Month: February 2013

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Issues for a prospective owner director – a dilemma

Businessman burying his face in his palms

Sam is an experienced manager and has worked for over twenty years in his industry. He has also sat on two not for profit boards and enjoys the governance role. Now he has an opportunity to buy an equity stake in a small business that has a product and service for which market demand is growing.

The business has not been growing as quickly as the market and revenue has been pretty flat for the past three years. The current owners are a husband and wife team and are tired; they have run the business for many years and want to retire.

The proposal is that Sam should purchase 40% of the company and take a seat on the board. The existing owners would retain 30% equity each and a shareholders agreement would stipulate that board decisions would require a 70% majority to be agreed. The current board has three members consisting of the owners and an ‘independent’ chairman who is the lawyer and a long-standing friend of the owners. The proposal is that he should remain as “He adds a lot of value and sees things we would miss”.

Sam intends not to work in the company but to be merely a shareholder and director. He has ideas for improving the growth and increasing the value of the company but wants to retain his full time employment in a larger corporation as a security measure. His employer is happy for him to take on a board seat and there is no direct competition between the two companies so Sam would have no conflict of interest; however, Sam’s boss, who is a friend and mentor to Sam, is uneasy and has suggested that Sam could find himself outmanoeuvred in the boardroom and overcharged for his equity. Sam is appreciative of the counsel but believes the shareholder agreement protects his interests. He would like to discuss board dynamics with the current owners but they seem not to be interested as they say the chairman handles all the compliance and they just run the business so there is nothing to worry about.

How should Sam handle this issue?

Many readers of this blog will be familiar with my newsletter The Director’s Dilemma. This newsletter features a real life case study with expert responses containing advice for the protagonist. Many readers of this blog are practicing experts and have valuable advice to offer so, again, we are posting an unpublished case study and inviting YOU to respond.

If you would like to publish your advice on this topic in a global company directors’ newsletter please respond to the dilemma above with approximately 250 words of advice for Peter. Back issues of the newsletter are available at http://www.mclellan.com.au/newsletter.html where you can check out the format and quality.

The newsletters will be compiled into a book. If your advice relates to a legal jurisdiction, the readers will be sophisticated enough to extract the underlying principles and seek detailed legal advice in their own jurisdiction. The first volume of newsletters is published and available at http://www.amazon.com/Dilemmas-Practical-Studies-Company-Directors/dp/1449921965/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1321912637&sr=8-1

What would you advise?

Julie Garland-McLellan has been internationally acclaimed as a leading expert on board governance. See her website atwww.mclellan.com.au or visit her author page athttp://www.amazon.com/Julie-Garland-McLellan/e/B003A3KPUO

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Foundations of Consulting — Part 1: What Do Consultants Do?

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Peter Block, in his seminal book, Flawless Consulting, explains that a “consultant” is someone who is trying to change another person, process or organization, but who has no direct control over what they are trying to change. Usually, that change is intended to improve performance – the effective and efficient achievement of goals.

One of the greatest frustrations of consulting is the desire to change your client’s organization, but not having direct influence to accomplish that change. Experienced consultants have learned to work with – and even appreciate – the indirect nature of effective consulting.

You might argue that a leader acting as an internal change agent is not an internal consultant because he or she does have at least some direct control over staff members. However, there is not nearly the extent of direct control that you might assume – especially during long, but successful journeys for change.

The highly collaborative and facilitative internal consultant or leader does not always exercise direct control and often is quite successful in guiding change. Thus, a successful leader during change is acting much more like Block’s definition of consultant than you might realize.

It might be useful to consider the many perceptions that people have of consultants and the many roles that consultants might play in a project. Consultants often act as:

  • Advisor — giving expert advice to solve a problem or achieve a goal.
  • Coach – helping individuals clarify and achieve goals and also learn.
  • Collaborator/partner – working with people to benefit from the relationship.
  • Educator/trainer – helping others develop new knowledge, skills and insights.
  • Expert – providing content expertise in certain areas.
  • Facilitator – helping a group to decide what it wants to accomplish and then helping the group to achieve those desired results.
  • Problem solver – clarifying problems, using various styles and approaches to “solve” them.
  • Researcher – collecting, organizing and analyzing information.
  • Facilitator – guiding groups or individuals through learning experiences.

