Duta Business School Indo

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When R. J. Lewis left a corporate job to start his own business in 1999, he knew his bank account would suffer. He gave up a six-figure income and assumed that the first few years of entrepreneurship would be lean.

Still, he did not realize just how much of a toll running a business would take on his personal finances. For four years, Mr. Lewis, the founder of eHealthcare Solutions, an online advertising network that is based in Ewing, N.J., and represents health care Web sites, took home about $20,000 a year and had to deplete his retirement savings account.

"It was draining to watch that savings go down," he said.

But as soon as he was able, he started saving again. Unfortunately, many business owners never reach that point. One study found that 40 percent of business owners had no retirement savings. There are a lot of reasons saving for retirement is difficult for owners, but perhaps the biggest mistake many make is assuming that they do not need to save — that one day they will sell their businesses and live off the proceeds.

Many businesses simply cannot be sold, and others end up being sold for far less than expected, said Randy Gerber, founder of Gerber L.L.C., which helps business owners manage their personal finances. And even if a business can be sold, he said, owners often have an unrealistic notion of how much it might be worth. That is why a potential sale should not be an owner's only plan for retirement.

PLAY IT SAFE By definition, business owners take a lot of risk in their professional lives because much of their net worth is tied up in one asset, typically as much as 65 to 85 percent, according to Rob Pettit, a high-net-worth planner at TD Wealth.

For this reason, they are often advised to follow two rules with the money they manage to save: invest conservatively and diversify. Following that advice, however, does not come naturally to all business owners. Many are eager to invest in stocks and do not want to consider fixed-income securities.

When Mr. Lewis started investing in the stock market, he bought mostly health care and pharmaceutical companies, industries he is exposed to through his business — a common mistake.

"It seemed to make sense for me to invest in health care because I know it so well," he said. "Most of my business is tied up in that sector." He eventually realized that it would be wise to change that approach, and he now owns shares in technology, oil and gas and financial companies.

Mr. Gerber, whose financial management firm is based in Columbus, Ohio, said he believed that assets that are liquid, have low volatility and generate income were generally an entrepreneur's best bet. Many of his clients own corporate bonds that can either be sold quickly or held to maturity, and mutual funds that invest in equities and pay dividends. He avoids mutual funds that invest in bonds, he said, because when interest rates rise, they lose value.

CUT YOUR OWN PAY? When times get tough, many owners stop saving for retirement. They either forgo salary altogether or reduce their pay. That can be a mistake, said Ellie Byrd, founder and chief executive of ForumSherpa, a business based in Atlanta that offers executive leadership and training courses.

Ms. Byrd used to run a software training company. In 2000, she stopped taking a salary, and a year later, she found herself $500,000 in debt. With no income, she could not contribute to a savings plan — or pay her bills. When a business struggles, deciding not to pay yourself may seem a natural reaction, but it can obscure larger issues.

In retrospect, Ms. Byrd says she believes she should have laid off staff members and made other adjustments before stopping her own pay.

Mr. Gerber said owners should stop saving only if it is clear the business can be turned around. If not, there probably are bigger problems, and stopping saving isn't going to solve them. "You often have to do some real soul searching to figure out why the business is struggling," he said.

Of course, there are times when it makes sense to hold off on saving personally to invest more in the company. In these instances, Mr. Gerber said, the business should be running smoothly, and the investment should promise a healthy return. He likes to see an investment, like a new piece of equipment, generate a return that is three times greater than can be gained in stocks or bonds. If it cannot do that, he advises putting the cash in a personal account.

BUY THE BUILDING Although Lenny Verkhoglaz invests in an individual retirement account, he thought he should hold more than just stocks and bonds in his overall portfolio. In 2006, Mr. Verkhoglaz, the founder of Executive Care, which is based in Hackensack, N.J., and provides in-home health care to the elderly, bought the building that holds his offices.

