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If everyone at your small company started coughing tomorrow you might suspect swine flu. But would you send your workers home? Could you send them home?
After reporting earlier this week that one of its employees was diagnosed with swine flu, Ernst & Young told its workers they could work from home. Typically, large firms like Ernst & Young have the technological resources and size to make such an offer.
The accounting giant later said it could not confirm the earlier diagnosis, but with the number of swine flu cases growing each day this is an issue you should think about carefully. Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano has told American workers to stay home if they feel sick. If they were to take her advice, what would that mean for your business?
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I'm a big fan of finding a mentor or a counselor to help you launch or grow a business, but that doesn't mean everything they tell you is right.
Lately, a couple of entrepreneurs told me horror stories about advice they got early on in their careers.
One woman who runs a successful fashion Web site told me this week that a small business counselor actually discouraged her from leaving Corporate America and starting her own firm.
Thank goodness she didn't listen.
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I keep hearing lately how a recession is a good time for people to start businesses.
Call me cynical, but this sounds like something a crazy person would say, or someone just being counterintuitive to get attention. There’s a lot of that has been going around lately.
“It’s completely counterintuitive,” agrees Thomas Koulopoulos, author of "The Innovation Zone: How Great Companies Re-Innovate for Amazing Success.”
But he still thinks there’s some benefit to unleashing your entrepreneurial dreams during a crummy economy.
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It's April 1 and the world has not come to an end.
Many of you might seem surprised because the latest cyber worm threat, Conficker, was billed as a ticking time bomb. Even 60 Minutes got into the act this past weekend with a scary piece on the cyber threat.
I don't know about you, but these endless stories about cyber sabotage are starting to sound like parent threatening a child with the bogeyman.
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The federal government has been pouring money into failing financial behemoths with what appears to be little to no oversight. Executives at these major financial firms that caused the collapse of the financial system are even getting bonuses for jobs not well done.
But just mention some help for small businesses and the "we-need-scrutiny naysayers" crawl out of the woodwork.
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I know banks are tightening the screws on lending but before you head over to your local loan shark, let's think outside of the business-financing box for a second.
There are a few sources of money we haven't thought about -- credit unions and microlenders.
These are not traditional pathways to money for small businesses, but things are changing.
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With the credit markets gummed up, everyone is holding their breath and waiting for banks and other lenders to re-open their money spigots. But for many small businesses the funds may be too little, too late.
Until recently, GiGi Stetler's 35-employee business -- RV sales Broward in Fort Lauderdale, Fla. -- was booming, hitting sales of more than $20 million in 2007.
In 2008, the business "crashed," she said. Sales plunged to $11 million, and three months ago she let go of the bulk of her staff and now only employs nine. A decline in sales and the tightening of credit was the double whammy for her business.
"We can barely pay the electric," she laments.
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It's getting ugly out there for small business owners that have been struggling to keep on paying high health insurance premiums for themselves and their workers. So ugly, in fact, that more and more are just dropping coverage.
Because of ever-escalating premiums and falling sales, Craig Sumsky, director of Philadelphia-based DJ company Cutting Edge Entertainment, had to put the kibosh on health insurance for his office manager this year.
In response, Sumsky's office manager handed in her two-week notice. She needed a job that could get her benefits, he said.
Sumsky is not alone. One recent poll put out by credit card company Discover uncovered a disturbing trend.
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Why does everyone insist on making my life more difficult?
I can't just pop a DVD into the player and have it start playing a movie without watching the previews. People don't respond to my e-mails with a message history anymore. And lately, Twitter keeps saying it's "over capacity" and won't let me tweet.
Now the Better Business Bureau (BBB) is getting in on the make-my-life-more-difficult act.
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Recently we decided to take the kids to the Museum of Natural History in Manhattan and we encountered parking hell.
I was circling the neighborhoods near the museum looking for someone who was pulling out of a primo spot, and my husband kept insisting I just pull into a parking lot. He had to go to the bathroom but I just couldn’t bring myself to drop $40 plus for a lot.
Turns out, a young entrepreneur’s recession-busting idea could have saved us all some grief.
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