Spacing Out: A Common Dilemma

As a purveyor of shared office space, we definitely hope that anyone reading this will consider the services of Office Space Coworking with offices in Akron, Cuyahoga Falls & Canton.  But our vested interest aside, we are committed to helping small business owners & entrepreneurs find the right office solution to meet their needs.

We’ve talked a lot about the pros and cons about working from home. As a small business owner, you either started out at home and/or you’re still there. But for some, it might be time to consider making a move out of the extra bedroom to their own office space – even if it’s only a one-person show.

This question is a fairly common one for many small business owners. Some need to move because of growth, others because of loneliness or a need for stimulation. Regardless, the cost of office space is a variable that can have a big impact on a business’ bottom line, so it’s not surprising that it ranks near the top of the list of owners’ concerns. If the time is right, the key is to find a space that meets your business’ needs without breaking the bank. Location is important (especially for retail), but so are issues such as usability, cost and condition.

Decisions, Decisions

The advantages of moving out of your home office boil down to increased professionalism, more space to work and unlimited growth potential. Of course, with any advantage come a few disadvantages, but nothing that can’t be overcome:

• Your daily commute will be longer, but if your office is located near your home, the lost time and frustration should be minimal.
• You may need to furnish your office professionally (unless you go with a shared office solution like Office Space Coworking)
• Your overhead may increase, but your revenues could grow proportionately as you attract larger or more clients.

Here are few points of thought we’ve compiled to help guide you through your decision-making process:

Luxury or necessity: First, it’s important to determine whether or not your business is at a stage where finding an office is a luxury or a necessity. If it’s just you, and you have very few interruptions, you may be fit to stay. However, if you’re overseeing four employees who are working out of their homes, you have a communications disaster waiting to happen. Moving to a central location will most likely improve communication and create new energy in the business.

Assess your space needs: If you’ve made the decision to rent of lease space, the next step is to assess your company’s needs. If you’re business is not retail, you do not need a high-end space. But at the same time, you don’t want the space to be so inexpensive that it is depressing for your employees and potential buyers. One alternative might be to find less expensive space that can be transformed into an environment that stimulates creativity. Or, if you’re looking for a more formal environment consider choosing a reasonably priced office space that can be broken up into different areas. Invest more resources in meeting rooms that will be used by potential buyers, and less in rooms that will be used by employees.

Consider alternative options: If the budget is just not going to work, but you still need an “outside” space, consider some other options. Business centers, for example, are temporary offices that provide traditional office space for you to work in and usually come with amenities like Internet access, videoconferencing, conference space, copiers and sometimes, receptionists.

And then, there’s always the option of spicing up what you have. Reinvent your present office by hiring a professional organizer to help you make the best use of your space. Or, think about outsourcing work to other free agents instead of trying to squeeze employees into your already packed space. The options are limitless – it just takes a bit of time and vision to do what’s right for your business.

Monday Motivation – February 15, 2010

To get what you want; stop doing what isn’t working.
–Dennis Weaver

You have your To Do list.

Do you have a Not To Do List?

Jim Collins’ book Good To Great was the first time I was introduced to this concept and I found it fascinating.

The basic concept is we all have idiosyncrasies which sap our productivity day by day. Usually these are seemingly little things but they add up quickly.

If you can identify where some of the holes are in your productivity, you can set yourself up for success by avoiding these items altogether.

Do you frequently get sucked into email strings that have no bearing on your original work plan for the day?

Do you find yourself obsessing about little gaffs you may or may have not made in the last to call to a customer?

Have you ever caught yourself whiling away the hours surfing YouTube for the latest Britney embarrassment?

Simply put: If they aren’t helping you accomplish your goals, stop doing them.

Some Additional Take Aways:

*A great Not To Do List can be found at 52 Projects

*Try to identify distractions that take away from your focus for the day.

*Reference and add to your list on days where you feel didn’t get as much accomplished as you would have liked.

Project Management – Part 3: Alternative Tools

Beyond Microsoft Project: Alternative Project Management Tools

When we think about project management, we often go straight to images of Gantt charts and Microsoft Project. While these are extremely useful tools and ways of thinking about project management, there are alternatives to these approaches that may approve more useful for you, depending on your learning and doing styles as well as your clients’ approaches to communication and project management. In this report, we’ve outlined various tools and processes that we encourage you to explore. Also, feel free to customize your own project management approach by borrowing elements of each – remember, it’s most important that the project is completed effectively, and it’s your job to make that happen in a way that works for you and your clients.

