Bridging the Gap: Musings of a Career Librarian: start-ups

Showing posts with label start-ups. Show all posts

24 January, 2013

Becoming an Entrepreneur in 12 weeks?

Paul Brown is a contributor at Forbes magazine. In this article he details how some of his ideas* have been expanded upon by Tom McDonough (www.getappia.com), to form the basis of an idea (and eventual a course) about becoming an entrepreneur in 12 weeks.

This idea falls in nicely with other pieces I have discussed in the employment trends and start-ups posts. Essentially, all of us will need to develop some familiarity with the traits of good entrepreneurs. As the nature of work shifts to away from traditional 40-hour per week full time jobs to contract work/consulting the ability to sell your skills/services and/or create new ideas/products will become critical.

In this article Mr. Brown discusses how he agrees with Mr. McDonough, and encourages everyone to use the 12 week framework to try out being an entrepreneur and see if they a) like it and b) can make money with an idea/product/or service they have.

If you have read this blog with regularity these ideas shouldn't seem outrageous. Whether you are looking for a more traditional full time job or looking to improve your skills as an entrepreneur you need to be well informed. Learn to improve your skills at finding high quality information about those you will be working with (companies, people, industries...) visit your local library and checkout their business resources (or check if your state offers virtual resources for its residents.) Check with a state office for small business resources.

If you have questions you think others could benefit from, I would look forward to some conversation via the comments.

*Paul B. Brown is the co-author (along with Leonard A. Schlesinger and Charles F. Kiefer) of Just Start: Take Action; Embrace Uncertainty and Create the Future recently published by Harvard Business Review Press.

19 July, 2012

Is traditional employment dead?

Last fall I tried to jump start my motivation for the job search by attending a job search club at my local public library. For me the best positive from this group was this blog. One of the other things we discussed at great length was whether traditional employment was dead. Most of our discussion was about the difficulty for an employee to find a traditional full time job with benefits. Instead people would have to begin working part time, project work, consulting, contract work, etc.

This piece details how many people are perhaps giving up on traditional work. Those of us still trying to find full time work may find this hard to believe, but there is a growing group of people leaving full time jobs to become more entrepreneurial. Kevin Wheeler gives us 5 Reasons Why Traditional Employment is in Trouble.

What do others think? Are you ready to abandon full time work to venture out on your own?

09 July, 2012

Taking Charge of Your Career

A few weeks back an article appeared in The Atlantic that has stirred up some controversy. It talked about the near impossibility of women 'having it all'... I debated discussing it here on my blog, but it didn't quite seem to fit perfectly with my general theme of advice for those looking for work. Then I saw this response to that article, 5 Tips to Take Charge of Your Career (Startup Success for Women). The author, Mariette Johnson Wharton, is an entrepreneur in the field of marketing and has some good advice (that is of course valuable for men and women.)

#1 Negotiate for promotions and salary increases...
          don't for get my many posts about salary, especially this one on finding salary and employment data.

#2 Start doing the job you want.
Most of us know what we want to do, but opportunities can come at unexpected times and in unexpected ways...

#3 Work on developing a strong leadership style.
          Try reading my friends Jerry Steuerwald's leadership blog.

#4 Become a subject matter expert.
          Knowing your subject better than anyone else will equal success as an entrepreneur.

#5 Build strong relationships in industry.
          Networking, networking, networking.

It doesn't matter if you are considering starting your own business or remaining in a traditional company or if you are a man or a woman... these tips can be valuable for shaping your future employment prospects.

Good luck.

28 June, 2012

State Small Business Development Centers

27 June, 2012

Small Business Development and Entrepreneurship

As I alluded to in my last post, I am beginning a series of pieces that will provide detailed summaries of information freely available for start ups, small businesses and entrepreneurs. To get this series rolling, I will state the obvious, government resources will/should become your best friend. The grandfather of these is the US Small Business Administration.

Every state has at least on district office for the SBA, and numerous college and university resources guides. My next piece will attempt to provide links state level resources for small businesses, that come from sources other than these federal district office or colleges and universities. Also most states have regional offices within them. I am attempting to link to the state level offices to manage the length of the list... but here are some quick web searching tips:

search for:

name of state AND "small business development"
should result in these regional and college sites
name of state AND "small business grants"
should result in sites focused on funding small business development

The remaining pieces will then get into specific resources for the specific aspects of starting and running a small business: writing a business plan, industry and market analysis, demographic information, competitive intelligence, funding.

I welcome thoughts, suggestions and comments.

20 June, 2012

The F-word entrepreneurs love to hate.

As I mentioned about a week ago I am working on a series of pieces to cover resources for entrepreneurs. These resources will run the gamete from demographic and market research sources to covering the basics for writing a business plan. While I finish these posts up I heard this story yesterday on NPR's All Things Considered, it covers failure and start-ups, how it is more common than we would like but is a driving force for the spirit of the entrepreneur.

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