Apple has been granted a new patent for it’s iWork Numbers application. You might want to take a look at it.
It relates to when you want to copy data into a new chart that the new data is associated with the old data into a new data set.
That’s business.
Do you have a Mac and want to make some money? Do you have skills or talents that are underutilized? Are you just itching to do something more with your life?
I’m putting on a FREE Hour Seminar for those that have Macs that are considering starting their own business. From your “idea” to your “Grand Opening” I will walk you through the necessary steps to get started. I will cover:
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Attention Grad Students, University Students and High School Students!
If you are using a Mac, business classes, entrepreneur courses and business accounting just got easier. Our Back to School Special offers students the opportunity to purchase our Advanced Business Planning system for just $25 when you enter the Student Discount Code.
ION FreshStart’s Advanced Business Planning uses iWork – Pages, Numbers, Keynote. We have a series of business plan templates and workshops that allow you to create your professional and sophisticated business plan.
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I’ll be attending the Personlize Media Conference at the Chautauqua in Boulder, CO on June 20-21, 2011.
The Agenda covers:
It should be a good conference, I’ll blog about it when I’m done. Change is all around and this conference will be a part of that change with technology being at the forefront of media and content.
As a startup entrepreneur you can sit at home or be a mompreneur or dadpreneur if the case requires it, but how does one get the job done or keep their business running in a secure or private manner.
Conferencing. Webinars.
But it’s just not for home or virtual offices any more, it’s also for coworking (see my previous blog). Conferencing, whether video/audio/web, is becoming big business. Whereas communicating has gone from phones to email, we’ve also added IM (Instant Messaging) and social media and now conferencing to the mix.
Conferencing is just another step into breaking down the barriers to communicate. And for the startup entrepreneur it can have its place in many of the tools to communicate with both your customers, vendors, and colleagues, and on a less extent, families and friends living in other states or abroad.
Why have a online conference and what does it entail, what can you do?
- Time – the time needed to get together all at the same time, especially across time zones.
- Distance – the time it takes to get to the location can be time consuming, and everyone at the same time.
- Recorded/Not Recorded – recording the conference using a video camera and audio recorder takes multiple gadgets and inputs to complete the conference session.
- Audio/Video/White Board – recording the sessions notes is usually handled by a presentation software such as iWork Keynote or MS Office Powerpoint. However, if you write something down, you need to take those notes down for further distribution to attendees.
- Remote sharing or computer access – you can chat and record the conversation, but you can also share files or remotely control another computer.
How is it done?
- Yourself – with a MobileMe, Yahoo, ICQ, ooVoo, or other chat service account.
- Hosted Services by a business or your own company servers – Some of the hosted services below you can use for free, pay a fee for, or your can host your own by using Mac OS X Server Snow Leopard. Here is standard and HD quality for the video conferencing.
- Others – you need an audience of more than yourself.
- Hardware and software to communicate.
Here are a list of some of them. Some offer free services, others cost, do your due diligence to see if one is right for you.
- iChat (free on a Mac) + MobileMe – while MobileMe provides a number of online services, it’s chatting quality is great. But you need both Macs to have an account. Cost is $99 a year for each Mac.
- Skype.com – requires nothing more than loading the software and having an account. If you want to record it, you’ll need additional hardware or software.
- ViVu.tv – host video conferencing and webcasting.
- GoToMeeting.com – meetings, webinars, and training.
- WebEx.com – similar to the above.
- ooVoo.com – chat from mobile to mobile, mobile to computer, and Mac to PC, pay per use or by month, three way chatting is always free.
Image via Wikipedia
When it comes to startup entrepreneurs, one of the key factors of getting started is the key word: Focus. What should they focus on to get them going?
Have you heard of the comment, “What you focus on is what you get!” It’s true. The same thing goes for seeing a glass half empty or half full. If all you see is obstacles and not your vision of accomplishing something it is demotivating. But even if you focus on the positive, what do you focus on?
I once was working a job at a small retail company and the Regional Director was visiting and “motivating” us by stating, “Focus, focus, focus!” But of course, most of the people took that and ran “fast” with what they saw, but each in their own direction with activities that, while helpful to the business, were actually NOT the right priorities for the business. Her leadership skills were fear based and while they were “detailed,” her motivation did not embrace what the priority of the organization’s goals were. It was a scattered view of “getting it all done and fast,” it intentionally “blurred” everyone’s focus costing the company time, money and resources.