Other roles might include analyst, synthesizer, impartial observer, critic, friend and mentor. These are mostly positive roles. Of course, some people have strong negative impressions of consultants, as well. They might view consultants as outsiders, charlatans or even as nerds.
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Look for the articles in this series, including:

  1. What Do Consultants Do?
  2. How Do Consultants Work?
  3. Most Important Goals and Working Assumptions of Consultants
  4. Major Types of Consultants
  5. Internal and External Consultants
  6. Good Reasons – and Poor Reasons – to Hire Consultants

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For more resources, see the Library topics Consulting and Organizational Development.

Information in this post was adapted from the book Field Guide to Consulting and Organizational Development by Carter McNamara, MBA, PhD. For training on consulting skills, see the Consultants Development Institute. For more resources, see the Free Management Library’s topic All About Consulting .

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Carter McNamara, MBA, PhD – Authenticity Consulting, LLC – 800-971-2250 Read my blogs: Boards, Consulting and OD, and Strategic Planning .

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Foundations of Consulting — Part 6: Good Reasons to Hire Consultants and Poor Reasons to Hire Consultants

An-office-man-sitting-behind-his-desk

Welcome to this six-part series on the foundations of consulting. If you have not been following along with us, then we encourage you to read parts 1-5, referenced from the bottom of this article. Part 1 establishes the basis for the series by using Peter Block’s definition of a consultant as someone who is trying to change another person, process or organization, but who has no direct control over what they are trying to change. (We highly recommend his book “Flawless Consulting.”) This article describes good reasons and poor reasons to hire consultants.

Good Reasons to Hire External Consultants

  1. The organization has limited or no expertise in the area of need, for example, to develop a new product or program for customers and clients.
  2. The time of need is short-term, for example, less than a year, so it may not be worth hiring a full-time, permanent staff member.
  3. The organization’s previous attempts to meet its own needs were not successful, for example, the organization developed a Strategic Plan that was never implemented.
  4. Organization members continue to disagree about how to meet the need and, thus, bring in a consultant to provide expertise or facilitation skills to come to consensus.
  5. Leaders want an objective perspective from someone without strong biases about the organization’s past and current issues.
  6. A consultant can do the work that no one else wants to do, for example, historical data entry. (Some would argue that this is not really a consulting project.)
  7. A funder or other key stakeholder demands that a consultant be brought in to help further develop the organization.

Poor Reasons to Hire External Consultants

The following reasons are likely open to disagreement – some people would argue that some or all of the following are good reasons to hire a consultant.

  1. The organization wants a consultant to lend credibility to a decision that has already been made, for example, the Board of Directors has decided to reorganize the nonprofit, but the Chief Executive Officer disagrees – so the Board hires a consultant to lend expert credibility to their decision. Many consultants might consider this reason to hire a consultant unethical.
  2. A supervisor does not want to directly address a problem of poor performance with one of the employees, so the supervisor hires a consultant to do the job that the employee should be doing. This is an irresponsible action on the part of the supervisor.
  3. The organization does not want to pay benefits (vacation pay, holiday pay, pension, etc.) or go through the administrative processes to withhold payroll taxes (social security taxes, federal taxes, etc.) for a position — a position that seems consistent and long-term, e.g., longer than a year or more — so the organization hires a consultant. This reason for hiring a consultant is likely to be illegal and could result in the organization paying fines and penalties to the appropriate government agency. The organization should proactively contact the IRS to discuss this situation.

What do you think?

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Look for the articles in this series, including:

  1. What Do Consultants Do?
  2. How Do Consultants Work?
  3. Most Important Goals and Working Assumptions of Consultants
  4. Major Types of Consultants
  5. Internal and External Consultants
  6. Good Reasons – and Poor Reasons – to Hire Consultants

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For more resources, see the Library topics Consulting and Organizational Development.

Information in this post was adapted from the book Field Guide to Consulting and Organizational Development by Carter McNamara, MBA, PhD. For training on consulting skills, see the Consultants Development Institute. For more resources, see the Free Management Library’s topic All About Consulting .

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For more resources, see the Library topics Consulting and Organizational Development.

