Life and Business Improvement

Recently, I was watching news on moneywatch.com on my laptop that spurs me in writing this article. In the news, Sales Machine received some comments from reader complaining about having to “click 10 times” in order to view a long post. This kind of complaint is an outward sign of a way of thinking that automatically programs a person to fail. Let me explain. Everybody has a set of arbitrary rules defining the meaning of events in their life. Most people don’t set these rules consciously; instead, they just “grow” into them based on their temperament and upbringing. Because of this, many people have rules that tend to make them miserable. I have known people who, in order to consider themselves really happy, must be on a wonderful vacation, drive the coolest car in town, win the lottery, fall in love, eats some rare delicacy, or some other unusual or even once-in-a-lifetime event. In almost every case, these same people can find virtually any excuse to be miserable. If they mis...

In spite of the numerous social-economic problems we face today, a sustainable future is possible! Watch this:

Segmentation consists of group of buyers or a process of identifying groups of buyers who share similar set of need and wants.  It is the breakdown of the market for a particular product or service into segments of customers, which differs in terms of needs, wants, lifestyle, religion, income level, gender, buying process etc, and their response to marketing strategies. Today’s organisations need fresh thinking on how to operate and compete in the new economy characterised by hypercompetition, customization and digitalisation. An organisation cannot serve all the consumers in the entire market, the consumers are too many and are too diverse in their buying process.  An organisation therefore, needs to identify the market segment(s) it can best serve. Organisations been aware of these facts has been segmenting their products offerings to target a particular segment(s) of the market rather than using the old method of mass-marketing.  ...

Niall Ferguson: The 6 killer apps of prosperity | Video on TED.com

A constant no sayer among your employee can be frustrating and draining for everyone. There are three tips in managing this negativity trends. That is, checking your own behaviour, being specific with examples, and discussing the impact on other people—to get this pessimistic person to commit to changing his behaviour. Have you ever managed a really negative person? The ‘no sayer’, the employee who shoots down every idea, the one who pushes back on everything asked of him or her? This kind of behaviour is more than annoying; it's obstructive and draining. Managers at all level are saddle with the responsibilities of managing this kind of people. Some people posses an innate pessimism. Their tendency is to question and criticize rather than adopting ‘a can do attitude’. If you are a manager and this sounds familiar, here's how to create shift in behaviour. You first need to evaluate your own conduct. If you decide that a team member is too ...

As the global war for talent grows increasingly fierce, management of people is a key concern among organisations.  Once thought primarily in terms of cost, people in successful companies are being valued as rich sources of talent, skill and diversity, which are critical to the success of the organisation. Managers have identified the shortage of skills as one of the main threat to prospect of growth; they are devoting a greater share of resources to protecting themselves.  For this reason, the role of human resource in an organisation has been and continues to be scrutinized in terms of how it can add most value with the rest of the organisation, helping to overcome the challenges adherent in the people agenda. In defining performance measurement, Dessler states that it “means evaluating an employee’s current or past performance relative to the person’s performance standards”.  This entails evaluation or assessment of the actual p...

Outsourcing is the contracting of a company’s specific function or functions to another or other companies for the purpose of efficiency or fast delivery of services. Most a times, the function been outsourced to another organisation is considered non-core function of the contracting company. Though outsourcing has been in operation as long as the work environment existed, recently, companies embrace the outsourcing model more to carry out narrow functions, like billing, order processing, data entry etc. These processes are considered to be done more effectively, efficiently and less costly by contractors who may be considered to have more specialised personnel, tools and facilities. Outsourcing takes many forms; organizations still hire service providers to handle a single business process but some organizations outsource whole operations. The most common forms of operations where organisations outsourced wholly are information technology and bus...

There is an adage that ‘he who fails to plan, plan to fail’. This statement is as true as tomorrow, because whether you like it or not, tomorrow must surely come – unless you are dead! Planning is the integral part of our daily activities. If you don’t plan your day before going out, no wonder you failed everyday! For marketers planning is an essential task that must be continually undertaken. As we will see, shifting market conditions, including changing customer needs, advance in technology and competitive threats, almost always insure that what worked in the past will not work in the future, thus requiring a new strategy on how a product is marketed. Marketing planning is also important since it is often a prerequisite for obtaining funding whether one is a marketer in a large corporation seeking additional money for his or her department or is part of a small start-up company looking for initial funding. The 21 st century business environment...