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Articles.
If you have a specific keyword you want to search for, please use the search box at the top of the page. Click on the titles of each article to see the whole things on company.com.
Franchising 101: What to Know Before You Invest
It seems like a lifetime ago, but I once worked for Starbucks. The pay wasn't great, but the perks were good. Just saving you the trouble of making that joke yourself. One of the most asked questions I heard was, "How can I get one of these franchises?" And the answer was, "Starbucks doesn't franchise. Every store is corporately owned, and the ones in grocery stores are managed through affiliate relationships with those corporations."
Five Lessons Every Small Business Can Learn From The Renaissance Festival
You might not think a modern small business owner can learn anything from the Renaissance Festival, except that jousting never really lost its appeal to the 8-year old kid in us all.
But if you look closer, you'll see that all those stores are independent small businesses -- and with most RenFests getting an average of 15,000 visitors per day, there's a lot of pressure to be better than the next guy selling ear-rings made out of feathers, or cell-phone covers made out of leather and deer antlers.
...and again, in Pirate.
If t’first rule o' Fight Club be not talking about Fight Club, t’first rule o' RenFest be "nothing attracts a crowd like a crowd." Fake accents, grown men wearing Errol Flynn's hand-me-down tights, and buxom wenches on stilts wearing jester hats while juggling swords that be lit on fire will all make people stop and look. And if they be stopping t' look it means ye have their attention. What ye do with their attention when ye have it, well that be another thing.
The Most Memorable Administrative Assistants on TV
Jennifer Marlowe - WKRP in Cincinnati - "I don't get coffee, Mr. Carlson. We agreed."
Why we like Jennifer: She has an extensive list of things she does not do.
Loni Anderson was catapulted to fame as the serial older-man-dating Jennifer Marlowe. WKRP's elderly general manager, Arthur Carlson, depends on Jennifer to protect him from people and situations he would rather avoid. Rather than playing into the "dumb blonde" sterotype that was almost unavoidable on television in the 1970s, Jennifer showed herself to be smart, resourceful, and sophisticated.
Ten Ways to Show Your Assistant That You Care
It's Administrative Professionals' Day on April 23rd (that's pronounced Secretaries' Day for those over 40). Its a day to celebrate the person who manages your calendar, does your photocopying, handles all maner of irate colleagues, clients and family members so that your day can be as close to smooth sailing as possible. Here's a list of ten things you can do that won't break the bank, but will make your assistant feel like you respect and value them.
Five Lessons Every Small Business Can Learn from IKEA
Swedish big-box home furnishing store, IKEA, has tailored its customer shopping experience in a way that would make M.C. Escher proud. Its goal, like yours, is to drive up volume and drive down costs. Here are some things you'll learn if you take a trip to your local IKEA store
Health Insurance for Small Business
This is the health care article that has nothing (well, very little) to do with the ongoing discussions about the Healthcare Bill, whether it's good or bad, whether it's a blessing or a curse, whether it's constitutionally sound, or a blight on the pockets of future generations. This is the health care article that's about what you need to consider when choosing a medical insurance provider for your employees.
Protected Classes and Discrimination
An action does not need to be intentional to be discriminatory, it only needs to produce a disparate effect on members of a protected group. Imagine that an employer decided to only hire people with naturally blond hair. Since caucasians are the only ethnic group with naturally blond hair, such a decision would discriminate against job-seekers of every other ethnic backgroud, and would be illegal.
Airline Quality Rating Report: Discount Airlines Are Most Consistently Reliable
For most small businesses, airline travel was consigned to the island of misfit perks a couple of years ago. Between the early bite of the recession, and the post-9/11 price increases for air travel, many companies changed the way they do business. And for some, that meant an end to sending execs to conferences in far away and exotic places.
How to Fire an Employee
Firing people. Once, back in the days of the Hawthorne Experiment, it was easy, and employees would thank business owners for having hired them in the first place. Then it became kind of awkward for employers, having new "human resources" rules to follow. But now Donald Trump has made it cool again -- you just sit the underperforming employee down, look them in the eye, and matter of factly tell them "You're fired."
What to Do If You Won't Be Able to File Your Taxes On Time
It's April 8th. Raise your hand if you've filed your taxes. Anyone who raised their hand, you get a gold star, two if you estimated and paid throughout the year. Everyone else, read on.
At this point, you're probably tempted to load those receipts and log books into a wheel-barrow and tote it all down to your local One-Stop Tax Prep Store.
Don't -- for three reasons.
Ten Tips for a Successful Performance Review
If you can keep a journal on the behavior of each employee from review to review, you'll have a good deal of anecdotal and analytical information to base your assessment on. Since most of us find it much easier to remember the things other people do badly, rather than the things they do well, if you rely on your memory, the review could turn out to be much more negative than you think. Let the facts speak, instead of fitting facts to a pre-conceived idea of what the employee deserves.