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Carter McNamara, MBA, PhD – Authenticity Consulting, LLC – 800-971-2250 Read my blogs: Boards, Consulting and OD, and Strategic Planning .

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The “I’m So Stupid” Defense

attractive-black-man-keeps-hands-praying-gesture-prays-while-works-desktop-wears-transparent-glasses-looks-with-pity-expression

Playing dumb is really not a smart crisis management move

After being taken to court for underpaying a cook at his Oriental Teahouse restaurant in Melbourne, Australia, to the point where she was owed $28,000 in back wages, owner David Zhou appears to have decided some crisis management was in order.

We would assume that’s why Zhou, who runs a restaurant group which operates three other locations in Australia, agreed to an interview with Smart Company, but what exactly made him think that the “I’m so stupid” defense was a legitimate one, the world may never know.

Here’s a selection of choice quotes, from the Smart Company article by Cara Waters:

Zhou told SmartCompany the underpayment was not intentional and the case was an anomaly.

“We had trouble finding out about it because she was not returning calls, if she really had issues she should have raised the question a long time ago,” he says.

“I just ask myself why has this happened and I talked to my bookkeeper about why has this happened and I really think it is a bad mistake.”

Zhou says Oriental Teahouse has tried hard to be a good business, with many staff working for the group for 10 and 15 years.

“We are a happy company and a happy family and always generous but we made a mistake, as more and more people come on board things can get complicated and particularly these HR things,” he says.

Oh well he was TRYING to be generous, see? He just made a mistake cause these HR things, like paying the correct wages, are just SO tricky that honest, happy restaurant groups which run four successful businesses get confused about it. Their professional bookkeepers too!

Why it doesn’t work

Claiming ignorance of the most basic facts of your own business is probably one of the most ridiculous methods of crisis management you could attempt to employ. In this case it’s even more outrageous because Zhou just faced the same type of case last year!

Assuming that your audience is foolish enough to blindly believe lines like, “We had trouble finding out about it because she was not returning calls,” is flat out insulting. It isn’t going to earn you the sympathy of anyone, and it does have a good chance of inciting some folks who might have remained otherwise uninterested (not to mention attracting the attention of some wily crisis management bloggers).

In fact, even if you really were ignorant of the basic daily workings within your organization, it would be extremely unwise to share that with the world at large.

Balanced reporting?

Our colleague Tony Jaques actually sent this story over, and he was quite astute in pointing out that not only was this an example of spectacularly poor crisis management, but also a demonstration of the fact that, if you can find a sympathetic writer, you can get away with just about anything. Well, on the page at least.

Of the 659-word article, 45 words were dedicated to the fact that there was another recent complaint against the tea house, for the exact same reason, that had been settled out of court in favor of the complainant. The rest was filled with Zhou’s protestations of innocence, as well as a hefty segment interviewing the HR consultant who represented Zhou in the case, a far cry from balanced reporting. Shame on you Smart Company!

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For more resources, see the Free Management Library topic: Crisis Management
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[Jonathan Bernstein is president of Bernstein Crisis Management, Inc., an international crisis management consultancy, author of Manager’s Guide to Crisis Management and Keeping the Wolves at Bay – Media Training. Erik Bernstein is Social Media Manager for the firm, and also editor of its newsletter, Crisis Manager]

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Tips For Wireframes

Wireframe layout of a website

Wireframes allow developers, designers, trainers, managers, marketers, etc. to communicate and transfer knowledge to different types of audiences through the use of diagrams, images, models illustrations, or drawings. They exist in the form of screen shot, diagramming, and modeling applications. A few of these features are already included within existing applications. These suites of tools provide the ability to translate concepts into functional requirements, prototypes, and eventually real models or products. Another important capability is the facility to present easily understandable views of processes and procedures.

They are extremely useful in helping to avoid misinterpretations of deliverables in a global market by providing:

  • a view of, e.g., user interfaces, procedures, and schemas (for interactions, work flows, and relationships),
  • the ability for early design decision making , and
  • a means for translating complex ideas into simpler concepts or thoughts .

