Business is fun

Gloss

According to the weather forecast, there is no real snow forecast before Christmas now. Which is not to say that we will be having pretend snow instead.

Many people would say that we've had enough anyway in the last few days, though I for one would not agree - I love the snow. For one thing, it makes everything brighter and cleaner-looking, so in many ways its a bit like slapping on some make up and, in the process, hiding a multitude of spots and other blemishes.

But it is superficial and as we all know, usually it doesn't last, and before long, lumps and bumps reappear, the potholes in the road seem suddenly bigger and deeper and the once clean covering is dirty, brown-coloured and looks a bit like mashed potatoes and gravy, spread all over the roads.

Spiderman

Its a not uncommon thing now to walk into Starbucks or - if you're wiser, into biblocafe in Glasgow's Woodlands road - to find most of the seats occupied by what I call visonistas.

There they sit focussed, on their own creativity, oblivious to the world as it hovers in their presence looking for a share of a table. Few of us, sitting down in a cafe or public space immediately strike up a conversation with the stranger sitting next to or opposite us, and unless the lift breaks down, will easily pass a minute or so in a perhaps embarrassing silence as the hollow cube rises or falls in the lift shaft till we reach our destination.

We have become islands in our own world. And yet, "No man is an island, entire of itself" (John Donne). We should be - are - social animals but still it is the done-thing (no pun intended) to ignore our neighbours.

Line

Grey is the colour of an accountant or so popular culture tells us. Personally, I prefer red - for warmth, passion, love, adventure and danger. Maybe that says more about my personality than my profession. Many accountants choose the tried and trusted blue, grey, gold and sometimes, purple.

Designers will tell you that all of these colours have psychological overtones and that is why so many accountants' websites are a cold, chilling blue!

So here we have a very defined interpetative boundary between two primary colours.

5th October 1143

A long time ago, you'll agree. On that date, Portugal obtained its independence from the Kingdom of Leon, although it was a different kind of independence from that obtained by other countries in the 19th and 20th Centuries.

Whether or not you agree with Scottish Independence is a matter of fact and no doubt in a time to come, we'll find out if we want it or not. It's difficult to separate out partisan fluff from real facts and indeed even if you knew what the facts were, how could you be sure they were true! That would depend a lot on who was doing the telling, I guess.

Plumbing

I've often wondered whether I don't have the skills to be a tradesman. My wife would absolutely say "No Way!", but it is still nice to dream of working with wood and creating something pleasant to look at or better still, be a plumber and deal with creating new central heating systems or fixing bursts or just simply dealing with the waste products of the world...well on second thoughts, maybe not. Maybe a joiner after all... There is something satisfying I guess about making a "thing" and then getting paid for it.

But now I think about it, an accountant is a master craftsman too: kind of like electricians and joiners and plumbers all rolled into one. [That's me made a couple (at least) of enemies].

Accounting isn't about adding up the numbers. That's bookkeeping. Accounting starts afterwards; business advice starts after we have the numbers and that's why as a master craftsman we spend as long as any tradesman getting to understand what business is about and THEN another 3 or 5 years serving our apprenticeship.

Screen play

I find it difficult to read long tracts of text on a computer screen. Especially narrative. Maybe this is because my brain is conditioned to see reading on screen as needing to be fast and in "byte" sized chunks only; because I need the kernel of tax information or the accounting rule in a few words (in joke!).

Everything these days is chunked down to small bits - twitter limits you to 140 characters - and no one seems to want to spend more than 1 or 2 minutes on any web page searching for information. And that piece of information is taken directly from my own web stats. So small is beautiful it seems.

Simples!

KISS - Keep it Simple Stupid. I think everyone knows this acronym and uses it regularly (sometimes appropriately).

But I think it's more complex than just using the glib, almost hackneyed phrase. It's almost an automatic response nowadays, almost like the "air quotes" many people use.

It's more complex because the glib phrase requires action to make any sense of it. As business owners it's all too easy to get so embroiled in the complexity of a problem which by its nature grows arms and legs just by looking at it. Arms and legs that twist and turn and become tangled, making a real gordian knot of a problem.

Just for wimps and wooses

Continuing on the values bandwagon...

One of the values I said that we hold as a team is about feelings. Here is our explanation of what that value means for us:

Our personal feelings are important to each of us and must be respected by others in the team. We ensure that no-one is subjected to harassment,bullying, emotional blackmail, racism or any form of discrimination whether enshrined in law or not. Idle gossip can become unintentionally harmful and so we avoid it at all times.

Values

I don't often write about ethics and so you'll be pleased to see that I'm not going to start today. Ethics, while interesting and challenging, is not a topic for a fun-focussed blog like this.