When he retires, he plans to sell his company and the building together. He holds the building in a separate company for rent-related purposes but thinks he will get a better price by selling the two assets together. "If I sell the company without the building," he said, "the value of the real estate may go down if the company moves out and another tenant doesn't take its place."

Even so, Mr. Gerber suggests keeping ownership of the company and the building separate. That makes it possible to sell the company and keep the real estate, collecting rent from a new occupant. A separation can also limit liability, Mr. Gerber said.

There is another advantage to owning your own building: you do not have to deal with a landlord who might raise the rent or evict you. And as a real estate investor, you have a dream tenant: yourself.

KNOW YOUR BUSINESS'S WORTH If selling your business is any part of your retirement plan, Mr. Gerber said, it is essential to know what your business is worth. And it is important to start tracking its value long before you plan to sell.

Mr. Gerber suggests hiring a professional who can figure out the current value of your company. Then determine how much money you will need to live the lifestyle you want. Most important, think about whether you will be able to increase the value of your business enough to match that retirement number.

At age 43, one of Mr. Gerber's clients decided he wanted to retire at 50. To do so, he determined, he would need to build his business to $20 million in revenue from $10 million. Doing that meant finding new distribution channels to sell his products. It is working, Mr. Gerber said, but if it was not, he would have to think about retiring later. "It's about the math," he said. "It needs to be clear."

Business owners also must be prepared to sell early if their business or their industry starts to head south. Another of Mr. Gerber's clients was in a sector that was consolidating quickly. She received an offer on her business that was far less than she believed it was worth, but she decided to take it, knowing that it would be tough to compete against the big players beginning to dominate the market. "If you think the number will get worse and not better," he said, "then get out when the getting's good."

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CRM is an important part of doing business, but solutions like Salesforce have an ongoing subscription price that can cut into a small business's budget. Additionally, these solutions often come with more features than a growing small business needs in its early stages. For a new business, learning and managing a complex CRM can be time-consuming.

"The W5T product is built on a PC application everyone uses and is familiar with: Microsoft Excel," says David Oshlag, founder of W5 Templates. "In fact, according to Gartner Research, there are over one billion users of the Microsoft Office suite product worldwide."

As Oshlag points out, the name W5 Templates is built on the five W's of most projects. He has found these five W's are universal to most work activities:

• Who does what
• What needs to be accomplished
• Where something has to be
• Why something needs to be done
• When it needs to be completed

W5T uses color coding to allow workers to easily see, at a glance, when it's time to follow up with a customer. The spreadsheet displays each project, along with contact information, date of last contact, and any notes workers need to include.

The best thing about W5T is that it works with existing software. The downfall is that if a business doesn't have Microsoft Office, W5T won't be usable. The built-in security features are also added through Microsoft's security options.

While W5T is simple and clean, there's no comparison to the interface of a service like Salesforce. Salesforce is a full app, designed to allow for easy flow from one screen to the next. W5T is a series of templates, and CRM templates are available for free. Additionally, W5T isn't the only easy-to-use CRM offered as a one-time licensing fee, rather than a monthly subscription.

For businesses impressed with W5T, Sage ACT! Pro is worth investigating. Available for nearly $100 less than W5T, Sage ACT! Pro provides a single view of contact information, e-mails, activities, and to-do lists. The product also works with a variety of mobile devices, including iOS and Android tablets and phones, as well as Blackberries. Currently, W5T requires Windows XP or 7 or Mac OS X, along with Microsoft Office.

One thing W5T offers that other companies doesn't is customization. The company tailors the product's interface to each individual business's needs. W5T also offers Google mapping to allow for easy access to each customer's information.

CRM is an important part of growing a business. W5T and Sage ACT! Pro are both easy-to-learn alternatives to much more complex CRMs. Both services offer a free trial to allow you to determine which software is best for your business.

Thank you for using rssforward.com! This service has been made possible by all our customers. In order to provide a sustainable, best of the breed RSS to Email experience, we've chosen to keep this as a paid subscription service. If you are satisfied with your free trial, please sign-up today. Subscriptions without a plan would soon be removed. Thank you!

