Do not use your blog to actively sell your products or services; use it discuss them, their uses, products with which they compete, the fields to which they are related–anything which can give your readers a broad-based look at whatever you are offering, so that they can respond with their own thoughts and suggestions. Increase the time visitors spend learning more about your products and services.

If you have products and services for each level along the way, you will also develop multiple groups as who will gladly spend anywhere from a few dollars a month to a few thousand dollars at a time to learn, understand, and experience what you have to offer. Your cold and old products and services will be eaten up like new services again when the momentum of the hot new ideas brings in fresh new audiences into your mix.

Online chat rooms, if provided, are another great resource for you to seek for answers. Often times you may have come across the same solution and maybe a recommendation of your products is in order. Only offer products you know are of quality because later they become targeted fans and will remember your name and take interest when they hear of new products or services with your name on them. They will proudly talk about you and your services, programs and anything else with your name on it.

Another way is to start a blog and submit it to the hundreds of free blog directories. blogging is a great way to log your ideas, opinions and experiences regarding any subject that you strongly feel for. Leave comments on other blogs with a link back to your site. This will boost your link popularity and page rank for your blog.



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A SHORTCUT TO PROJECT SUCCESS

Speak to an experienced project manager, and they can give you a wealth of good advice on the do’s and don’ts to successfully manage any project. All this advice, in a nutshell, would be about how to manage the people doing the work (that includes you too), to deliver their results on time and to a budget, while keeping the risk of failure to a minimum.

It really doesn’t sound that difficult to do, but for some reason, many people think that project management is a massive overhead to any project. I often hear phrases like “oh, don’t waste your time planning the work, just do it!” or “why are you wasting your time writing the objectives, we all know what needs to be done!”.

So the number one key to successfully manage any project is:

“Understand the few essential brief documents you need to create and regularly review during the life of your project.”

DOCUMENT #1 - THE PROJECT CHARTER

For example, at the beginning of your project, you need to create a one-page document called the Project Charter. This document will make sure that you and your customer understand the general goals of the project. After all, if you don’t know where you are going, how are you going to get there? Remember, you could also be your own customer!

To get this information, have a meeting with your customer and ask the following 3 essential questions:

1. What are the objectives of your project?

2. What do you want to produce or deliver?

3. What is the business reason for doing this project?

After the meeting write the answers to these questions in your Project Charter and email this back to your customer and ask them for their approval.

You have now successfully completed the most important aspect of any project, and that is to understand and agree with your customer where you are going with this project.

If you look at the time spent to achieve this important step in a project, you are looking at one or two meetings and about 30 minutes to write up the information, say 2 hours in total for a small project. Not a big overhead at all.

DOCUMENT #2 - THE PLAN

You can now get on and create the second document call the plan. This will include a list of the work that needs to be done (also referred to as the scope of work), who will do it, the cost and time to do this work, and finally a simple review of what will go wrong (known as a risk assessment).

DOCUMENT #3 - THE PROGRESS REPORT

On a regular basis, anything from weekly to monthly, you need to create a progress report and deliver this to your customer. They want to know what work was done, when, and how much was spent. They also want to know if you need their help to solve any problems. Your major challenge is just collecting this information so that you can create your regular progress report.

A FINAL THOUGHT

I have described the absolute minimum information you need to manage any project, and the key to success is understanding the few essential brief documents you need to create with this information - the Project Charter, the Plan and the Progress Report. I hope it leads you to success in your projects.

Visit www.itcentre.com for more help on managing your projects and claim your free project management newsletter

© 2007 Dr Sam Elbeik. All rights reserved



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Money changes everything. This line from a song takes a pitch on how money affects man. People from all walks of life - poor or rich - think of numerous ways on how to earn money or even how to grow them into million bucks. We are not survived by love alone, money still matters.

One of the most-sought after money-making investments nowadays is the popular forex trading. You watch them in the news, read them in the papers, see them in the movies - everybody’s talking about it, and you don’t even know a thing that people really do get rich from a well-managed forex trading.

If you are a novice, we are providing you with guidelines on how to start with forex and have a successfully managed forex trading all throughout.

Knowledge is Power. The most successful businessman in the world is the man who has gained true knowledge and master of the business. You can’t engage your money at once just because people are telling you this is how you do it. If ever their opinions matter, it is your opinion that matters the most. Search for numerous information about the business. Read them thoroughly and learn them by heart. Try joining seminars or workshops, watching online videos and tutorials, and don’t stop until you know you have gathered more than enough information.

Right Trading System at your doorstep. Before finally making a choice on which broker you have decided to put your money on, study all the different systems of brokers and do some sort of charting or auto trades on the computer.