But Values are important - and different from ethics in some ways - and are the rules by which we work or behave or act. Embedded often by our parents, our values can change in time and because of our life experiences. Nowadays values seem less like values to me at any rate. Personal values like honesty, decency, integrity, loyalty, truthfulness, and fairness all seem such old fashioned concepts in our "who cares" world.

At times like this I am glad to be old and as an accountant to have these values deeply embedded in my psyche. It is not of course something we brag about in our marketing. It would be boring in the extreme and also because they are taken for granted by everyone else: our clients expect these as a basis for doing business and NOT as an extra that is negotiable.

No really, it is just for fun

No thoughts, no comments (other than to say there aren't any). I'll leave today's picture to you.

A free gift if you like.

Appearances can be deceptive

Isn't it wonderful that so many things can be "fixed" nowadays with the benefit of multiple technologies?

The best of cameras can be used to eliminate "red-eye", focus automatically, select the correct exposure, add flash when needed. We no longer need to learn "How to be a photographer in 10 easy lessons". And if all you want is a picture of people or landscape then you need worry no more. If on the other hand you want to create a work of art, win prizes and be successful as a photographer, there is more to it than point and shoot techniques.

You'll need to know about picture composition, what is art as opposed to a picture, what might sell.

5 P's

There are some words and phrases which get on my nerves. That may not be all that surprising to those who know me well.

As a consummate networker, I hear many other accountants talk about their services to their clients and all too often they hit their audience with one of the 5 P's.

Proactive.

Tinker Tailor Accountant Spy

I was lucky enough to receive copies of all of the classic Bond films for Christmas or Fathers Day or some such celebration last year. I still insist on watching the films when they are on "live" tv much to the annoyance of my family who seem to think that just because the DVD's are to hand I shouldn't watch the films on TV.

Clearly I am living my life vicariously through the bond franchise, although it must be said that they are becoming a little dated when it comes to the "bond girls". I also love the Robert Ludlum series of books - Bourne is probably his best known assassin but his books are widely varied from The Osterman Weekend to The Scarlatti Inheritance. There is something of a closet spy in me I guess.

My alter ego is quite different from my day job of course. At NGM accountants I have to be who I am, and as a qualified professional accountant, that means honesty, integrity and transparency in my behaviour and dealings with the public.

I'll phone a friend, Chris....

It's been a while since my creative urges have been exercised - at least as far as writing is concerned. The January peak was more than a peak this year it felt like walking to the moon and back and while it was an exciting time, it was challenging for me and the team.

And that is an important statement - perhaps just a phrase: me and the team.

The bigger a business gets the less it can depend on just one person and actually, the bigger the business gets, the less that the business owner can depend on himself or herself because there is so much more to do; to remember. It forces dependence on others, regardless of whether you call them "team" or whether they call themselves a team. And it demands systems and processes so that the team can work well.

DNA

Curioser & Curiouser said Alice.

Alice in Wonderland has much to answer for, not least of which is a string of popular sayings that have burrowed their way into common-ish usage.

Penny Plain Tuppenny Coloured

That is an old expression in the UK that perhaps your granny may have used, and of course nowadays you can get nothing for a penny whereas in the good old days that would have got you admission to the "pictures" (cinema we call it nowadays) AND your bus fare home!

You can look up on google to find out the origin of the phrase if you wish.

Plain speaking is really important though isn't it? As a budding italian speaker, I know only too well that common idioms in English rarely translate in Italian on a word for word basis, "cielo a pecorelle, acqua a catinelle" translates as "a mackerel sky, water in buckets" but idiomatically becomes, "it's raining cats and dogs" - so far as I can gather.

Belt & Braces

MUSSBURGER

is in a basement tailor shop. LUIGI, an old Italian tailor,

is just running his tape up Mussburger's inseam.

Dynamic?

In this post - which is our last before Christmas - I pose a simple question and ask you to consider an opportunity.

Business owners don't generally draw pictures. They are there to make profits so why would they waste time using some artistic and creative skills that do not directly contribute to profits?

Most data is capable of being presented visually but few people bother. Few people bother to capture the data permanently quite apart from bothering to graph it! That may be simply a lack of excel skills or it maybe that they do not grasp the importance of charts, which quickly and simply portray trends, sudden changes in behaviour and loads more. We chart our freeindex enquiries, our clickthrough rates, our website traffic, new visitors and usable new visitors (in our geographical market area). And that's only a small sample of the things we measure and track every day. I can spot a change in the rate of growth of our web traffic, sources of leads and how effective all of our marketing strategies are. Most people don't (care enough).

Practice

I suppose Einstein was pretty clever, relatively speaking.

Relativity is a simple concept when all's said and done, especially once it's been explained and demonstrated. The great thing about it is that you can "see" relativity in action just by driving along the road in the car or as a bus passenger etc. The clever bit was putting what he saw into words (or a formula). It also demonstrates something else which is difficult: observing something which happens every single day or is at least commonplace, recognising the principles behind it or which cause it to be and then turning that to advantage in some respect or other.