Thank you for using rssforward.com! This service has been made possible by all our customers. In order to provide a sustainable, best of the breed RSS to Email experience, we've chosen to keep this as a paid subscription service. If you are satisfied with your free trial, please sign-up today. Subscriptions without a plan would soon be removed. Thank you!

I was at a party on Sunday and the host had hired a contractor from TaskRabbit to man the barbecue. She did this so she could enjoy her party and mix with her guests instead of worrying about the food.  

The TaskRabbit did a great job and before he left he also fixed her broken front door nob.  

Welcome to the task economy.  

There's been lots of buzzwords coined to describe the shift from traditional employment and towards temporary and/or self-employment.  Examples include The Temp Economy, The Gig Economy, Freelance Nation, The Grassroots Economy, The Artisan Economy (a term we use), The Bottom Up Economy (we posted on this one yesterday, etc. etc. etc.  

I'm starting to warm to the task economy because all work - and not just temporary work - has become much more task oriented.

There's also been almost an explosion of firms offering services that provide work on a task basis.  Our friends at Staffing Industry Analysts tell us there are at least 60 online staffing firms that provide task-based workers.  This, by the way, does not include crowdsourcing firms.

The chart below comes from the PC World article Inside e-ployment: Online staffing services put temporary labor within reach of small businesses.  It only covers 6 firms, but it's an interesting mix and the chart highlights major differences.

It's clear from our research on independent workers that the role of talent intermediaries like these is going to continue to increase.  There are two primary drivers of this trend:

1. Government crackdowns on employee misclassification is leading more hiring firms to use 3rd party labor providers to help avoid the misclassification risk.  

2. Growing numbers of independent workers needing access to buyers of their services.  

What ever we end up calling it, expect to hear more about the task economy in the future.

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Thank you for using rssforward.com! This service has been made possible by all our customers. In order to provide a sustainable, best of the breed RSS to Email experience, we've chosen to keep this as a paid subscription service. If you are satisfied with your free trial, please sign-up today. Subscriptions without a plan would soon be removed. Thank you!

Thank you for using rssforward.com! This service has been made possible by all our customers. In order to provide a sustainable, best of the breed RSS to Email experience, we've chosen to keep this as a paid subscription service. If you are satisfied with your free trial, please sign-up today. Subscriptions without a plan would soon be removed. Thank you!

Brought to you by Staples, the world's largest office products company and second largest internet retailer. Staples now carries the HP Officejet Pro X series, the world's fastest desktop printers, with up to twice the speed and half the printing cost of color lasers, setting a new standard for business printing. You can visit them at http://www.staples.com/

New HP Printer Breaks World Records

It isn't every day a piece of technology lands in the Guinness Book of World Records. So the recent announcement that HP's new desktop printer is setting world records for speed got attention. Technology reviewers from PC Magazine to CNET came forward to try out the device's various features and came back with rave reviews.

On the market since 1988, HP has cornered the market on small business printing, providing multi-function devices ideal for home offices and small business suites. The two HP OfficeJet Pro X Series devices that set records, and are sold exclusively at Staples, are single-function printers dedicated solely to print jobs. The HP OfficeJet Pro x451dn can print 55 pages per minute in general office mode, offering duplex and enterprise network capabilities. The HP OfficeJet Pro x551dw can print a jaw-dropping 70 pages per minute in office mode and, in addition to duplex and enterprise capabilities, adds wireless printing and a USB slot on the front of the device.

Revolutionizing Business Printing

The small business world is growing each year, as technology allows small businesses to compete with big businesses in ways never before seen. Recognizing this, HP has honed in on this segment, creating a line of desktop printers that are productive enough to meet the daily demands of a small business, while still keeping operating costs low.

