Advice on growing your small and medium sized business, SME, in the UK. Hiring and managing staff and finance plus marketing all on one website
Low-risk approach, long-term view and lower borrowing advantageous in today’s business environment –
UK businesses can learn from adopting elements of the family business model
A new report entitled ‘Family Business: In Safe Hands?’ published today (2nd March) by Barclays Wealth and the Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU), suggests that family businesses have leadership values and particular characteristics which may position them well to ride out the economic downturn.
A study has found that 1 in 5 British workers would rather have sex with their boss for a quick promotion than the drawn out process of working hard.
Frontline bank staff are denying small firms loans backed by the government’s £1.3 billion enterprise fund – because they have not been told how the scheme works.
The Federation of Small Businesses yesterday said that some bank workers were not even aware of the existence of the Enterprise Finance Guarantee scheme.
Rented office provider Regus is to giving start-up firms free use of its business centres.
It’s all part of its £10m British Chambers of Commerce-backed Get Started campaign. Now Regus is calling on other businesses to join the cause and do what they can to inject new activity into the UK economy.
Over 80 per cent of UK small businesses see smarter use of communications technology as the lifeline to help beat the recession, according to a study of small and medium-sized business (SMB) owners participating in the Business Growth and Development Programme (BGP) at Cranfield School of Management. The study of the 31 small businesses between £500,000 to £20 million turnover, which was commissioned by Siemens Enterprise Communications, found that 84 per cent of those interviewed think that enhanced communications will deliver competitive advantage in the current recession. A further three quarters want improved productivity when they are investing in IT and communications.
Budding entrepreneurs and small businesses could inject over £5bn a year into the UK economy and meet the economic crisis head-on, thanks to Smarta.com – a cutting edge new online platform backed by some of the biggest names in British business.
More than 70% of British adults feel as though they have been bullied or witnessed bullying of some sort in the workplace and over 30% were too worried about the repercussions to report the problem.
A study of 934 Brits commissioned by the UK’s leading recruitment scoring website has found that 73% of Brits have, at some stage in their career, witnessed workplace bullying or inappropriate behaviour and almost 1 in 3 admitted they were too worried about their job security to report the incident.
In spite of the economic slowdown online shopping is still thriving, with more people taking advantage of the cheaper prices available on the net and shopping in the comfort of their own home.
However, internet expert WebTrends is warning ecommerce sites that they must provide a seamless online experience, or they could face missing out on a significant piece of the action, as internet shopping gets increasingly competitive .
In this current climate, hiring new permanent senior level staff to run projects might be considered a major risk and financially unfeasible for small businesses. But, to remain competitive, companies cannot afford to put plans on hold, put their head in the sand and hope the upturn isn’t too far away, while the competition steals a march.
10 tips to save on insurance premiums
With money getting tighter and costs increasing, all businesses are looking to make savings wherever they can. Insurance brokers also have overheads and many may not be too keen to highlight things that will reduce their commission earnings.
Andy Lopata talks to Warren Cass about the success of his online business networking and events company Business Scene
With so many opportunities to network in the UK many business people are more than spoilt for choice; they are becoming increasingly confused by the range of choices available to them.
Once they have decided whether it is more convenient to network locally or regionally, they then have a range of events to choose from at all times of the day, with the opportunity to network over breakfast, lunch and dinner.
The New Year is traditionally a time for change with people promising to embark on more fulfilled lifestyles. Research has found that owning a business actually has a positive affect on the wellbeing of small business owners.
I have recently read a number of articles on the problem of absenteeism and was struck by how most of them completely ignored the causes of the problem, and instead focused solely on the measures organisations were taking to ensure that persistent offenders are deterred from taking time off.
Spare room start-ups have increased by 16% during the past 12 months taking the number of UK home businesses to 2.5m, the report by BT and Enterprise Nation showed.
Released as part of Small Business Week, the study said home based entrepreneurs are also bucking the trend when it comes to confidence in their prospects during the financial crisis.