Work out your Trading Plans. Get your objectives, market strategies, point of investment and expected return on investments sorted out. If you have not finalized these details, then do not try to jump into the water yet. You will likely lose whatever you have invested. If in case you have a well-managed forex plan ahead of time and still failed to profit from the business, do not fret for there is always room for improvements on everything. Find out where you have mistakenly set your plans.

Managing your money. In every business or investment, there are always possible risks or dangers. Learn how to manage your money and protect it from losing terribly. As I have mentioned earlier, set your objectives on your profits and set protective indicators on when to make a stop. Because if you lose everything at once, you might miss a great chance along the way since you have no capital anymore. Also, try managing your personal expenses with it.

Everything is learned thru discipline. Especially if you are about to target a well-managed forex trading success from the beginning, it is important that you learn the art of discipline. Do not be moved by your emotions along the way; do trade with your trading plan at hand.

Once you have discovered the right formula to a well-managed forex trading, forex business can really be a smart and beneficial move to grow that capital in hand.



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network administrator will tell you that a successful management strategy includes not only proactive monitoring of the servers and network by use of a polling mechanism, but also a comprehensive fault management strategy, including the smart capturing of SNMP Traps. Advanced Fault Management products are now within reach for the average small and medium size businesses and their networks, with the inclusion of some hot new monitoring products, both windows and linux based. These monitoring systems can discriminate between the important and non-critical alarms, and notify the user when there is truly something worthy to look at. The rest is just noise, and good systems can easily filter that out.

What are SNMP traps? They are packets of information sent over the network by managed and unmanaged agents that have something to say. For example, an Oracle database administrator would be interested in hearing if the database was about to run out of disk space, or if there were an excessive number of authentication failures. These little bits of information provide timely updates about bad (or sometimes good), things happening to critical services and processes on the network.

So now you have your trap receiving system in place. Now what? How does this integrate with the rest of your processes? There is some setup involved, yet, once one spends some time getting used to the messages that arrive and doing some preliminary filtering and categorizing, the best systems actually start to “learn” from the user-choices. These learned behavior heuristics can be applied automatically by the system to find patterns and generalities in the data. Once these patterns are found, even more power is harnessed by the system as it can filter out unwanted information or become even more aware of critical information that may be hiding in the sea of messages being sent by hosts on the network.

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Offshore outsourcing is no longer a novel idea. It is an accepted business practice and for many the offshore operation has become a significant part of their overall operations. So it is essential they succeed in this endeavor. However the reality is that better than 50% of offshoring initiatives fail to meet original expectations. Successfully managing offshore projects requires that you understand the major challenges. I have broken them down into two categories – External and Internal.

External Challenges

Staffing and retention

Competition for the right skills in countries like India is very high; you need to determine whether the vendor has and can offer you the staff with right level of experience. Once you establish a team, you need to proactively manage staff retention.

Time Zone Differences

Your staff in the US will need to get used to staying up late and/or coming in early for telecons with the offshore team.

Country and vendor infrastructure

Both can be issues; you need to determine if your project needs special tools and/or other infrastructure.

Security

Major offshore vendors have established good business practices; but if you are dealing with a small vendor you need to make sure that you are not taking risking with your IP.

Vendor stability

Thorough due diligence of vendor should be part of the vendor selection process.

Cultural differences

This is a significant issue; training programs that help you understand how culture affects communications and your projects are available to help you.

Geo-political concerns

This should be taken into account during vendor selection. Once a relationship with a vendor is established, it is hard to change.

Distance to vendors

India, the most popular destination being 10000 miles away means it takes an entire day to reach your vendor. Travel to the vendor at regular intervals will be part of managing offshoring.

Internal Challenges

Unrealistic expectations

Often companies overestimate savings and underestimate the effort and cost of establishing and managing the relationship. You need to invest the time up front to gain a realistic understanding of both; once done, it is important to communicate to all stake holders.

Improper project selection

You need to clearly define project selection criteria; in particular whether you plan to offshore projects that require direct customer interaction by the offshore team.

Governance

How do you plan to organize the offshoring function? In addition to the technical part of the management, how do you manage the business and relationship issues? How do you plan to measure if the effort is successful?

Processes

Recognize that vendor processes for development and integration may be different than yours; reconcile differences and establish a mechanism that is acceptable to both parties. The other major element is establishing processes for visibility and control.

What does this mean and what can you do?

For competitive reasons, every company must determine if offshore outsourcing makes sense. If the decision is to go forward, you need to recognize that it takes a lot of work. Management is key to offshoring success. Understanding challenges is the first step. Next, you should get a deeper understanding of best practices that make offshore outsourcing successful in your particular environment.



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