Many of these tools are accessible on the web for free. Here are some tips for choosing a wireframe:

  • Make sure that the application does what you need it to do and functions in a way that is easiest for you to use. For example, can it easily help to develop use cases, testing scenarios, flow diagrams, site maps, functional specifications, charts, processes, prototypes, etc.?
  • Can it create a view of the information architecture and aid in organizing data into categories, visual frameworks, and models?
  • Does it fit within your system platforms (web-based or desk-top application)?
  • Can saves be performed in various formats and are they shareable?
  • Check out the options. Is it suitable for you – can it help with online static content as well as dynamic content?
  • Check out ease of use. Does it provide, e.g., ease of navigation, drag and drop, preformatted styles and templates for flow charts, org charts, and diagrams.
  • Is it interactive; can it create a simulation or can comments be added? Does it allow for online learning, presentations, storyboards, and mockups to explore a wide variety of design options using different formats?
  • Are objects reusable?
  • Is it flexible enough for use on mobile devices?
  • The most expensive may not be the best application. Check out licensing agreements and costs before purchasing. Make sure you have the correct number of licenses for the number of machines or platforms that is needed for the present and the future.

In the end, when deciding on a wireframe tool, think of the above questions as well as:

  • Can it help to provide information and knowledge to help meet business goals?
  • Can it aid in training and marketing for understanding the product?
  • Can it help in presenting departmental, software, or functional processes?
  • Can it help to meet the company goals and provide the desired outcome?

Wireframes aid the technical writer in creating a structured framework for communication. It is the skeleton of a product or process and is a great aid to get technical writers through the first stages of development. You might say it’s an outline and provides a background from which to begin building.

Please leave a comment if you have used or find that wireframes are indeed useful.

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Anonymous(e) Training Analysis

mouse-in-the-wall.

We talk about being the fly on the wall or the mouse in the wall that can hear every thing going on everywhere. This is more than water cooler buzz. Employees want to know what their bosses really think of them and bosses want to know what employees think about them, about the company, etc. Training is often sought out as the reason when something doesn’t feel right in the company anymore. Sometimes it is a training problem. Often it’s not. The solution, however, can be found by the mouse in the wall.

I believe Anonymous(e) Training (its sophisticated name) is coming back. I just made up that term, but I think it’ll make sense to you in a minute. You’ve seen Undercover Bosses or some other reality show like it. There is another related reality show–where someone comes in from outside and discovers what’s really wrong your failing business. Now is the time for Anonymous(e). The mouse in the wall can determine what, if any training, needs the company has, and idenify the other general needs that training can’t fix.

Now, I’m not saying it’s because of Generation Y that we need to do this, but they are our youngest workers. We need to start there anyway.

With more free time and easy access to electronic devices, the new generation entertains themselves clandestinely rather than work. Talk about productivity taking a dive and the only person who seems to care is you. Any time they are bored, out come the electronic devices; they can do both: the minimum standard at work and play games, surf the Net, watch videos, or listen to outrageous. What does it matter? They’re getting the job done. You may say, “It’s not true.” It is. The minimum standard can kill productivity, but you knew that already.

I’ve heard it from my own students’ mouths–that is from those who work. They do it in class, too. They are truly multi-tasking. Don’t think they won’t do it in a meeting. They can turn off the sound and still use their smart phone or tablet a hundred different ways and still look like they are paying attention. They can’t really help it if their brains operate faster than the information they are handed. Attitudes worsen usually when they are given something in a form that is foreign to them–in paper. It’s not a giant leap backwards, but it does feel a bit awkward. When was the last time, you used an actual typewriter?

Consider this, the newest generation of college grads rarely take notebooks to class–at least not paper ones. Some of the students may have gone to a high school that had all their books online. In fact, it’s rare that my college students have to buy books. They are quick to say their minds are so used to flying faster than they used to the second they become bored they turn to electronic games or the social network. And they are addicted to their use as well.

Getting them to go “cold turkey” in the office is easy. Buy a couple of devices that make getting a signal impossible. Now you may find more people taking smoke breaks, but you can manage that as well. That’s the Y generation, I think…just one group of workers.

X and the rest of us come next.

