Virtual lessons from across the pond
The USA has as many domestic flights as the rest of the world put together. Project meeting with customer? Flight. Project management training course? Flight. Travel budget and carbon footprint? High. So it’s no wonder the Americans have been at the forefront of finding project management training alternatives. But what can we learn – good and bad – from their experience when considering training in the UK?
Project Training Options
The backdrop is good traditional project training such as PRINCE2 is pretty effective: studies show that lecture-based instruction gives an information retention rate of between 5-10%, while interactive and discussion-based activities, such as the average PRINCE2 course, improve it to 40-50%. Hence the holy grail for Virtual is to keep that, then add the learn-anywhere benefits of eLearning, for the best of both worlds.
Virtual = Efficiency
Since the advent of virtual the big benefit for American companies has been the travel saving – both time and money. In a much smaller country we are never far from PRINCE2 courses, so the travel saving can be much less. But if you are posted on customer sites, including overseas, the benefit of doing PRINCE2 training from anywhere is very real.
The time benefit has also been taken up in a different way that is very relevant to us. With virtual training ‘modules’ typically taking only 3-4 hours it is much easier to schedule PRINCE2 training alongside business-as-usual – no need to draft in someone to cover a week’s absence.
Prevalence of Virtual Learning
So as Virtual learning matures in the US when is it most often used? As an alternative to PRINCE2 and other popular and specialist classroom project management courses it is proving to be a serious alternative. Virtual is also increasingly being used for short learning ‘nuggets’ – short sessions that couldn’t be justified as a classroom training session. As an example, imagine you are a PRINCE2 Practitioner facing a major project change of scope and you want to refresh yourself on best practice first: attending a two hour virtual training session that allows expert tutor led discussion of applying PRINCE2 theory to real-world situations is so much better than just reading the manual.
Conclusion
Amidst the hype some perspective is needed. The majority of PRINCE2 courses are done face-to-face, something that is unlikely to change much in the future. Where Virtual is finding its place is to compliment classroom training. Out-of-hours courses, bite sized learning subscriptions and specialist courses that only run in one location all have a clear case for being better done virtually.
About the Author: This is a guest post from Jamie Simpson on behalf of QA, who are experts in Prince2 training in project management
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A “Stand-Out” Google Feature and Why F8 Was a Mistake
Google released the +1 in response to Facebook’s Like button, then Google+ in an overall response to Facebook and all other social media platforms. Huge numbers of people were fed up with Facebook anyway so they all migrated, found it unfamiliar and went straight back to Facebook’s comfortable, cozy familiarity. Read more
10 Online Security Tips for Small Business
Many of us think because we have the latest version of anti-virus and anti-malware software running on our computer, our business is safe. This is definitely not the case.
There are many other situations you could be compromising your information and that of your customers. Your website, the basis of your online marketing and income, could come under attack.
It is prudent to look at all areas of your activities and have all of them covered. This article outlines all those areas to keep you secure.
10 Online Security Tips for Small Business
- Anti-virus. Yes, this is an absolute must. Your other option is to get an Apple Mac. Having said that, as Apple computers become more popular, there are more chances that problems will develop in the future. Your anti-virus software must contain anti-malware components.
- Firewall. Your operating system should already have this as a part of your network connection. This should always be turned on. There are addition software packages that are small and light, that can do a lot more. Software that allows to monitor incoming connections with more detail is a great idea as an addition to your firewall.
- Chat Client. While many people care about their internet communication, they often forget how insecure the standard chatting clients are. Products like Yahoo’s messenger and MSN messenger are broadcasting your chats for the world to see. Look for a chat client like Adium, that allows you to encrypt your messages. Skype is also pretty good for this.
- Hard Disk. Storing your information is very important. If your laptop gets stolen or lost, you could be in real trouble. Again Apple comes up trumps here. File Vault will encrypt your whole hard drive. Make sure you have something like this with whatever system you are using.
- Back Up. There are those who have lost data, and those who will. Make sure you are backing up at least 1 time a day. There are very good systems available. Again, Apple’s Time Machine, is an excellent example. It is not just a copy of your files, it is a complete snapshot of your system. Get this type of backup for what ever system you have.
