Gross Profit Margins
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Every business in the world, whether it is selling bath rugs or shipping thermonuclear materials, is in the game to make a profit. It isn’t enough that they are covering the cost of operations, because that’s just getting by. They need to actually be making money off of what they’re doing. How much money differs from person to person – the Chinese, for example, have a cultural tendency to apprec
Spinach – No, Not That Kind
For a time in the 80s, it seemed as if Japan – with its seemingly-alien values and precepts – was poised to take over the world not through force of arms, but through unprecedented economic growth. Their economy always felt inches away from simply being able to buy its way into international superiority, and some analysts pinned that down to a difference in mindset between the Western corporate culture and that
Time, And Why Businesses Don’t Value It
Time is an interesting thing. Everyone in the world has a finite amount of it, making it a bit of a commodity. Yet, at the same time, people seem to have an inexplicable desire to waste it despite acknowledging that they “don’t have the time.” This is doubly true in business, even if it isn’t always apparent. Sure, a split-second isn’t going to be a big deal when handling freeze dried
Reflections on Open-Mindedness in the Business World
In a nutshell, 2011 represented a lot of firsts for me. First times can always mean so many things, and more often than not they correspond to failures, or mistakes, or disappointment. I guess I was just unbelievably lucky. All my firsts were beautiful. They were meaningful, insightful – and in some small or big way you were part of it.
Open-mindedness is a gift not many people are blessed with. But you can l
Mergers and Acquisitions: An Introduction
Businesses combine forces all the time. There are instances when it is necessary for two businesses or more to combine power or be bought and sold to make sure of survival. The two most popular are mergers and consolidations. They are both combinations of two companies; the difference is that in a merger, one company is dominant – it absorbs the other into itself, therefore the second company becomes a depart
Picking a Partner
Every resource is limited, according to some military analysts. From manpower to time to finances, everything that a functional army on the move needs is limited. The same concept applies to business, perhaps to an even greater degree. Making money requires something to make it with, and most people don’t have that much “raw material” on hand. One way to get a little more of those resources, as we
Tools of the Information Trade
No matter what industry you’re in, it pays to stay informed.
In today’s interconnected world, all sectors are intimately related to one another. An issue that affects the prices of oil, such as the Libyan crisis, will have a definite impact on aviation, shipping and transportation. This means that any fluctuation in fuel prices will have an impact on the delivery or shipping costs of your business.
Oil
The PDCA Cycle
Big companies usually follow a tried and tested method to improve their organization. There are many such methods that have been developed by experts over the years. In Japan, companies implement kaizen in their organizations for development. The big automaker Toyota has developed its own way to improve. This is known as “The Toyota Way.” Meanwhile, companies in the West use different models for improve
Software: In-House vs. Licensed
It can be said that, sooner or later, every business is going to find itself needing specialized software to fulfill one function or another. However, most companies aren’t built or in a position to develop their own solutions to their software concerns. Even big tech-oriented companies sometimes don’t have the manpower or resources to create their own in-house software to handle their needs, which is w
The Hottest Gadgets for Business Travel
Let’s be honest – technology is great. Imagine for a moment trying to do your every day job without the use of the modern computer. I can still remember my excitement when I played my first Flash game – imagine trying to create presentations and send them around the globe like we do now if we were still in those days.
Every year our technology gets better. My favorite thing is when I identify a pet pe