Posted on September 19th, 2008 in Business Productivity

In an interview with Jim Edwards he revealed that he used to write everything from scratch but that now he typically comes up with an outline and talks the outline into the recording device, has it transcribed and then he re-writes it, edits it, fixes it up and uses it as big chunks of his eBooks.

There are three main ways to record material for your information product: using a portable recorder, recording directly to your computer, or using the telephone. Lets talk about using a portable recorder.

First of all, you should make sure when you purchase your portable recorder that it is a digital recorder and that the information can be downloaded to the computer. Most recorders that cost less than $100 are not downloadable to the computer and are more useful as reminders of things to do than as repositories for information.

Also make sure that you can attach an external mike to the recorder. Although all recorders have an internal mike and that mike is good, it is better to have an external mike for better pick-up. This is particularly essential if you are interviewing someone and want to use two mikes which can be hooked up using a splitter.

All digital recorders are similar and operate very similarly. The main differences youll find will be the quality of the recording you achieve.

If you want to produce a CD, you would need better quality. You will get better quality with one of the more expensive recorders such as a Marantz or Eiderol. These are in the range of $300-$600. For purposes of recording for transcription, the quality you will get with a recorder that costs from $100-$300 will be sufficient. Sometimes these will also make an acceptable CD product.

One of the reasons for using a portable recorder rather than one of the other methods of recording information is because it can be taken with you and used anywhere. You can be relaxing by the pool, but your ideas dont necessarily stop. You could write a whole book in one afternoon by the pool.

In fact, the next time you want to improve your sun tan but dont think you can take the time off from work, schedule yourself for a relaxing day at the pool, or take a picnic in the park, take a walk along the beach, even go for a nice long drive and write your book by recording it. Youll come back having accomplished a day off, plus getting an information product completed.

Once you have recorded your information on your portable recorder, you can easily download it to your computer by following the instructions which come with the recorder.

If you are giving presentations, you will want to record all of your presentations and this is easily accomplished with a portable recorder. They are small and fit into a pocket. With a lavaliere mike attached to your lapel, you can record your presentations as you give them, thus creating another information product.

Important considerations when recording are your environment and the way you speak. In order to get a good quality recording and not have your transcriptionist wondering what in the world you actually said, avoid having noises nearby (children playing or noisy animals), chewing gum or eating while recording, and speak clearly into the microphone.

Watch out for these few things and you can produce a work product while taking a day off and improving your sun tan.

Patsy Bellah is the owner of Great Transcriptions where the spoken word becomes the written word. Check us out at http://www.greattranscriptions.com For more information about recording your information products, read How To Get Your Info-Product to Market With Lightning Speed! for only $29.95 at http://www.lightningfastinfoproducts.com

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Posted on September 18th, 2008 in Business Productivity

Always remember that your business plan lays the foundation for your new business. The discipline that is required for developing a franchise business plan lets you look at the challenges ahead and your expectations that you have for your new business.

For a proper format, the first part of your franchise business plan should usually have a cover sheet, a proper statement of purpose, and a table of contents. Please note that the statement of purpose gives the reason for your business plan.

You may also visit the business plan competition web log to get the most up-to-date information on entrepreneurship-related postings. Do remember to express your gratitude to the ideas of business plans. And if youre lucky, in the short time that you have had your business plan posted on any site, you can have had several interested investors contact you. There are sites where you can post your full business plan and receive a free review.

Try and attract investors by thinking outside the business plan. Attempt to create a winning online presentation of your business plan. Visit sites and get tips and advice from business plan professionals and learn how to write the perfect business plan. Try to search the web for free sample business plans that can give you ideas to help you get started.

But always remember that the most important audience for a business plan is you, yourself. You may also use your business plan as a tool to generate interest from financiers, prospective employees and strategic partners.

Try to focus on key aspects of business planning to consider as you write a business plan. There would be a dozen questions you might have to answer in order to get the key components of a business plan. For writing a business plan you can refer to sample business plans for reference.

You may wish to read more : href="http://www.howtowriteabusinessplan.org/">Sample Business Plans

Jonathan travels around the world and has extensive experience in many fields. Business being just one of them.