- Online Storage and File Transfer. Online backup and storage is one of the best ways to protect your information. If you want to go the whole way, you can keep your laptop or computer just about empty — a great solution for business. Make sure the client you are using is secure. This goes without saying with any file transfer… no, those normal networks will not do the job.
- Payments. There are a number of systems that allow you to make and receive payments without sharing information of your customers. This is the best way for you. It might cost you a little bit in charges, but at least you will not have to worry about having anyone’s credit card details lying around. You are responsible for them too.
- Email. This is another area many of us forget about. Having the right software to encrypt your emails is extremely important. Encryption means that others will need a key to access the information, otherwise it will be useless.
- Website Firewall. Yes! Websites should have a Firewall too. Make sure your website design and setup incorporates this. This is your best defense against hackers harassing your site. This is extremely important if you are in the business of e-commerce.
- Online Physical Monitoring. Yes, set up cameras and watch them live online, where ever you are. You never can be too careful.
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When Small Businesses Need to Collect on Outstanding Debts
When the economy is in the current shape it is, it behooves small businesses to make sure they’re collecting on any outstanding customer debts. That being said, what are the best ways to go about doing that? Read more
How to Protect Your Small Business ASSets
When it comes to safeguarding your small business, there are a number of assets you need to consider. First, there is the solvency of the business itself (not to mention your personal finances). Read more
Cheaper Doesn’t Mean Better
Unlike their Japanese counterparts, the American automotive industry is well-known for cutting corners.When they’re building a car, American companies look at the sticker price and go with the cheapest part possible. Never mind that nobody wants a car that ignites when it’s rear-ended; it costs less than a safe one!
When Cheap is Just Cheap
Gluttonous executive compensation and high manufacturing costs aside, American automakers are failing because they’ve made inferior products for too long and nobody wants to buy them anymore. They could make a little bit less per car that they sell but end up selling more because their cars wouldn’t have plastic hulls, flimsy vinyl dashboards, or spontaneously-combustible gas tanks.
Many businesses throughout America think this way and are successful anyway.They don’t change till it’s too late it because they’re still profitable and because it doesn’t usually do immediate damage to their bottom line. It can even boost profitability for a little while since customers can take a while to notice.
CRM Can Help
Trimming the fat without cutting into the bone is just as important when a business is buying a business-to-business product. Buying a customer relations management system without good deal management capabilities is a lot like buying a Pinto with a shoddy gas tank: It’ll get you from point A to point B for a while but you’re going to wish you got the Toyota when you get rear-ended.
Potential deals have many steps, such as initial contact, negotiation, and closing. This is where most CRM deal management stops, but a good deal management system goes beyond this. Users need to instantly know what was said at the last meeting, what the client’s expectations are, and what their company’s goals are.
Furthermore, a good deal management system seamlessly incorporates task management so that different employees can be assigned different sub-tasks to help complete the deal.CRM systems should be elegant enough so that they can manage deals effectively but simple enough to not require any training. If it isn’t intuitive, it isn’t good CRM.
Losing a few big deals because somebody didn’t know what happened at the previous meeting or couldn’t figure out how to use your CRM system will cost your business a lot more money than you’ll “save” from buying a substandard CRM solution.
About the Author: Steve Sims is the Junior Sales and Marketing Manager for amoCRM, a hosted application developer and service provider known for its eponymous customer relations management solution. amoCRM is a proud sponsor of Small Biz Bee.
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Are you clear about your Business Idea?
Having worked with a startup since quite some time now, I have realized that one does not need to know rocket science to be an entrepreneur. You just have to plan and plan well. Right from the ideation stage to the execution to the allocation of your resources, all your activities should be planned well. Your idea need not be revolutionary in order for you to start; it just has to be in place!
Do You Lack Clarity?
One key reason why most startups fail is due to the lack of this clarity. ‘What do you want to achieve through this endeavor? What solution are you attempting to provide? Who are your target customers?’ – these are some crucial questions which need to be answered before you venture out.