Most of us have adapted, except poor, old Betty in the corner there. She’ll sit there until she dies; she even take a downgrade rather than learn something. But we have adjusted, and we find that some of us are just as addicted as the Y generation. That’s not the worst of it. We are looking at our job differently. We are sure we are doing the job as we used to only it doesn’t seem good enough. We used to get awards. Office politics, boss’s pet, etc. Anyone to blame but ourselves.

Here’s where Anonymous(e) Training comes in. The mouse has to be a real “people” person to ask random employees to give him or her a run-down of the office. If the office is big enough, the mouse will be practically invisible; however, in a smaller office, the manager may have to announce a new person in the office just hired (not high enough up, low enough to be non-threatening) and the mouse will be going around getting “acquainted.” How it functions. Who’s the boss’s pet? Who’s the biggest slacker or slackers. Believe me, the mouse will get different takes from each person, except on those things that really matter. That’s what we want to collect.

Some bosses object to having a stranger lurking about the office and having his or her employees “airing the bad laundry” “telling all the dirty little secrets” “telling where the bodies are buried”–whatever cliché you want, but that’s not what we are looking for as trainers.

I realize that corporate consultants can do the same thing and that they usually perform their analysis from higher up. They could do this if they were young enough to fit in, while trainers are looking to see if there is a training solution at area closest to where productivity actually happens. It’s not meant to be a situation where the trainer is going to inform on the employee for saying something negative about the boss personally either, but rather form generalities that management can fix on its own or discover what is truly a training issue.

Now, we just need the owner, CEO, board chairman, president of the company or whoever makes those decisions to let the mice in.

Well, that’s all for me. I hope this blog was a little different. I do try to be different and I hope that sometimes I make sense.

For more resources about training, see the Training library.

A final reminder: I do have a website where you can find other items I have written, including coupons to get my best selling, The Cave Man Guide To Training and Development and my novel about the near future, Harry’s Reality for free! Happy Training.

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The Secret to a Strong Opening

group-diverse-people-having-business-meeting

How you start a facilitated session is critical to the overall success of the session. Conventional wisdom states that a good meeting should start with the agenda. The reason typically given is that the agenda answers the question, “What are we going to do.” However, Smart Facilitators know that participants in a facilitated session need answers to several questions before the agenda is discussed.

  • Why are we having this session?
  • What do we need to have accomplished when we are done?
  • What is our role in the decision-making?
  • Why should I invest the time?

Smart Facilitators answer these questions, and more, in the first fifteen minutes of a facilitated session.

From my book, The Secrets of Facilitation 2nd Edition:

Secret #13 – The Secret to a Strong Opening

Inform, excite, empower and involve in the first 15 minutes.

In the first fifteen minutes of a facilitated meeting, you must inform, excite, empower and involve the participants to get them focused and engaged from the beginning of the session.

The opening sets the tone, pace and expectation for the rest of the day. Your opening words should cover four key points: inform, excite, empower and involve (IEEI).

  • Inform the participants about the overall purpose of the meeting through the session objective.
  • Excite them about the process by giving them a clear vision of the overall result to be achieved and the benefits to them.
  • Empower them by discussing the important role they play in the process, the reason they were selected or the authority that has been given to them.
  • Involve them as early as possible by identifying their personal objectives, the issues that must be covered, the challenges that must be overcome or some other topic that contributes to the overall goal of the session.

You can consider using the IEEI as an outline for your opening. The IEEI opening is a powerful tool for making sure your participants understand why they are there, what they are trying to achieve, and the benefits to them. It helps get them focused on the session, and committed to the purpose.

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For more resources, see the Library topic Facilitation.

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Certified Master Facilitator Michael Wilkinson is the CEO and Managing Director of Leadership Strategies, Inc., The Facilitation Company and author of the new The Secrets of Facilitation 2nd Edition, The Secrets to Masterful Meetings, and The Executive Guide to Facilitating Strategy. Leadership Strategies is a global leader in facilitation services, providing companies with dynamic professional facilitators who lead executive teams and task forces in areas like strategic planning, issue resolution, process improvement and others. The company is also a leading provider of facilitation training in the United States.

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Centralising Your Project Portfolio

Guest post by Ian Needs, Marketing Manager for KeyedIn Solutions

If your project management has no formalised frameworks, your business may well be losing money.

Standardisation and consistent application of project management methods, processes and technologies is a key factor in business success.

