THIS WEEK’S HEADLINES:
- California’s Budget Position in May
- Median Home Price in SoCal Hits Five-Year High
- Retail Sales in May
- Events of Interest
- July 17, 2013: LAEDC Mid-year Economic Forecast: The Future of Energy in the Southland
Tag: small business
10 Lessons College Won’t Teach You — But Entrepreneurship Will | Entrepreneur.com
College is a step toward adulthood for many, but the transition from bachelor’s degree to entrepreneur can feel a bit jarring. Keeping your chin up, a stiff upper-lip and other empty clichés everyone says to you can’t really prepare you for one really important truth: There isn’t a curriculum for adulthood. Knowing this, here are a few changes to expect when you take your first steps away from college and into starting you own business.
1. Attendance is always mandatory.
In college, you may have ditched class or ducked out early and still managed to pass. This isn’t going to fly in the startup world. Rain or shine, young treps need to show up and do so in a punctual fashion. Not only will it keep you in the loop of the day-to-day activities but will also set a good example for employees.
2. Scheduling isn’t set in stone.
Your Friday morning biology lab is finally over. What a relief. While you may be thanking your lucky stars you don’t have to roll out of bed after a crazy night to go and dissect a frog, don’t get too excited. Adult life and entrepreneurship means you’re beholden to a schedule of necessity rather than attendance sheets. As a young trep, you are the harbinger of your own success, meaning you sometimes will need to ask yourself to come in on a Saturday.
3. Free time isn’t free.
Just as there is no such thing as a free lunch, there is no such thing as “free time” in the world of startups. During college you may have had huge breaks between class or long holidays but startup reality is quite different. While most of your friends are working at finding a nine-to-five job and attending happy hour, you are slaving away at your business plan or putting out fires at your company. And that’s just the reality of being an entrepreneur — sacrificing free time in exchange for freedom.
via 10 Lessons College Won’t Teach You — But Entrepreneurship Will | Entrepreneur.com.
Weekly Economic Forecast | LADEC
THIS WEEK’S HEADLINES:
- March S&P / Case-Shiller Home Price Indices
- April Personal Income and Consumption
- Events of Interest
- June 14, 2013: Think Asia, Think Hong Kong
- July 17, 2013: LAEDC Mid-year Economic Forecast: The Future of Energy in the Southland
Sleeping Bag Coat For The Homeless Draws Fashion Industry Attention | Huffington Post.com
A coat developed by a social entrepreneur and designed for homeless people is now a somewhat hot item in the high-end fashion world.
Earlier this month, 23-year-old Veronika Scott told PBS News Hour that she had plans to add a for-profit arm to her non-profit company, The Empowerment Plan, which has donated over 1,000 coats to the homeless since launching in late 2010.
Scott’s foray into the private market comes after she debuted the coats at last year’s Aspen Fashion Week to much fanfare, helping her land a $100,000 investment from the billionaire founder of Spanx, Sara Blakely.
Co-marketing is a powerful lead generation tactic|ducttapemarketing
One of the greatest lead generation tactics around is the trusted referral. I mean, I know you know that, but what are you actually doing to take advantage of it?
photo credit: Wicked LIttle Cake Company via photopin cc
What are you doing to make certain that every single day dozens of unpaid sales calls are being made on your behalf?Sound intriguing? Co-marketing, or getting others to actively market your business, isn’t a new concept, but surprisingly few do it actively.
The basic idea behind it is to form a small network of “best of class” providers who can act as an additional arm of marketing for each other. I’ve seen this done with remarkable results – sometimes tripling and quintupling the number of leads an organization creates – particularly for businesses that operate on a the local level.
Weekly Economic Update | LAEDC
THIS WEEK’S HEADLINES:
- First Quarter GDP: Moderate Growth
- California Housing Market: Inventory Dips Below 3-Month Supply
- Global Economy
- Events of Interest
- May 15, 2013: LAEDC International Trade Outlook
Weekly Economic Update | LAEDC
THIS WEEk:
California’s Budget Position in March
HEADLINES:
- Retail Sales Weaken in March
- Wholesale Prices Retreat by 0.6% in March
- Events of Interest
- April 23, 2013: Economic Outlook for the San Gabriel Valley
- May 15, 2013: LAEDC International Trade Outlook
What the Rolling Stones Can Teach You About Business | Inc.com
In December, my wife, Elaine, and I attended a 50th-anniversary concert of the Rolling Stones at Brooklyn, New York’s new Barclays Center. They’re often referred to as the Strolling Bones these days, and with good reason. They’re old. You can’t help noticing how weathered their faces look. So it’s all the more amazing to watch Mick Jagger, at 69, strutting around the stage just like he did half a century ago. I couldn’t take my eyes off him. He and I are about the same age. “Why is he doing this?” I asked myself. “He doesn’t need the money. What is it?”
Then it hit me. I dropped down into my seat and started to laugh. “Why are you laughing?” Elaine shouted over the din. “I just figured out what’s been driving me all these years,” I shouted back.
As I told her later, I’d had an epiphany. I’d suddenly understood the meaning of the word passion. Mick Jagger, I realized, keeps doing what he does for the same reason that I keep doing what I do: because he has to. Performing defines him. He has to do it in order to feel alive–which is also why I start and build businesses.
The Next Step After a Mistake | The Simple Dollar
I’ve messed up many, many times along my financial journey. I’m willing to bet you’ve messed up a time or two as well.
I’ll spend too much. I’ll forget a bill and have to face the consequences of the lateness. I’ll try to adopt a new positive habit and then find myself slipping in my diligence with that habit.
Whenever I find myself making a big financial mistake, I feel a ton of regret. I’ll usually find myself wondering whether or not I’m a failure and whether or not I’m actually going to be able to continue on a better path.
Can I do this? Can I really do this?
This is a thought process that I’m far from alone in going through. Almost everyone I’ve ever talked to who has challenged themselves to make a life change has made mistakes along the way, mistakes that left them second-guessing the whole process. They’re left with guilt and doubt and a sense that this whole thing might just be a failure.
It’s not a failure.
Mistakes are a normal part of anything new that we take on. We are not perfect. We make mistakes because we’re trying something different than what we’re used to.
The real challenge is to learn how to handle those mistakes and turn them from being setbacks into being tools for success.
For me, there are three powerful tactics for moving on from a mistake.
10 Perks Your Small Business Can Afford | Inc.com
Perks that make your employees happy don’t have to cost an arm and a leg– really.
A happy, engaged workforce is a high performing workforce. When you hear of companies like SAP that offers onsite putting greens or Google, which offers onsite everything, you probably think, “We have 25 employees and cannot compete on that level. And where would we put a putting green anyway?”
Dispatches From The Front 