David Allen: Getting Things Done (GTD)

In previous articles, we’ve lauded the ways of David Allen and his “Getting Things Done” approach. While some of his approaches can be geared toward individual productivity, many can also be applied to project management.

With Allen’s “Getting Things Done” approach, you make your work/life/responsibilities into real, actionable items or things you can just get rid of. Everything you keep has a clear reason for being in your life at any given moment—both now and well into the future. This gives you an kind of confidence that a) nothing gets lost and b) you always understand what’s on or off your plate

Also built-in to the system are an ongoing series of reviews, in which you periodically re-examine your now-organized stuff from various levels of specifics to make sure your focus is on track. Similarly, Allen has put together a “project planning checklist” to help individuals consider the various ideas to be considered when creating and managing projects. These can be helpful triggers to help you create a customizable project management process. His project planning checklist includes thinking about:

Resources

• Whose input do we need?
• Whose input could we use?
• Has anything like this been done before?
• What mistakes can we learn from?
• What successes can we learn from?
• What resources do we have?
• What resources might we need?

Executive issues

• How does this relate to the strategic plan?
• How does it relate to other priorities, directions, goals?
• How will this affect our competitive position?

Administration

• Who’s accountable for this project’s success?
• Communication and reporting – methods and processes
• What structures do we need?
• What planning is still likely to be required?
• What people do we need?
• What skills are required?
• What training do we need?
• How do we get it?
• What other communication do we need?
• Who needs to be informed as we go along?
• What policies/procedures affected? What needed?
• What about morale? Fun?

Finance

• What will this cost?
• How do we get it?
• What might affect the cost?
• Might we need additional $?
• What are the potential payoffs ($)?
• Who signs the checks?

Operations

• What is the timing?
• Hard deadlines?
• What might affect timing?
• Who’s going to do the work?
• How do we ensure complete delivery?

Quality

• How will we monitor our progress?
• How will we know if we’re on course?
• What data do we need, when?
• What reports, to whom, when?

Politics

• Whose buy-in do you need?
• How can you get it?

Stakeholders – Considerations?

• Board
• Stockholders
• Employees
• Suppliers
• Customers
• Community

Legal

• Issues?
• Regulations?

Research

• What might you need to know?

Public Relations

• Is there value in others knowing about this?
• How do we do that?

Risks

• What could happen?
• Could we handle it?

Creative thinking

• Who would have concern about the success of this project?
• What would they say, ask, or input, that you haven’t yet?
• What’s the worst idea you can imagine, about doing this project?
• What is the most outrageous thing you can think of, about this project?
• How would a 12-year-old kid relate to this project?
• What would make this project particularly unique?

Online Project Management Tools

There are also a number of Web-based project management tools that may prove better aligned to your ways of work. Clarizen is an example of on-demand solution that allows you to effectively manage all your projects and resources with a dynamic, collaborative solution that incorporates the user-centric, interactive nature of the Internet with powerful project management tools.

Clarizen’s web-based project management solutions can help to manage the complete project life cycle from inception through to completion, to capture templates and best practices for future replication, and to connect team members across departments, functions, geographies and organizations.

For more information, and to participate in their free beta trials, visit www.clarizen.com.

Professional Project Managers

You also have the option to hire a professional project manager as an adjunct to you and your staff. There are likely significant costs associated with this option, but if you are strapped for time or resources, or if your project requires intense project management skills, this could be your best option. Visit http://www.pmi.org/info/default.asp to connect with a professionally certified project manager. Whatever your method, make sure it works for you. Nothing can compare to effectively manage projects. Remember, doing it well means more business from the same client referrals to others. It’s not a skill or process that can be overlooked, so make sure you invest the time into creating the process – whether traditional or alternative – that works for you.