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Posted on September 18th, 2008 in Business Productivity

When William Shakespeare wrote the famous words To be or not to be he might have finished the statement with these additional words at maximum productivity depends upon your ability to be a problem finder or problem solver.

The self leadership skills of:

• Creativity
• Communication
• Organizational
• Goal Setting and Goal Achievement
• Courage
• Open Mindedness
• Risk Taker

are necessary whether you are finding a problem or solving a problem. These self leadership skills maximize productivity whether you are working or even playing.

To the question is to be answered is How productive are you as you carry forth in your daily problem finding or problem solving?

Maybe one issue to maximum productivity is changing your focus. When you are at Sea Level where you cant see the forest for the tress, you have one viewpoint. There are so many trees or problems, you begin to start problem solving because you do not have time to find the right problem to solve. Problem solving indicates that an event has already happened. This is a reactionary behavior.

To start problem finding in the quest for maximum productivity means that you must be at See Level or the 30,000 foot viewpoint. At this viewpoint, your focus changes and you can potentially see the real problems and find the first one that you must take action. Therefore, problem finding is more of a pro-active behavior.

Since we live in a world of ongoing change, maximum productivity demands that we have the ability to be both terrific problem finders as well as problem solvers.
Individuals and companies who can find problems before they happen offer incredible value. This value includes avoiding the ongoing list of redos such as revise, rethink, rework as well as the resources that support these redos such as energy, time, money and individual morale.

These same individuals and companies who can solve problems quickly offer provide value by not wasting precious resources of energy, time, money and individual morale.

To achieve maximum productivity suggests that you must develop the self leadership skills of your greatest asset, human capital, so that they can be exceptional problems finders and problem solvers.

Would you like to increase the productivity of your employees? Then you may find the FREE Leadership Audit of interest at http://www.processspecialist.com/od.htm

FREE monthly teleconferences registration at http://www.processspecialist.com/seminars.htm that will help you increase your business productivity to personal productivity.

Please feel free to call me, Leanne Hoagland-Smith, Your Chief People Officer and Business Coach for individuals and organizations that are not where they want to be 219.759.5601.

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Posted on September 17th, 2008 in Business Productivity

For people starting their own business/company, having an office is of great importance. But, for the businessmen starting their business with low budget, it is impossible to own/hire an office, and execute their business matters from there. Thus, in UK, the facility of having a registered office fulfills this very need of businessmen. The Companies Act of UK allows even one or two people to form a company. To have such an office what all one needs to have is an office that is registered.

Having a registered office is mandatory for small business houses, as the address which is registered under Company Act is used by government offices to make all official correspondence with the company. Besides, the address that you have registered for your company is used also for all your business interests like corresponding with your business associates like clients, customers, business houses, etc.

The Companies Act also allows people living outside UK to open a company of their own in UK. A registered office plays another important role here in providing such people a place which they can use as their official address. There are several companies offering this facility. Paying them their annual charge will let you avail the mail delivery facilities according to which you will get all the letters delivered to you at right time. Finding a good service provider is not a problem, as the their online availability has made the entire process easier.

Location of an office gives your company a positive image. Likewise, registered office also helps you to boost corporate image of your company. Your office address is forwarded to all your business associates through the letters heads. If the address is of a reputed office location, it is conveying people a positive impression of your office. Thus, availing the facility of an office that is registered helps you in positive way to boost the corporate image, which may lead your company having growth in business sells.

The author is a business writer and writes on business services like Mail Forwarding services, Registered Office Address and Apostille services. Currently he is working for Small Firms Services . To get more details visit UK registered office

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Posted on September 17th, 2008 in Business Productivity

So many businesses that I work with have owners who are straddling the fence of generations. On one side of the fence is the generation that struggled with new math and actually learned to spell using a dictionary instead of a spell checker. On the other side of the fence is the generation that could write a term paper in a matter of minutes with the help of Google. If you find yourself more akin to the former, you possibly could be suffering from anxiety created by living in an online world with an offline mentality.