Project portfolio management (PPM) software provides a centralised dashboard for the meta-management and analysis of multiple projects, so that your project management team works within clear guidelines that design projects to succeed.

Issues Faced by Businesses
If your business manages multiple projects and resources, you may find PPM software helps you to align and streamline your projects.

When project staff work independently without any formal PPM structure, their unstandardized approaches will directly influence the progress and success of individual projects. In some organisations that might be a benefit, but in others it leads to unpredictable performance and non-comparable measurements of key performance indicators.

If you’ve found yourself:

  • struggling to analyse performance across projects due to a lack of comparable data
  • being forced to make project management decisions without complete information
  • suffering the ignorance of stakeholders due to a lack of consistent, engaging communication
  • worrying about the practicality of your pipeline management decisions
  • wishing for more integrated information on overall portfolio viability

…then it may be time to explore PPM software.

What PPM Software Can do for Your Business
Most professional PPM solutions support the management of project scope, time, cost, procurement, integration, resources, communications, quality and risk.

A good PPM application lets you track and manage projects seamlessly, applying time-saving templates, scenario models and workflows. You’ll be able to take a long-term overview of all projects –past, current and future—to ensure that everyone’s efforts and resources are aligned toward your organisation’s strategic goals.

Some PPM software provides a real-time view, while other options are dependent on scheduled data refreshment. Real-time data is invaluable to its end users: your project managers, resource managers and executives will all benefit from timely insights into resource demand, capability and project delivery.

Who Doesn’t Need This?
If you’re running a very limited number of projects, PPM software is perhaps not an essential for your business. However, it’s a nice-to-have that may become increasingly useful as your project portfolio evolves.

Similarly, if your budget is limited then you may debate the value of PPM software. In a down economy, many businesses do without an automated PPM solution, but this often leads to inefficiency and a reduced ROI. Different organisations have different project portfolio management requirements, but most can benefit from clearer oversight of programmes and projects.

Rather than buying a licence for software that will only be partially rolled-out, it makes more sense for businesses with lower budgets to use easily scalable Software-as-a-Service project portfolio management solutions. PPM in the cloud offers a great deal of flexibility as well as location-independent access to information.

If you think it might be time you got project portfolio management software for your business, consider the numbers, types, and hierarchies of the projects you currently manage. What you’re looking for is a solution that suits your current portfolio and management requirements, so that you can improve your business efficiency without a long and complex implementation phase.

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For more resources, see the Library topic Project Management.

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Ian Needs is Marketing Manager for KeyedIn Solutions, provider of the KeyedIn projects project portfolio management software package.

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4 Reasons Business Contracts Fall Apart

Man in blue shirt signing a business contract

Reasons for Lost ContractsGuest Author: Jon Tucker

Lost Contracts Mean Lost Revenue

Business contracts provide the legal framework for mutual agreement between two business entities. Mutual benefits are realized when the two sides offer products or services in exchange for compensation. However, problems may arise in business deals when one side or the other fails to deliver according to the terms in the contract. Since casual agreements will not provide sufficient protection against loss if an unforeseen event causes the contract to be breached, legal advice must be sought in the early stages of contract creation.
In order to avoid unpleasant surprises with respect to contract terms at a later stage of business deals, there are certain points that must be taken care of in every contract to create a legally binding agreement. They are as follows;

1. VALIDITY OF THE CONTRACT

A court of law has the final word in the validity of any business contract. Missing elements in the contract can prove to be costly and damaging to both parties. All valid contracts must possess these elements to be enforced in a court hearing.
Mutual consent, Offer and Acceptance – All parties in a contract must be allowed to enter into the agreement without any compulsion. Either party can claim that consent was not given voluntarily. So, a valid proof that the consent was freely given at the time of entering into the agreement is an important part of every contract. Acceptance of the contract terms are implied by the signatures at the end of the contract.
Sound mind – A person without sufficient mental capacity to agree to the terms of the contract would not be held to the agreement in court. For example; a party should not be in a mental state that would impair judgment, such as under the influence of alcohol or drugs.
Consideration – Both parties must exchange something of value that can be easily measured. Examples are exchange of money, tangible products or paid services. Any other arrangement is considered a gift in legal terms.
Legal purpose – A court of law will not enforce a contract for an act that is against any other law of the United States or its territories. For instance, two business entities cannot sign a legally-binding contract for prostitution, human trafficking or drug running.