These questions might seem redundant at the beginning but eventually you will realize that the answers to these questions hold the key to your success. As your venture grows, there would be different teams pulling and pushing this idea in different directions- your marketing team will have a different understanding of your product/service, your product team will have a different approach. At such a juncture your vision of the product/service is important to bring everybody on the same plane. Each team might be right in their own way and (without sounding too skeptical) might be thinking about the good of the organization, but there is only so much that can be achieved with the resourceson hand.
Don’t Be Led Astray
With new technologies coming up and new segments joining your target group, the lure to deviate from your core idea will be very strong. You will always find a better website, a better team and a better technology in the similar field of business and you would be tempted to incorporate their ideas into yours. This might be detrimental to your core idea. I am not suggesting do not take inspiration, I am just saying do not lose out on your key focus.
The clearer you are about your product/service, the easier it will be for you to steer your team in the right direction. Remember you cannot be everything to everybody but you can always be something to somebody!
About the Author: Shilpi Choudhury is a SEO, Social Media and Business Blogger based out of Bangalore, India. She is currently working for Vavia Technologies, Bangalore, specialists in developing Web and Mobile Applications.
Photo Credit: rachaelvoorhees
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Is Google+ Like a Post-Apocalyptic Facebook?
It was all the buzz in June and July this year but the disappointment of early adopters means that Google+ is like a post-apocalyptic Facebook, technologically advanced but with none but a few jaded survivors populating the streets.
I’ve been an early adopter on a few trends, I registered for Twitter early enough to get me own name but then didn’t even look at it again for about 2 years while it matured, the same with LinkedIn and I signed up for Facebook when you actually had to know the person you were friending up. Such a difference from MySpace. Do you even remember MySpace? But I digress. The problem is, with being an early registrant, that no-one really knows how a platform works so those who aren’t really engaged go back to their familiar utilities while the die-hard fans make it a useable place to be. Finally those who had lost interest realise that all their friends are talking about it again and they take another look and realize things have really improved.
At the time of writing Google+ are asking business not to get involved on the platform while users get to know how the environment works and iron out any wrinkles that still exist. But that doesn’t mean that if you have a business you shouldn’t be getting to know your way around, investigating the facilities and strategising your activities when Google+ for business finally goes live.
Does Your Business Need Google+ Like It Needed Facebook?
In the same way that it became a truism that you business needed Facebook if it was to have any chance to survive on the internet, being on as many platforms as possible is equally as important. And when you bear in mind that anything you produce which you release publically (rather than targeted to specific Circles) will be crawled by Google’s spiders plus a plethora of other benefits you should be able to see why allowing yourself to fall behind the curve is a poor option.
In the old days of three months ago Facebook was the industry killer when it came to social media. Zuckerberg could make up any rules he liked regarding our privacy and we’d just go along with it because we had no option. We’d put our business on Facebook so that we could look into our likers’ and friends’ API and use it as part of our client relationship management strategies, it was an industry expectation and if you didn’t have a Facebook page people would think there was something wrong. Zuckerberg seems to have changed his ideas about whether users actually need privacy and want the same comments to be visible to all your friends rather rapidly and purely coincidentally as soon as Google+ introduced Circles.
Set up a Google+ profile and follow everyone who’s in your sector, build relationships in the same way it was recommended you did in Facebook but with circles you’re able to keep competitors separate from suppliers, stakeholders from staff (if you think that’s appropriate). In much the same way Twitter users generally follow back so will Google+ users. Add them to your Circles and every time they Google something, if you’ve written about it, your articles will appear in their first page. That’s some good looking SEO for nothing but an on-topic blog or two.
Keep On Doing Everything You Always Did, Just Add Another Platform
In the same way that everyone was encouraged to Tweet about their blog and any new developments in their industry Google+ allows you to reach your followers in exactly the same way only you can provide a couple of paragraphs of précis and a small picture. The comments you and your friends and followers add stay associated with the original post or commenter and conversations can be ‘muted’ if you no longer want updates on that topic but you can still hear from the same people making comments on other threads.
As well as these relatively ordinary facilities you can also start hangouts with followers and their followers even if you’re not connected directly. These can take the form of either instant messages or video conference. At the moment you’re limited to ten participants at a time, but any more than that would be an impossibility to organise and control. If you want to visualise ideas that you are talking about there are whiteboards which everyone can contribute to and then save, these developments make virtual team management and integration more than just a realistic possibility, they actually make it fun! And given that Google+ integrates seamlessly with Gmail, Calendar and Documents even if you don’t use it for client relationships, internally it’s a free resource that is provided by other organisations at a premium.