There are a number of symptoms of this dreaded affliction, but the most prevalent seem to be:

1. A consistent attempt to deny that the internet has become the driving force shaping the landscape of social interaction today, and is rapidly doing the same to business. A common comment from this type of behavior is I know I need to do something on the web, I just dont know what. This person can be likened to the farmer who has a bag of seeds with no crops to harvest.

2. A belief that the internet is a fad that will pass like the mood ring and cabbage patch doll. One only has to look at the number of large advertisers, both in print and tv/radio that will include a web site address in their ads. These are companies that spend millions of dollars on consumer research each year. They know buyers behavior. They also know what buyers want from sellers. Small companies would do well to follow their lead

3. Continuing to use out dated offline methods of prospecting and lead generation, i.e. dreaded Cold Calling. Nobody likes cold calling-not the prospect, not the salesman, not the gate keepers. So lets once and for all put it where it belongs, in the graveyard of bad ideas (along with the New Coke and the play at home version of Fear Factor). With the internet, it is entirely possible to gather quality leads from people actually looking for you and your products and services. I can not tell you the difference this realization brings to many business owners lives.

The real fact of the matter is that the online world makes the offline world as obsolete as the world looked with and without the steam engine, jet airplane, automobile, or any of the life changing creations before it. As the world begins to change faster and faster, information becomes the power driving the engines of development and the advancement of modern civilization. And the internet makes the acquisition of information fast and cheap, which in turn makes business success easier.

Offline businesses can choose to continue to be stuck in neutral, and watch as their competitors pass them in overdrive or hop on the freeway and put on the cruise control.

The author, Michael Simmons, owned his own business for 27 years before going into web marketing. He now specializes in optimizing the web presence for local businesses through website development. You can visit his website at http://www.gmsimmons.com He also utilizes video, developing web video ads thru http://www.proweb-video.com He can be emailed at mike@gmsimmons.com

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Posted on September 16th, 2008 in Business Productivity

Vampires are mythological blood suckers. They are creatures of the night that you have to be cautious about. If they bite you, you will be infected and become a vampire as well.

In your office too you have a few different types of vampires. These office vampires are of a more dangerous breed as they are able to walk and infect people during the day.

Office vampires do not necessarily suck your blood, but they do gain sustenance in seeing you suffer by making you feel inapt, irresponsible, frustrated and emotionally bankrupt because of their actions or inactions.

However just like the blood sucking type of vampires, there are some effective cure and protection from these office vampires. But first it is important to identify them. Office vampires can be classified into three categories:

1. Resource Vampires
These are the creatures of the office who are always complaining about lack of resources. The more you give in to them, the more they feel that they lack resources. These vampires are always short of stationeries, staff and equipment. They will borrow your stuff, but do not believe in returning. You will be made to feel petty when you make an attempt to take it back from them. Resource vampires feel that taking office stationeries home or using the office phone to make personal phone calls is part of their job description.

Cure for Resource Vampires
Make them account for what they use. Ask them to put up a request order and get them to justify investment. When asking them back for what is yours, specify to them the time and date when they borrowed your stuff and how long it took them to return. Also if you have to lend them something, ask them to sign for what they are borrowing and make it as official as possible. You may also include a column to inform them when it is due back and the consequences for late return. The best way to deal with resource vampires is to be firm with what you say to them so that they know that you are protected from their infection.

2. Time Vampires
This is a deadlier breed than the former. The characteristics of Time Vampires are as follows. When they make an appointment at a pre-agreed time they dont turn up. They are perpetually late for meetings, appointments and other office functions. It is easy to spot them from the kinds of excuses they give which includes, the bus was late; it was raining and I had no umbrella; the alarm clock did not ring and Ive got a lot on my mind

You may be efficient in your time management, but what the time vampires do is to sap your energy by turning up late and thus disrupting your schedule.

Remedies and Prevention for Time Vampires
Make it very clear that you have zero tolerance for time vampires. If possible leave a time vampire out of a certain event when they turn up late just to prove a point that you mean business. This will definitely drive home the point that you view time management seriously. If this option is not possible you might have to give them an earlier timeline to finish taking into consideration their weakness in keep with the time.

It is very important that you are discipline with your time in order to control these vampires. They can be extremely infectious in that there is a tendency for others to become like them when it becomes an accepted culture to be late.