Along with HP's new lightning-fast models, Staples has added HP's newest multi-function printers to its stores. Staples has seen a growing demand for deskjets, as HP technology has allowed for print quality that rivals laser printers at a fraction of the price. Laser printers not only command a higher price tag, toner cartridges can run in the hundreds of dollars. HP's quick-drying ink allows a busy entrepreneur to rush documents from the printer to the conference room without worrying about smudges.

Staples, America's number one choice for ink and toner, has a full line of XL cartridges for HP's deskjet line, each having a print yield of thousands of pages. Small business owners can also return empties to Staples stores for $2 in rewards toward future purchases. With additional rewards and rebates, business owners can shave money off office supply budgets while speeding up print time.

A Growing Market

Inkjet printing is a growing market, with the devices expected to replace laser printers in offices around the world. Technology consultant Zac Butcher says the market will grow 5.2 percent each year, with an expected 18.9 million inkjet printers in use worldwide by 2016.

Inkjet printers have come a long way since 1988, with prices dropping from around $1,000 to just a few hundred dollars. With added functionality for scanning, faxing, and copying, the HP multi-function printer can replace four separate devices in some offices. For the startup business, a trip to Staples can provide all of the functionality a business needs to start doing business right away.

To determine which HP inkjet printer is right for your small business, visit your local Staples store to look at each deskjet model in person. The Staples staff works one-on-one with small business owners to find the perfect device to fit each business's individual needs.

Thank you for using rssforward.com! This service has been made possible by all our customers. In order to provide a sustainable, best of the breed RSS to Email experience, we've chosen to keep this as a paid subscription service. If you are satisfied with your free trial, please sign-up today. Subscriptions without a plan would soon be removed. Thank you!

Brought to you by Staples, the world's largest office products company and second largest internet retailer. Staples now carries the HP Officejet Pro X series, the world's fastest desktop printers, with up to twice the speed and half the printing cost of color lasers, setting a new standard for business printing. You can visit them at http://www.staples.com/

New HP Printer Breaks World Records

It isn't every day a piece of technology lands in the Guinness Book of World Records. So the recent announcement that HP's new desktop printer is setting world records for speed got attention. Technology reviewers from PC Magazine to CNET came forward to try out the device's various features and came back with rave reviews.

On the market since 1988, HP has cornered the market on small business printing, providing multi-function devices ideal for home offices and small business suites. The two HP OfficeJet Pro X Series devices that set records, and are sold exclusively at Staples, are single-function printers dedicated solely to print jobs. The HP OfficeJet Pro x451dn can print 55 pages per minute in general office mode, offering duplex and enterprise network capabilities. The HP OfficeJet Pro x551dw can print a jaw-dropping 70 pages per minute in office mode and, in addition to duplex and enterprise capabilities, adds wireless printing and a USB slot on the front of the device.

Revolutionizing Business Printing

The small business world is growing each year, as technology allows small businesses to compete with big businesses in ways never before seen. Recognizing this, HP has honed in on this segment, creating a line of desktop printers that are productive enough to meet the daily demands of a small business, while still keeping operating costs low.

Along with HP's new lightning-fast models, Staples has added HP's newest multi-function printers to its stores. Staples has seen a growing demand for deskjets, as HP technology has allowed for print quality that rivals laser printers at a fraction of the price. Laser printers not only command a higher price tag, toner cartridges can run in the hundreds of dollars. HP's quick-drying ink allows a busy entrepreneur to rush documents from the printer to the conference room without worrying about smudges.

Staples, America's number one choice for ink and toner, has a full line of XL cartridges for HP's deskjet line, each having a print yield of thousands of pages. Small business owners can also return empties to Staples stores for $2 in rewards toward future purchases. With additional rewards and rebates, business owners can shave money off office supply budgets while speeding up print time.

A Growing Market

Inkjet printing is a growing market, with the devices expected to replace laser printers in offices around the world. Technology consultant Zac Butcher says the market will grow 5.2 percent each year, with an expected 18.9 million inkjet printers in use worldwide by 2016.