Ten Interview Questions That Sound Like They Should Be Okay (But Aren't)
If in doubt about whether the elderly, wheelchair-bound, Belgian cross-dresser would be a "good hire" for you, ask yourself if you'd have the same doubts if they were a middle-class white college graduate, or a black VP of another company, or an hispanic entrepreneur. Cut through the adjectives and focus on the qualities the candidate has, and whether they can fulfill the requirements of the job description, and you should be able to stay on the right side of the law.
Accounts Receivable Funding: Better Than a Bank Loan in the Great Recession
Small-business owners don't start their companies to be short-term loan officers for customers. But when your business allows customers to pay on 60 or 90 day terms, that's effectively what part of the business becomes -- and sometimes that means hiring or subcontracting with a collections company to make sure you get paid. So not only is your business not getting paid quickly, it's also incurring extra expenses to make sure that the agreed payment happens.
Pants on the Ground -- Tips for NOT Looking Like a Fool
As a teenager, Larry Platt marched with Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., and Reverend Hosea Williams, in Savannah. He was beaten by Alabama's police officers during the Bloody Sunday march from Selma to Mongomery. He worked with peaceful protest organizations like the Southern Christian Leadership Conference and the Student Non-Violent Cooordinating Committee. He is a hero and veteran of the Civil Rights movement. And in less than four minutes on American Idol, Platt changed his legacy. Once remembered as a survivor of racial abuse, attack dogs and fire hoses, he is now destined to be "that dude who sang that 'Pants on the Ground' song."
Unemployment Insurance Tax -- What The Media Isn't Saying
Company.com conducted this research by calling each state and requesting state maximum UI tax contributions for experienced employers, starting UI tax rates for new employers, and the state's maximum pay base which those taxes are applied to. Employers who did not pay the state maximum in 2009, but who will be required to pay the state maximum in 2010 will see larger tax increases.
Ten Ways to Raise Capital
Some Things to Remember:
1. "Vegas, Baby!" is not in this list for a reason.
2. If you borrow from your 401(k) you can't retire.
3. If you borrow from your company payroll tax trust account, you can go to jail.
4. People who invest in your company will want to have a say in how it's being run.
5. Investors are not wealthy by accident, they're usually pretty smart.
6. Bake sales work. On a small scale. On a large scale, you'd have to be the Girl Scouts to have it fund your organization.
Cash-flow, Profitability, and How You Can Still Go Broke
Generating a cash shortage is easy -- just let your expenditure exceed your liquid assets. Sure, you might have a million dollars in sales on the books, but since the payments from your customers aren't due for another 60 days, you need to be able to stay in business, pay your bills, and keep turning out product until those checks arrive.
Social Networking and Your Business
Social networks are about connecting with other people. Whether it's sharing vacation stories or connecting one of your friends to another for a job opportunity, social networking is about connecting. Church choir? Social network. Gym? Social network. Library? Social network. Chamber of Commerce? You better believe it (and join it).
Social Networking Dos and Don'ts
There's a delicate balance between good communication and spam. If what you're putting out into the world has little actual value -- and be honest with yourself about that -- you're going to turn people off. If you join in conversations in the many forums you could join, there are some simple etiquette guidelines to follow.
Taxes for Entrepreneurs: Your First Tax Season
If, like tens of thousands of individuals in 2009, you started a business, 2010 might be the first time you’ve ever needed to file business taxes. You might think that they’re just like individual taxes, but you’d be wrong. Business taxes are the Complete Works of Shakespeare. Your individual taxes are the Cliff Notes of “Where’s Waldo?”
Taxes for Entrepreneurs: Limiting Your Audit Risk
You can never eliminate that chance of being audited, because a perfect tax return will be suspicious, too (who files perfect taxes?) Company.com has ten ways to reduce your risk of an audit – we figure that most small businesses don’t have big accounts in the Caymans or Switzerland, and that if you’re reading this you haven’t run into significant tax problems in the past. Otherwise you'd know this stuff already.
Taxes for Entrepreneurs: Tax Resolution
Taxes can be the death of your business. Or rather, a failure to understand or pay taxes can be the death of your business. If a liability with the Internal Revenue Service is not addressed quickly, the Collections Division can be rather aggressive. The IRS can levy bank accounts and/or accounts receivable, garnish wages, or seize assets.
Tax Credit Services: Why the WOTC is Nothing to Do with Your Tax Preparer
The government wants to pay you $9000 for your most recent hourly-paid new hire. It will be paid in the form of tax credits available to your business, and it's not a deduction. But how do you know which employees qualify for which credits, and how do you know if you're claiming the right amount?
Debt vs Equity: How Much Will You Give Up to Get What You Want?
Let’s say you know how to turn a $20 million business into a $50 million business.
You need $5 million more to make it happen. Your couch has $0.82 under the cushions. What now? Where does the rest of the money come from?