3. Emotional Vampires
This is the deadliest of them all. They may seem perceptually harmless. But they can do a lot of destruction to your self-confidence and capabilities. This is how you can spot them.

During meetings and discussion they are the ones who would always love to play the devils advocate. Every idea that you come up with they have a negative opinion about it. When you engage in any new activity they will enjoy by telling you how you might fail instead of looking at the strong points that you possess.

Emotional Vampires may be good friends when you need their assistance, but after that they relish the prospect of living in the past and telling you how they helped you when you needed them. Sometimes you wish that you never asked them to help you.

Prevention and Cure for Emotional Vampires
There is no effective treatment for Emotional Vampires. Their existence is most likely based on their attitude towards life generally. If you can you should try to spot them and stay away where possible. They are highly infectious if you do not take care as you might become an emotional vampire yourself if you fall into their paradigm trap.

If it is not possible to avoid them, then you should protect yourself with a strong personal vision of who you really are and what you are capable of. This is to ensure that if you do get an Emotional Vampire on your back you can probably assist in their own self-destruction when they find that they cannot get to you.

Dr Daniel Theyagu is a corporate trainer and seminar leader who has designed and conducted competency-based training for more than 150 organizations. He is based in Singapore and can be reached at
dtheyagu@singnet.com.sg

Website: http://www.thinklaterally.com

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Posted on September 16th, 2008 in Business Productivity

1. Create a plan. This may sound like a statement of the obvious but far too many people go into business without one. You must have a plan or you will fail. That is a guarantee. If you fail to plan you plan to fail.

2. Set goals and write them down. This is essential. In addition to this you must also read your goals daily. Make your goals specific, clear and achievable. An unwritten goal is just a wish. If you need help figuring out what goals are realistic and achievable try asking someone who is already in the same business or one similar to yours.

3. Be realistic. Realize that it will take to be successful and be willing to do it at any and all costs. Have the mentality that quitting is not an option.

4. Set and keep a budget. It is imperative that you know how much money you can afford to spend on a monthly basis and that you do not spend more than this no matter what. It can be tempting to get carried away spending too much on advertising or other unnecessary items. In the beginning as long as you have business cards and a basic website that is really all you absolutely must have.

5. Get and stay organized. Disorganization makes running a business difficult for anyone. It is much easier to take the time in the beginning to do this and to make a commitment to stay that way. Everything is easier when you are well organized. Be willing to take the time to do this in the beginning and you will be glad you did.

6. Pick a few aspects of the business to focus on and concentrate on for the long-term. It is fine to experiment with many different ideas but trying to do everything or to be the best at everything is a recipe for disaster. It is much better to become great at two things than to be mediocre at five things.

7. Realize when you need to take a break or get help. Running a business is difficult and everyone needs a break or some assistance from time to time and that is ok.

AnnaLaura Brown is a successful home business owner who markets herself and her business on the internet. Subscribe to her free internet marketing E-course at http://www.onlinemarketinglessons.com. She can also be contacted via her website http://www.scentedcandlesclub.com

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Posted on September 15th, 2008 in Business Productivity

Business itself consists of the production of goods and commodities, and of their transportation and exchange. To study these things is to study business itself. We cannot study any one of these processes without gradually working off into other sciences. But there are certain features of business, which taken together, we may call the functions of business. In a rough way, these functions may be divided into four parts called production, marketing, financing and accounting.

Production includes the study of the organization and management of the processes required to transform raw material into useful commodities and simple energy into useful services. Marketing includes the study of all the means whereby goods are exchanged and transported from one owner to another.

Financing, in a sense, is not a true function of business, since it merely facilitates production and marketing; and the same may be said of accounting. Financing, however, may be defined as that function of business which facilitates production and marketing through the use of funds.

And accounting may be said to be that function of business which analyzes the other functions and properly records the results of the analysis to the end that those other functions may be intelligently carried on.

There may be elements of the science of business which are generally recognized as parts of the science of business but which cannot easily be fitted into any one of these four functions. We shall find little difficulty, however, if we stick close to our definitions as given above.