Inkjet printers have come a long way since 1988, with prices dropping from around $1,000 to just a few hundred dollars. With added functionality for scanning, faxing, and copying, the HP multi-function printer can replace four separate devices in some offices. For the startup business, a trip to Staples can provide all of the functionality a business needs to start doing business right away.

To determine which HP inkjet printer is right for your small business, visit your local Staples store to look at each deskjet model in person. The Staples staff works one-on-one with small business owners to find the perfect device to fit each business's individual needs.

Thank you for using rssforward.com! This service has been made possible by all our customers. In order to provide a sustainable, best of the breed RSS to Email experience, we've chosen to keep this as a paid subscription service. If you are satisfied with your free trial, please sign-up today. Subscriptions without a plan would soon be removed. Thank you!

Homebrew is a new seed-stage VC fund focused on investing in what they call the bottom up economy. They define this as "the idea that technology is now helping individuals and small businesses drive economic growth and innovation." 

Key quote from their blog post explaining their investment thesis:

For many decades, the cost, complexity and rigidity of technology limited its power and benefits to large corporations - a Top Down Economy. Today, we're in the midst of a transformation where technology is increasingly accessible enough, cheap enough and flexible enough to empower individuals and small teams. Teams of 5, 50 or 500 can compete with organizations tens or hundreds of times their size or create entirely new markets with innovative products and services. 

They go on to explain the drivers of the bottom up economy are technology and the shift to the business of one, meaning solopreneurs.  They have a nice description of the business of one:

The path back to personal economic stability?  It's no longer a career in middle-management and a pension.  We'd argue it's entrepreneurial activity.  Being able to enter the marketplace not as part of a large corporation but as an individual, team or emerging enterprise.  Building small businesses or offering talent, time, creations or assets directly to customers with little friction.  Not a single wage, but many wages.  Supplementing or creating entirely new income streams.  

We've long followed and forecasted the growing role solopreneurs and micro-businesses (those with less than 5 employees) are playing in the economy.

Homebrew is yet another example of the growing recognition by a broad range of organizations that self-employment and independent work has not only entered the mainstream, but is a key driver of economic success in today's world.

CRM is an important part of doing business, but solutions like Salesforce have an ongoing subscription price that can cut into a small business's budget. Additionally, these solutions often come with more features than a growing small business needs in its early stages. For a new business, learning and managing a complex CRM can be time-consuming.

"The W5T product is built on a PC application everyone uses and is familiar with: Microsoft Excel," says David Oshlag, founder of W5 Templates. "In fact, according to Gartner Research, there are over one billion users of the Microsoft Office suite product worldwide."

As Oshlag points out, the name W5 Templates is built on the five W's of most projects. He has found these five W's are universal to most work activities:

• Who does what
• What needs to be accomplished
• Where something has to be
• Why something needs to be done
• When it needs to be completed

W5T uses color coding to allow workers to easily see, at a glance, when it's time to follow up with a customer. The spreadsheet displays each project, along with contact information, date of last contact, and any notes workers need to include.

The best thing about W5T is that it works with existing software. The downfall is that if a business doesn't have Microsoft Office, W5T won't be usable. The built-in security features are also added through Microsoft's security options.

While W5T is simple and clean, there's no comparison to the interface of a service like Salesforce. Salesforce is a full app, designed to allow for easy flow from one screen to the next. W5T is a series of templates, and CRM templates are available for free. Additionally, W5T isn't the only easy-to-use CRM offered as a one-time licensing fee, rather than a monthly subscription.

For businesses impressed with W5T, Sage ACT! Pro is worth investigating. Available for nearly $100 less than W5T, Sage ACT! Pro provides a single view of contact information, e-mails, activities, and to-do lists. The product also works with a variety of mobile devices, including iOS and Android tablets and phones, as well as Blackberries. Currently, W5T requires Windows XP or 7 or Mac OS X, along with Microsoft Office.

One thing W5T offers that other companies doesn't is customization. The company tailors the product's interface to each individual business's needs. W5T also offers Google mapping to allow for easy access to each customer's information.