One of the most amazing things I've experienced in the last 6 months since we restarted business coaching (and which is working brilliantly) is the rate at which I can get through business books. I've learned so many new ideas and concepts from loads of different authors about lots of different topics. Of course the edges begin to blur after a while as many of the characteristics begin to repeat with a slightly different slant or emphasis.

Get out of jail free

"Money back guarantee!"

"Your money back if not completely satisfied"

"100% Customer Satisfaction"

Lions, and Tigers, and Bears - Oh My!

Success is a terrible thing.

Oh yes, getting there is an amazing journey both at the start and during it, but arriving, while exhilarating and a realisation of one's dreams, is followed shortly by an anti-climax when you realise something.

That becoming successful means you need to climb another hill - a bigger one - once you get there. The bigger hill is staying successful and doing even better. Remember that on a hilltop you are more easily seen and more people want to knock you off your pinnacle.

How Social-able is your business?

Santa Claus

It goes without saying that you ought not to do business on a whim.

Sales - in fact business more generally - is all about relationships. Yes, it is about the people and how well they get on with each other, and actually the better you get on the less important you might think it is to sign up a contract to seal the relationship. And while things are going well there would seem to be no reason for getting into the formality and often the costs often assumed to go hand in hand with contracts. Just think about it, you would need to get involved with a solicitor, sit down and work out what YOU want to do and then, having got the contract drawn up, perhaps negotiate it with your customer. You could of course simply say - these are our terms - take it or leave it. It depends on what you're selling I guess, because in some cases you might need to accept your customers' contract.

One of the best bits of contracting is the negotiation!

Red Bull

How do you maintain your energy? The most common way I suppose is to eat and drink. I'm sure though that the nutritionists out there will suggest that only some foods generate energy. Whatever.

Where does your energy for your business come from though, it doesn't eat stuff to create energy. For team members, it's sort of easy, the leader provides the energy and direction and cajoling and support etc. But even team members need to have their own drive and enthusiasm that keeps them going when they start to become tired.

I would suggest it all comes down to (shared) vision. To have a big vision and desire to achieve is one of the commonest characteristics of leaders as is a certain charismatic quality that causes followers to follow. Sharing that business vision with your team and helping them to share the vision in the same way is one big energiser, as is the demonstrable benefits for all of reaching the vision state.

ASBO

Do you ever talk yourself out of anything while you're still thinking about it, before you've even taken any action? There are few people who haven't at some stage in their lives whether that's in business or in your personal life.

"He/She's fantastic but he/she would never be interested in me/ would never go out with me..."

Zoning out

There are two zones in business and you are either in them or out of them but it depends on which one we're talking about whether being in the zone is good or not.

Unless you know what the zones are, you will be a bit confused by now.

The two zones are simply "The Zone" and "Your Comfort Zone". Lets start with the first one.

Stormy weather

When you first engage a financial advisor as distinct from an accountant, one of the topics of conversation is about your attitude to the risk profile of your preferred investments. And you will have this conversation more than once during that relationship. I almost wonder if I should have that conversation with my clients because there are times when the approach they take to getting receipts for things is high risk. But enough about that, I'll tackle that with those concerned.

Business is not a risk free zone at the best of times. Simply doing business on credit can be risky these days even with a credit check, and then where do you sit in the supply chain? You need to remember that it's not only your customer you have to think about, it's also their customers or their other suppliers. Of course YOU can't do anything about those people but how much interest do you take in them so you are better prepared?

Snow fun

Todays cartoon is just for a laugh.

An Andertoons Cartoon

Told you so!

Up periscope!

When you get to be as old as I am you almost get to the point where nothing surprises you. Now I don't know whether that's because I know there is no point in thinking life or business will be predictable since I know that it isn't or because I could care more. But a lack of "surprisability" depends I think of having had experience of the event that fails to evoke any interest. So the first time you get snow in May, even in Scotland that is a surprise, but now I've experienced it, it is no longer going to be a surprise if it happens again. ANd I think that's why the older you get the less surprising life is.

Supposing though you lived your life neither expecting excitement or surprises or trouble, just imagine what the effect would be on you when something hugely out of the ordinary occurred? How would you react? What would you do?

Business planning is all about removing the negative or downside on surprises or indeed thinking about how you would cope with the upsides, often more difficult. You can never plan for every eventuality but you can at least set out some ideas about how you might react if x happens

Spot the Difference

How good are you at puzzles?

One of my favourites as a child was spot the difference: you know the kind of thing, find 8 differences from one picture to another. It was always the last one that took longest because you had searched and searched and it was almost as if, suddenly a light came on, and there it was. How could you have missed it? So obvious!