2. BEWARE OF HANDSHAKES

The days of a binding handshake are long gone. Every business entity must be aware of the pitfalls of working with other businesses to accomplish a common goal. Strong business partnerships are rare. In the absence of a legally binding contract, breach of trust by one party will result in legal action from the other party which is a time taking procedure. Part of the lawsuit will also include legal fees associated with resolving the dispute. A contract will be binding on both parties only when all of the elements listed above are present.

3. WARNING ABOUT PARTNERSHIPS

Start-up business partnerships are formed without consideration of all the ways that the casual agreement can be breached. Both parties should discuss beforehand the ways that each person will contribute to the business. Failure of the business brings new challenges to the situation because personal and business assets are placed in jeopardy without careful legal planning. In such a situation, courts address the situation according to the state laws that apply at the time.
Business entrepreneurs must engage the services of a qualified attorney since partnerships fall under a different set of rules from standard contracts. Ignoring the possibility of failure can be costly when outstanding debts have to be paid from the personal assets of both partners. Verbal agreements concerning the use of financial resources will not stand up in court. Every aspect of the business life must be properly documented to prevent disastrous consequences for everyone involved.

4. LEGAL COSTS

There are attorneys with specific qualifications and experience who can provide legal advice before getting into different types of contracts. Use of the same attorney for each agreement will reduce the amount of time and effort needed to draw up new contracts in the future. Legal counsel will prove to be invaluable for the business owner who wishes to deal in multiple business agreements.
It is therefore recommended that both parties understand the requirements of a legally binding contract. Contracts must be refined and the negotiation steps should be completed with each new partner. Working under valid contracts will mitigate the risk of loss if personal or business problems cause one side to breach the contract terms.

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For more resources, see our Library topics Marketing and Social Networking.

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About the Author:

Jon Tucker is Director of ENotaryClasses.com, the leading provider of notary classes required by the State of California to become a notary public.
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Do the Rich Have Too Much?

Money luggage

We are often cautioned: “Don’t discuss religion and politics.” But why not? They’re a pretty big part of our total being, our livelihood and our spiritual lives !!

The “politics” thing, however, does have me walking with some care on what is often a rocky and sometimes perilous path – in these days of political topics so hot as to be overheated.

The all-too-frequent appearances on television of the “talking heads” with their polar opposite arguments keep the flames burning, and one of the arguments making the rounds these days does particularly tick me off.

That is the strong and intrusive idea of what to do with the money earned by the rich. Many of those firebrands who are belligerent about those who are “too” rich, tend to have difficulty defining what level of income is too much.

Who decides this anyway?

I have a strong and unwavering opinion regarding the “get-the-rich” attitude by all too many people in the U.S. And it’s an opinion based neither on left nor right, nor progressive, nor capitalist, ideology.

With nearly 40 years as a non-profit fund-raising professional under my belt, I have never seen or heard about a single building construction or a renovation of a facility for any charity whether it be food bank, nursing home, abuse or homeless shelter, animal rescue facility, education structure, arts and culture building, religious facility, hospital, etc. which was not paid for with contributions mainly and mostly from the rich.

Most always, such fund-raising campaigns have about 85% or more of the money raised coming from only about 15% or less of the donors. That funding ratio counts on there being people capable of making large gifts—the rich. If we had to rely on the middle class, even at its higher end, it would be a long wait for those capital projects. Nor can we expect the poor to be able to provide a lion’s share of the needed funds. After all, they are the ones in need—the ones the rich are making gifts to benefit.

Without the rich and a tax code that encourages giving, philanthropy as we know it would most likely take a drastic downturn. If we tax all their social capital away from the rich, we may find ourselves relying on a single funder—the government—to support the social good delivered by non-profit organizations. I, for one, am not ready to go that route.

Let’s take care that we don’t eliminate the goose that lays the golden egg by declaring war on the concept of being rich.
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If you have a question or comment for Tony, he can be reached at Tony@raise-funds.com. There is also a lot of good fundraising information on his website: Raise-Funds.com
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