CRM is an important part of growing a business. W5T and Sage ACT! Pro are both easy-to-learn alternatives to much more complex CRMs. Both services offer a free trial to allow you to determine which software is best for your business.

I am blogging on behalf of Visa Business and received compensation for my time from Visa for sharing my views in this post, but the views expressed here are solely mine, not Visa's. Visit http://facebook.com/ visasmallbiz to take a look at the reinvented Facebook Page: Well Sourced by Visa Business. The Page serves as a space where small business owners can access educational resources, read success stories from other business owners, engage with peers, and find tips to help businesses run more efficiently. Every month, the Page will introduce a new theme that will focus on a topic important to a small business owner's success. For additional tips and advice, and information about Visa's small business solutions, follow @VisaSmallBiz and visit http://visa.com/business.

Use Customer Complaints to Build Your Business

Every small business owner dreads a customer complaint. Whether it comes through your website, an e-mail, or a phone call, it feels like a personal slight against all of your hard work. But the longer you stay in business, the more inevitable a complaint becomes. Over time, a successful business owner learns that the key isn't to achieve a spotless complaint record. The key is to use complaints to help strengthen your business.

Research shows that customers value small businesses because they understand customers, anticipating their needs and exceeding expectations. A full 97 percent of customers state that small businesses are likely to say thank you, showing appreciation for a customer's business. However, as a small business owner I've found that these high expectations can also set a business owner up for failure. A sudden surge in business can create an overworked staff and stretched resources, leading to the occasional disappointed customer.

Invite Feedback

It may seem like a scary idea, but soliciting customer feedback could be the best thing you ever do for your small business. Before you post a feedback form, be prepared. Not every comment will be a glowing commentary on your staff, facilities, and products. However, after the impact of any criticism wears off, you'll likely be left with new insight into your business.

A customer's opinion that your product breaks too easily could lead to your decision to switch material or manufacturers. A comment about the sloppiness of your sales staff could give you the incentive to create your first company-wide dress code.

Respond Quickly

When a complaint rolls in through social media or e-mail, it's important to respond as quickly as possible. Nearly half of survey respondents state they expect to hear back from a brand within an hour of filing a complaint. This is especially important if the complaint is posted on your business's social media page, where everyone can see it.

Responding quickly demonstrates to your customers that you not only value their opinion, but their time as well. Sixty-six percent of customers revealed that in providing good customer service, the most important thing a business can do is value their time.

Social Media is Important

Whether or not social media is important to your business strategy, it's important to your customers. While 45 percent of customers expect businesses to provide customer service through social media, more than 60 percent of customers say they feel brands do not effectively communicate with them through social media sites.

Too many businesses use social media as a marketing tool, posting messages without paying attention to what customers are posting. Interacting with your social media followers not only shows your customers you care, it also has the ability to give you invaluable insight into how your business is being viewed by the community it serves.

Keep in mind that one person's opinion is just that. However, over time you may notice certain trends that could lead you to make changes to your business that reduce customer complaints permanently. By taking each complaint seriously, you can fine-tune your business until it well exceeds customer expectations.

Thomas Friedman's Welcome to the Sharing Economy is a rave piece on the sharing economy in general and Airbnb in particular.

This is but one of many recent glowing articles on the sharing economy. Examples include The Economist featuring it in cover story a couple of months ago and the Reuters story on the sharing economy going mainstream.

The high profile Altimeter Group has also become fans of the sharing economy. They call it the Collaborative Economy, which they describe as:

Social technologies radically disrupted communications, marketing, and customer care. With these same technologies, customers are now sharing products and services with each other, bypassing existing institutions. Beyond business functions, the Collaborative Economy will impact core business models.

They are pushing the sharing economy as one of the next big things for corporations. Click here to for their collaborative economy report and here for their list of 200+ collaborative economy companies.  

We view the sharing economy as part of the broader shift from fixed to variable cost business models. 