Swipe Files: Your Marketing Toolbox

Simply put, the best way to learn about marketing is to watch and learn from what others do. This is where a swipe file can play a huge role in getting your creative juices flowing. A swipe file is a file or collection of marketing messages, headlines, techniques, etc. Essentially, whenever you see an example of great marketing you add it to your marketing collection. Anyone who has been involved in marketing, online or off, for any length of time knows that creating a swipe file is a huge help when it comes to designing your own marketing campaigns.

Before the Internet, a swipe file would contain a bunch of direct mail marketing pieces, newspaper ads and postcards. Today you can still have a file folder full of those kinds of things, but you should also consider starting a digital collection where you can put great examples of email marketing, headlines, digital sales letters, etc. Some of the best marketing messages that I’ve seen were only presented in an online format.

Leafing through a collection of marketing materials will likely bring on a deluge of ideas for how you can position, write about, or promote your own product — and that’s why you should create your own collection. Remember, you’re just looking for inspiration. Some find it useful to have a digital swipe file as well where they save email messages, article resource boxes, sales letters, great headlines, and other promotional materials that they find good and effective. Remember, a great marketing piece doesn’t have to relate directly to your chosen market to be useful to you… so save any marketing piece that works, regardless of the product.

Hints and Tips

A swipe file is not for copying. Keep in mind that a swipe file is not intended to be a file where you store materials that you are going to copy later. Consider a swipe file as a place to store materials that you can use later to generate your own marketing ideas and tactics. Big and small both. Save materials from big companies and small companies alike. Just because a company is large doesn’t mean it has better promotional materials. In fact, you’ll find some of the best marketing and promotional materials are written by little known people who have really taken their time on each and every piece. Make swipe file categories. Here are a few groupings to get you started on your own collection of marketing materials:

1. Sales letter swipe file
2. Email swipe file
3. Headlines swipe file
4. Newsletter swipe file
5. General resources swipe file
6. Internet marketing swipe file

Don’t forget your everyday life. Sometimes it’s not other marketing materials that give us ideas, it’s actually what happens in our everyday lives. How about something one of your children created? It could provide inspiration into a creative idea for a marketing piece. Maybe you went to an association gathering where someone gave an inspirational speech with a unique message? That could give you an idea for a newsletter story for your customers.

The Ins and Outs of Solo 401Ks

One of the frightening things about launching your own business stepping away from your corporate sponsored 401k plan. Historically, the options available to small business owners for tax deferred retirement savings have been minimal.

But now, new options are available in the form of the “solo (or, one-person) 401k plan.” In the article below, we’ll provide you with an overview of what a solo 401K plan is, how it compares to other retirement options and additional resources for you to gather more information.

Solo 401K: The Basics
The solo 401k plan is suitable for businesses in which the owner or owners are the only employees.

This plan works in a situation where there are no common law employees. This means the plan can be used by the business owner, his or her spouse if working at the business, and any partners in the business and their spouses who work at the business. It could work well for businesses such as sole-practitioner professionals, partnerships, manufacturer’s representatives, small retail owners, freelance writers, computer consultants and electricians, to name a few.

Contributions to a solo 401k plan are based on revenue generated by your business. With a solo 401(k), annual contributions consist of two parts:

1. You can contribute up to 100% of the first $15,500 of your 2007 compensation or self-employment income ($20,500 if you’ll be 50 or older at year-end).
2. You can contribute and deduct an additional amount of up to 25% of your compensation income, or 20% of your self-employment income. This second part of your annual contribution is like what you can do with a traditional small-business retirement plan

You won’t be forced to contribute more than you can comfortably afford in years when cash is tight. You can always pay in less than the tax-law maximum or even nothing at all. In other words, the solo 401(k) lets you rack up major tax savings in the good years, while leaving you the option to contribute less (or zero) in the lean years, when conserving cash is your highest priority.

The Upsides
The biggest reason why you might consider opening a solo 401k plan is that it may offer higher contribution limits than other retirement plans available for small businesses.

In addition to the higher limits, the solo 401k has other advantages. These include:
Low paperwork requirements, including being exempt from discrimination testing as long as you have no eligible employees. The only annual paperwork you may be required to file is the IRS Form 5500, which applies when plan assets exceed $100,000. The IRS provides a form 5500EZ that is suited to small 401k plans.

You also have the ability to take a loan. SEP plans and SIMPLE IRAs, popular retirement plans with small businesses, don’t allow loans, although a profit-sharing plan could.