So, as any startup entrepreneur, here’s a short list of what to focus on:
- Product – putting in all of the features necessary and getting the product out the door.
- Competition – seeing what your competition is doing and not letting them out of your sight and ensuring you’re better than they are.
- Ideal Customer – what are your customer’s needs and wants.
So, what do you think a startup should focus on?
Here’s the wrong answers:
- Product – focusing solely on your product and building the most complete and perfect Swiss Army knife for your ideal customer takes time and resources, and maybe no one will want it. Therefore, you’ve wasted your resources and reduces your profit potential.
- Competition – if you focus on what your competition is doing even THEY can miss the boat of what a customer wants and needs. If they’re heading down the wrong path, they just get there sooner than you do. Don’t chase your competition’s bunny trial which may lead to a dead end.
These are the correct answers in the correct order of priority:
- Focus on your ideal customer’s needs and wants, it is here that you spend your time and effort so that they are willing to give you their money for your solutions.
- Product – when you focus on your ideal customer and their needs and wants your product becomes the result of that time and effort.
- Competition – while focusing on your customer’s needs and wants you’ll then focus on your product and services, but you need to keep your competition in your peripheral vision, not completely out of sight, but still in view and not your main focus.
A focused priority will keep you moving ahead in the right direction.
Startup entrepreneurs need to have the guts and confidence to take on “the world” with their new idea. But as with any new idea, most are bound to get butterflies in their stomach. But here’s how to look at them
- Butterflies in your stomach – this is a normal reaction toward fear of the unknown, some of you have small butterflies, others have BIG butterflies in their stomach. Some have so many BIG ones that they become paralyzed by their fears to the point of inaction.
- No butterflies in your stomach – You never want to NOT to have butterflies in your stomach. If you get to know any US fighter pilots, Marines or Army, you’ll understand their fearlessness about their job. But they still get butterflies. It’s when you do NOT have them that is of cause of concern.
- Getting your butterflies to fly in formation – here’s the answer to most people’s view of a certain situation: never have no fear, but control your fear to get you through what you need to do.
If you want to know more about the lessons learned about butterflies, just read about the account of Captain Sully, the airline pilot that landed his plane into the Hudson. What are the lessons:
- Push yourself to your limits – when you learn to fly each aircraft has a unique “flight envelop” which it stays within and pilots learn what these boundaries are. You need to learn your personal envelope to see what you are capable of including whether or not you can sing on American Idol. This means putting oneself into various situations and learning to get out of them over and over so that it becomes second nature to you, not a “it could never happen to me” reaction.
- Build confidence by training, humbled to know more – is built by doing #1 above and learning and doing the skills correctly, over time, many time, and not overnight. But you have to define, learn, and faithfully apply the best lessons learned over time. There is a certain protocol of a good life, learn it and live it.
- Discipline and take care of yourself first – (butterflies flying in formation) is the correct mental attitude. Have you ever flown in an airline and the cabin depressurizes? What do they say do? Put the O2 mask on yourself FIRST, THEN on those around you. Pilots call it having a “deliberate calm,” because staying calm under fraught circumstances requires both conscious effort and regular practice.
- Be a leader - being a leader is not about being dictatorial, “It’s about me,” or creating a “dictatorial fear” about doing something, but one of taking responsibility for you and those around you. Invert the organizational pyramid, and serving leaders is what it’s about.
- Share both the good and the bad – when it comes to things that turn out. If it’s good, then congratulate the effort, if it turns out bad, figure out how to prevent and prepare for it in the future. Tell the truth.
- Hope for the best, prepare for the worst – circumstances are never planned for, they just happen, it’s about “what if” this could happen and then planning some actions based on the inputs.
- Job is not done until you’re home – Sully’s job did not end once he hit the water, it ended when he got home after all of the things were completed. He checked his plane twice to ensure everyone was out. He
Bottom line – Sully’s USAF military training of his mission, discipline, and responsibility never left him, even in the business world.