This isn't as sexy as other descriptions, but we think it better describes the economic forces behind this shift.

Our favorite source of information on the sharing economy is Shareable Magazine.  It covers the business, social and environmental drivers behind this trend.  Everyone should read it.  

Ramon Ray badly busted his knee in a basketball game. This post is his reflections and lessons learned.

At Smallbiztechnology.com we do our very best to bring to you the latest insight in how you can use technology as a tool to grow your business. By the comments we receive on a daily basis and our increase in traffic we know that we're succeeding and providing value to you as you grow your businesses.

However, at times, LIFE happens.

Things happen in all of our lives – that give us pause and time to reflect and think.

For some it's BIG things like Hurricane Sandy, Boston Bombings, Sandyhook or other major incidents. For others it's "small things" – things that don't make it to the news media but that are important to much smaller segments of our individual lives.

This is what this short post is all about.

On Friday, I was playing some basketball with my son and his friends. Well towards the end of one of our games, I busted my knee. My knee cap came out of joint, I crumpled to the floor screaming – and the rest is history. My knee swelled. My knee (and entire body) was in intense pain. And I have to "rest" for days and days in bed.

I've only been in bed for about 24 hours or so, and this 24 hours has given me a renewed appreciation for the disabled.

Sitting in bed, with my back aching a bit from just sitting in bed for so long, needing help to move to the bathroom and relying on others for my food – I thought (and continue to think) about the many folks in our country and around the world who live a life similar to mine or worse – every single day.

I think about the elderly folks in a local Brooklyn nursing home that my wife and I used to visit on a frequent basis.

I imagine the middle aged woman who can't scratch that itch in her leg. I imagine the little boy who will never see his parents. I imagine the strong former athlete who will never run to catch a ball. I could go on.

You can imagine with me. But we really don't have to imagine – those with disabilities are all around us – they are our family. For some reading this – it is you.

Ironically, I was reading the National Speaker's Association Speaker Magazine about W Mitchell, who in a motorcycle accident had 60% of his body burned, including his fingers being burned off and in a airplane accident (in a second accident) became paralyzed from the waste down.

What's my point? Well I have two points.

First – I'm eternally grateful that I have all my limbs and mental faculties in tact and working just fine.

Two – I have so much more compassion for those who, in my eyes, are not as "fortunate" as me.  I have new respect for the disabled.

I'm also very thankful for my awesome family whose around to help me.

I could go on, but my "little boboo" has given me time to reflect, be grateful and be appreciative.

What about you?

Jessica Kourkounis for The New York Times

Robert Waks, of the Training Center for Sales and Business Development, told a small-business owner he needed to better understand selling.

Last year, my custom conference table business suffered a collapse in sales that caused me a great deal of anguish and led me to try a number of solutions. Most important, I hired a sales consultant to provide a critical evaluation of our selling methods, to suggest changes and to work with us to carry out those recommendations. This was expensive, costing almost $38,000, but the knowledge we gained from a fresh look at our sales operation provided a number of important benefits.

Here is a quick recap of our sales process at the time the trouble started. Inquiries were coming to us in two forms: as e-mail or as phone calls. We would ask a series of technical questions meant to reveal the functional aspects of the potential client's table needs. We would also ask about the budget. If we received answers, we prepared a proposal, a PDF that contained images of the options we recommended and information on wood choices, power/data options and pricing.

We saw these proposals as a good way to demonstrate our engineering skills and craftsmanship. I had developed the format myself, and we had used it to good effect, with more than $16 million in sales since 2003. I also developed an assembly-line method for the proposals: ask questions, design like crazy and send them off. Next!

When I promoted one of my bench guys, Nathan Rossman, to sales representative, I taught him the same method. And when I added another sales representative, Don Wuest, a year later, he worked in the same manner. We were brilliant at responding to requests, but we did no follow-up. The funny thing is that it was working. At least it was until it wasn't.

