Over a very pleasant lunch in London yesterday, I discussed with a client the merits of working to improve your strengths versus working on your weaknesses.  I'm a big believer in playing to your strengths and managing around your weaknesses.  He came from a different perspective, that if your strengths are solid, fix the holes instead. (…)

There's a brilliant post on the Psychotactics Zingers blog that comes with a neat cartoon, too - reproduced here with a bit of link-magic…

The essence is simply to make sure you do something every day in your business to keep you moving forwards.  Over time you'll take a great many actions that build into a substantial result for you. (…)

No, not YOU!  I'm talking about all those calls and interruptions that keep happening every day, stopping you when you're in mid-flow on something and making it really tough for you to concentrate on getting stuff done.  But you can have better time management, with just a little effort. (…)

You might wonder exactly what business coaching is and how it can help your business. 
You might even scoff at the thought of there being a magic bullet that can solve all of your business challenges, and you would be right.  There is no magic bullet - you need to do lots of small things that all add up to big results. (…)

Today there was a knock at the door as the postman came to hand over a parcel from Amazon. (…)

Recession is heavily in the news at the moment.  It's the economists way of feeling that they have something useful to contribute to the news headlines. (…)

In 2007, house prices were again rising at 12% per annum, way ahead of people's pay packets.  All forecasts for 2008 were that we'd see more of the same.  Who made those forecasts?  The experts.  The people in the banks and building societies who earn millions in bonuses every year. 
So how come they get paid so much when they are so bad at their jobs?  The credit crisis was pretty obviously going to happen, it was just a matter of when: house prices had become unaffordable for first-time buyers, personal debt was at an all-time high. (…)

When was the last time you sat in front of a salesman and thought about how good they are?  Most are awful, really damned awful! (…)

…your business partner out of the window? 
Monty Python understood the raw feelings that co-owning a business can cause…

Hopefully your business isn't quite at the stage of directors jumping out of windows, but if you have business partners I'll bet there are times when you don't feel you're running off the same plan. 
Last week I helped 50/50 partners in a business to agree a new plan that motivates them both.  Their business is strong but they need different types of goals to keep them energised and positive, especially in a tough market.  One needs a long term, visionary goal while the other needs to know what the business will give him in a much shorter period. (…)

When you peel away all the wrapping, there are just 3 basic strategies for small business to dominate a market locally, nationally or globally:
1 - Be the cheapest
2 - Be the best
3 - Be different
Think about it - what else can you do to distinguish yourself from your competition apart from being cheaper, better or different?  Just make sure your marketing communicates it properly. (…)