Seeing Off Panda
But getting back to SEO and SEM, post Panda Farmer Google’s SERPS have been based on quality and, increasingly, social, be that bookmarking, Tweets, Facebook likes and Google +1s et cetera. Reposting your blogs on Google+ means that you can increase your outreach and get double the number of +1 (on your homepage and Google+ profile) so that as well as being searchable your social is optimised as well. Talking of +1, if you don’t already have the button, add it now. Forbes published an article saying that if you didn’t you could forget about being indexed on Google. They had to pull it again sharpish but the suspicion persists. Plus, they wouldn’t have introduced it if it wasn’t going to affect search, would they?
Some people wonder if Google+ is here to stay. Look at the fuss they had with other tools such as Buzz and Wave. They were technologies which solved nothing and in the case of examples such as Buzz were intrusive and unwelcome. Google+ offers so much more. With increased, more intelligent security and privacy it’s hard to make the comparison. And if those early adopters who couldn’t see the benefits and kept to Facebook are right to stay away, is that such a bad thing? There’s a place for them and if they like it, fine. Google+ may become the ‘Facebook for Business’ that LinkedIn seemed interested in becoming for a moment. The thing is that Google can afford to do it bigger, better and direct into SERPs.
About the Author: @DanCash is a features writer living on the south coast of England. He’s taking his laptop over to a friend’s later to show them the advantages of using Google+ in SEO so they can replicate the method on their barebones PC.
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How to Choose the Payroll Software That’s Best for your Business
There are many great benefits to having payroll software for your business. If you’ve decided to look into getting payroll software, you’ve made a great choice. Many business owners lament over the tedious hours spent on keeping their payrolls neat, orderly and tidy. With all of the tax deductions, insurance benefits, sick pay, maternity pay and wages, it takes a lot of work to keep a proper payroll. Payroll software can do everything a payroll requires automatically. All you have to do is supply it with the numbers to do the math. Choosing the right payroll software for your business is essential, and it can save you the most time and money if you do choose the right one.
Advantages vs Disadvantages
In order to begin the selection process, you have to weigh out the advantages and disadvantages of all of the programs you’re interested in. These programs usually about the same package of features: the ability to calculate wages, deduct taxes, directly deposit pay to employees’’ bank accounts and make a convenient spot for storing all of your statistics on all things related to pay. What they don’t share similarities in, however, is cost. When in doubt, always go with the least expensive option when deciding between two payroll software programs. Any company who tries to sell one higher than the others is trying to rip you off.
The Reality Is…
The reality is that any payroll software will be a viable option compared to your current way of handling payroll. The software will replace long, frustrating hours of piecing together tax files, raises, wages and checks. With any payroll software, you’ll have the option of sending funds directly to the bank accounts of the employees you have working for you. The best part of that is that it benefits all involved. Employees have a quick, easy way to get their pay, and establishing good banking habits will make their credit score improve. Employers gain security that no duplicate checks will be cashed and that paper will be saved in this process.
Based on your Preference
You should choose payroll software that you like. It should have the interactive features you’re looking for at the most competitive price. Choose software that allows you to be flexible in your needs and one that can be updated to meet them when they change. Your payroll software will become an invaluable asset to your business, and it will save you time and money over the course of its use. You’ll really learn to love just how much work the software can accomplish. All you have to do is supply it with the information, and it takes care of the rest. Payroll software programs are efficient and they are very easy to use.
Take the Headache out of Payroll
Payroll software comes in all different formats and prices. Regardless of which kind you choose, you’ll enjoy the numerous benefits of worry-free payroll maintenance immediately. You’ll get more money back in your pocket and you’ll have more time to figure out the best way to use it when you invest in payroll software.
Photo Credit: Jeremy Brooks
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Ten Things Small Businesses Need to Consider When Branding
Brand management is a process that helps your business produce long-lasting connections with your customers. Your brand is an establishment of how you would like people to feel about your business. A good brand provides a solid identity, which endears itself to your customers. Read more