At the beginning of 2012, I set a sales target of $200,000 a month, and in the first two months of the year, we hit it. But March came in weak: we sold only $135,732. April was almost as bad. And May was even worse. I hired five people in 2011 to ensure that I could get $200,000 worth of work out the door each month. That was now looking like a mistake.

Naturally, I spent a lot of time thinking about what was happening and eventually I decided my problem was the economy. In spring 2012, there was a lot of chatter about poor job growth and the possibility of a double-dip recession. I latched on to that story and convinced myself that the problem was out of my hands. Then, in May 2012, I expressed my concerns to my Vistage peer group and got some good advice from the other business owners — namely, that the problem was not the economy and that I needed to look within my own organization. One of the members of the group, Sam Saxton, owns a company, Salter Spiral Stair, that is in many ways similar to mine. It manufactures custom items and sells them over the Internet. He told me that he had hired a sales consultant who had helped him double his sales volume in two years.

Being told that my selling methods might need improvement was a blow to my pride. I had been closing deals for 24 years, and I thought I had a pretty good handle on how it should be done. But I called the consultant Mr. Saxton recommended, Robert Waks. And to be frank, he came on a little strong. I was not prepared for a sales professional unleashing his skill set on me. While my main method had been to let my product speak for itself, to tell the story of how we designed and built tables, Mr. Waks suggested a different approach. His pitch was that we first needed to understand selling, pure selling.

Ultimately, I found him convincing. His ideas made sense to me. On the other hand, I was aware that I was getting the full treatment from an ice-to-Eskimos kind of salesman. And his services were not going to be cheap. He recommended a three-part contract: first, evaluations of me, my sales staff and our methods. Then a 10-week training course for me and my staff. And throughout that, and continuing for a year, monthly consultations. One meeting would be one-on-one with me, and the other with me and my three salespeople. All of this would cost $37,000 — $8,000 to start, the rest spread out in 12 payments.

We began with the evaluations. My three sales staff members and I were given psychological profile assessments along with a test to gauge our attitudes toward selling. I was given an additional set of questions designed to reveal my capabilities as a sales manager. Mr. Waks also spent a morning listening in as we talked to clients on the phone.

A couple of weeks after the evaluations, I received a thick report with the results. The good news is that we all had potential to be sales professionals, although some work would be involved. The bad news was that I scored a zero, literally, as a sales manager. I was not performing any of the practices that defined the role. No regular meetings. No continuing training for the salesmen. No consequences for failure to meet goals. No data gathering, other than the gross sales amounts.

Soon after the evaluations, we started classes. These were group sessions, and most of the attendees came from small companies like mine. I was one of the few boss-level attendees. We were taught the Sandler method, which focuses on understanding whether the person we are talking to has power and how to get to the decision maker. It also teaches techniques of influencing interactions with potential customers, to maximize our chance of closing a deal. I realized that we had been making some classic mistakes.

In particular, we were giving away our design and engineering expertise and revealing our pricing way too early in the process. It was an easy task for a potential buyer to hand our proposals to our competitors and ask them to beat our price. Also, we were making no attempt to figure out where our customer contacts sat in their company's hierarchy. We had no idea whether the person we were speaking with could make a decision, and we made no attempt to work our way up the power structure so that we could make our case to the people who would actually choose a vendor. We did not have good systems for keeping track of inquiries, and we were not keeping good records of what the sales staff was doing all day.

By the middle of last July, we started to deploy the new techniques, and we started to close deals again. We also introduced a technical modification to our sales process. Instead of sending out PDFs to clients, we started presenting our ideas in Web chat sessions, using screen-sharing software to show potential buyers a 3-D interactive model of our proposed design. This is very cool to see, but it leaves the client without a set of images to hand to our competitors.

Our sales started to recover in July, and in August we hit our target, closing deals worth $200,607. Even better, we kept up the pace for the rest of the year and, somewhat to my surprise, we have continued to do so. We have exceeded my $600,000 sales goal in every quarter since beginning our sales training.