The Downsides
If you decide to hire someone, the benefits of a solo 401K strategy change radically. That’s because an employer-employee relationship adds new layers of administrative, fiduciary and financial responsibility. For example, for a very small firm with an owner-employer and a few employees, the employer will likely be required to make mandatory contributions to the employees’ 401k accounts in order for the plan to pass its nondiscrimination tests. These tests determine if the plan is offered fairly to all employees.

Here’s some additional detail. First, if you have employees, the tax law may require you to contribute to their accounts as well as your own. But this is an issue with any type of tax-deferred retirement program — including a 401(k). So, if you have employees, please take my advice and hire a competent retirement-plan professional before making any moves.

Second, setting up and operating a 401(k) plan involves some degree of paperwork and administrative work. Fortunately, with a solo 401(k), this is only a minor concern, because you’re the only participant. Also, your brokerage firm is likely prepared to assist you in handling the details.

How to Set Up a Solo 401K
First, the plan needs a trustee to hold the assets on your behalf. Many people act as their own trustee, but if you decide to do this you need to be very attentive to detail and keep the appropriate records.

If you set up a solo 401k, you need to prepare and retain records concerning the plan and its activities. The plan also requires a plan document spelling out how the plan is operated. Most people use standard plan documents, and many one-person 401k plan providers include these in the cost of setting up the plan. You can hire services and firms to do the recordkeeping jobs to save you the time and hassle, but this will cost extra.

To set up your plan, you’ll typically pay a small set-up fee, which can range in price from $150 to $300. You will likely have to pay an annual maintenance fee, with the amount depending on the services you purchase from the plan provider.

The solo 401k is a fairly new retirement tool, however, it is gaining popularity. Fidelity, Principal, John Hancock Funds, Pioneer Investment Management, AIM and Salomon Smith Barney, among others, are already in the game. More are sure to follow. For a comprehensive list of providers, you can download a free report from 401K Help Center at
http://www.401khelpcenter.com/pdf/Solok_Vendor_List.pdf.

What To Look For in a Solo 401K
Here is a list of key things to be aware of when looking for a solo 401K:

No load funds
To minimize your long-term expenses, ask whether there are broker commissions or “loads” (upfront or backend commissions) that you must pay. Many solo 401k plans require you to pay up to 5.75% of your initial investment in a “load” fee.

Low expense ratios
If you are going to be investing in mutual funds, you should know what an “expense ratio” is. It is the percentage of your assets taken by the fund managers to manage the funds. Expense ratios vary widely and directly impact your return.

Open architecture
Look for a plan with self-directed brokerage account that allows you to invest in stocks, bonds, options, real estate and mutual funds to allow for maximum investment flexibility.

Index funds
These are designed to track the major stock and bond indexes and usually have lower expense ration than actively managed funds.

No or low setup fees and annual fees
Compare the load and administrative fees of one or more Solo 401k plans to make sure you aren’t paying too much for your 401k.

Online access
Get a plan that allows you to have online access to view and modify your accounts.

Is A Solo 401k Right for Me?
To determine if a solo 401K is right for you, use the following checklist:

• Sole proprietors, partnerships, corporations (including S-corporations), LLC’s, and LLP’s may all establish their own 401k.
• Higher contribution limits than other popular retirement plans.
  You can contribute more to a Solo 401k on less income than you can to an IRA, a SIMPLE IRA or a SEP-IRA.
• Contribution amounts are flexible
• Multiple 401k plans
  You can still have a 401k at work and open another one for your sideline business.
• Roll over other plans
  Once your 401k plan is established, you may roll over other retirement accounts into it.
• Loans
  You may borrow up to 50% of your account balance (up to a $50,000 loan) and repay it over five years (or longer, if the loan is used to acquire a principal residence). Interest is paid back into your own 401k plan at around prime plus 1%.
• Self-directed brokerage accounts
  The plan may include a self-directed brokerage account, allowing maximum investment flexibility.
• No tax returns for the plan are necessary, as long as assets remain under $100,000.
• Extended contribution date
  Employer contributions may be made after year-end (by your tax return deadline, including extensions).

Additional Resources
www.401Khelpcenter.com

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