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Posted on September 15th, 2008 in Business Productivity

Do your know what motivates your employees work productivity? Possibly, you may wish to actually survey them before you many any presumptions that will decrease productivity instead of improving productivity.

If you lack the time, money and energy or any other resource to undertake such a survey, maybe you can use a recent survey from the Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM) as reported in HR Magazine.

What this survey revealed is that there is a definite gap between what employees value most and what management and human resources believe to be true. (Note: From a performance improvement perspective, what I have learned this past 30 years is that beliefs are the major obstacle to improving performance.)

The top 5 factors or concerns as ranked by employees for job satisfaction which directly affects work productivity are:

1. Compensation
2. Benefits
3. Job security
4. Work/Life balance
5. Communication between senior management and themselves

Yet, human resource professionals and management believed these concerns to be the top 5:

1. Relationship with supervisor
2. Compensation
3. Employee job performance recognized by management
4. Benefits
5. Communication Between Employees and Senior Management

Beyond the compensation factor, the difference between the two lists is that employees value how their job will affect their personal lives or what some call Whats in it for me. (WIIFM) HR professionals are more concerned about job performance and their beliefs affected what they thought would be driving employee motivation.

To close this gap begins by first identifying any additional belief gaps between employees and HR management. Then, a plan should be constructed to close that performance gap which directly affects work productivity.

Within that plan, should be a focus on improving self leadership skills or what some may call strong interpersonal skills, soft skills or people skills. These skills are needed from both an employee perspective as well as a management perspective. Some of these self leadership skills include, but are not limited to:

• Active listening
• Decision making
• Verbal communication

A mentor once shared with me, when you change how you look at things, the things you look at will change. This is especially true when dealing with human capital your greatest asset. Take the time to look at the landscape from the eyes of your employees and not necessarily from the eyes of HR and watch your work productivity soar.

Is your productivity where you want it to be? M.A.P. for Success, a FREE email course may help you begin to chart a course of business, professional or personal success. Visit http://www.processspecialist.com/action-plan.htm.

Are you committed to getting to where you want to be? Then register for FREE monthly teleconferences at http://www.processspecialist.com/seminars.htm. These seminars will help you increase your business productivity to personal productivity.

Please feel free to contact me, Leanne Hoagland-Smith, Your Chief People Officer and Business Coach, who works with individuals and organizations that are tired of not being where they want to be and truly want more for their businesses and their selves. 219.759.5601

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Posted on September 15th, 2008 in Business Productivity

More often that not you will notice that several businesses go bankrupt - not because of their inabilities or because of their quality but because they could not control the ever inflating office overhead expenses, this is proven to be true for so many.

Office overheads are those costs which any business incurs while making day to day business, this costs range from the very basics like electricity and telephone bills to stationery, rent, taxes, etc. A smart businessman knows that the first steps he requires to take for making his business successful is to keep office overheads at par with requirements.

Reducing office overheads does not mean strangling even the basic needs of your office, like good lighting or making telephone calls to your business associates and clients or those representing your business while on the move. This would make employees unsure whether they would want to work for you. You have to ensure that you are providing all that is required for a business to run smoothly and all that your employees require to work happily and efficiently.

However, bloated office overhead expenses are more because of wastage of available facilities instead of utility. If your office is using all the available facilities properly you will not require worrying about overheads at all, these will be absorbed all together in the product price of your company. Bloated office overheads are caused due to wastage like, leaving electricity working even in those places where there is no one, or employees making their personal telephone calls from the office telephones.

Keeping air conditioners on when it is not at all required, or wasting stationery and office accessories. Office overheads may bulge when your company representatives traveling tend to take advantage of the situation that there is no one to monitor them. If you have provided a mobile phone from the office and they are traveling all over the country you may end up incurring high telephone bills, than your business can afford. Though a telephone bill on the higher side may not really affect a business it would always be great if you can save a few.

All you require doing is making smart choices and finding options where overheads are concerned, instead of faxing you can even email, instead of indulging in misuse of telephone by employees, you can prohibit employees to call from office phone, instead install a cheap public phone facility inside office so that they can make their own calls by paying minimal money each time.

You can save money and create more profits by keeping just the correct overheads for your office.

Find great office communications options and reduce communication costs to the minimum
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