Joiners

I'm sure you must have - at a few times in your life - been the new person. First day at Secondary school; at work; in an evening class. No matter how friendly we are, there is still that feeling of being new and unfamiliar with how things are done, where you need to go, what the rules are.

Of course it could equally be a new customer in your business, or a new employee. Either way, induction is a great idea to get people involved in your culture, to help them find their feet and get to know the ropes quickly. Remember how it felt for you last time you were the newbie? So why don't you develop ideas to help the newbie feel at home?

Some ideas to get you started....

Bright Lights

Have a happy Christmas, and a merry New Year.

I think that's the first time this year that I've said that although our current fall of snow makes it apposite, and while I love the snow, I really hope that it doesn't last till Christmas.

Christmas brings with it the joy of January tax returns at the same time as the credit card bills fall through our letterboxes. And that's when the problems may begin for many people.

Particle physics

When I was learning all about business and it's management, Drucker - I'm sure it was him - said that we should manage our businesses, people and tasks on an objective basis. Set and agree SMART goals and then measure results against the goals (or objectives).

Nothing has changed in the 56 years since "The Practice of Management" was published. People still set and report on objectives; appraisals are built around performance against objectives - whether they are personal development objectives or task focussed ones. The difference in today's amazingly complex business world is that now they have been systemised further and are wrapped up in something called "Balanced Scorecard". To a cynic like me that is what balanced scorecard is - a series of objectives and qualitative measures that define great performance.

I've no doubt the fanatics and purists will claim uniqueness for Balanced Scorecard, endless differentiators and identify 2 dozen (or more) management gurus to rubbish Drucker's original ideas. Great. Let's talk about that - add your comments below. But when it all boils down to it, businesses set objectives and then set out to achieve them.

Turn Again Whittington

As the pantomime season is almost upon us, it seems apposite that we should consider that most parodied of creatures, Dick Whittington. How many of us recall the whole story that the pantomime unfolds and in what degree of detail? But most will remember the title of this post as probably one of the most memorable (clean/ unfunny) lines.

It would be nothing short of tedious if I were to commence upon a treatise on how different childrens' theatre is nowadays; one of those, "Aah, I remember when..." moments. But I don't intend going down that particular road even if it is paved with gold.

Instead I'd far rather concentrate on the message - turn again. [aside: wouldn't it have been nice if a deep, dramatic voice had just said that?]

Beyond the chicken

Do you ever go to work each day and wonder why you do what you do? "There must be something better." It's almost as much a statement of hope as of fact. Thing is we are a massive bag of skills and intelligence and we often only concentrate on one small thing, "the job we do" or using the remarkably small 5% of brain processing capacity.

The same is true of many businesses. They do what they do because they always have, though many in these trying times are discovering markets where none existed before. The true bulldog spirit (or underdog spirit) is still alive in the UK psyche and more so in the Scots' psyche. Despite the mocking laughter after last week's miserable defeat of the Scotland Rugby team at the hands of the All Blacks, Scotland drew on hidden skills, talents and reserves to conquer South Africa the present World champions and World Cup holders.

Odious

It is human nature.

When Scotland was beaten squarely by the All Blacks on Saturday 13th November by the widest ever margin. There was much comparison between the teams.

We are taught to compare right from the earliest stages in our education - or at least 50 years ago we were! - how many red blocks are there. Are there more greens compared with the yellows?

Hark, the Herald Angels Tweet

I think many people believe that the new social media marketing is easy. And I really must stop referring to it as new: it no longer is new.

The challenge is being consistent in who you are across all of the marketing channels but still respecting the differences in each channel recognising how each of them works. There is an old saying that, if everything was known, everyone would leave the country. We need to remember that now everything is known to everyone. The combination of Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, Bebo and any other places YOU work with pretty much tells all of your story. Thinking that any part of your social activity is secret is foolish unless you actively restrict to whom you allow access and give out your handle.

And in first place..

An Andertoons Cartoon

Wifi Pad

Below Average

Technology is great when it works, isn't it. We all blame our email servers when things go wrong and get upset when a web page downloads in 3500 milliseconds (that's 3.5 seconds) instead of 500ms.

We forget sometimes what is actually happening behind the scenes to make things work so quickly (or in some cases, at all).

Clear as Mud

Business Cartoon by Andertoons

Hot stuff!

Cartoon by AndertoonsThere are 5 ethical guidelines and so if you run out of things to do today, you could read about accountants ethical principles or you could simply trust NGM Accountants.

Business advice is free at NGM Accountants - jargon free!

The problem with many people nowadays is they THINK you need to speak another language to be in business. The number of times I've seen the most flowery language or the long words emerge in a business letter is more than I've had hot dinners! I think the worst was "Speaking for myself, personally, ...."

However there's one thing you can be guaranteed of at NGM Accountants, and that's plain, jargon free advice. You get the flowers on your birthday.