Power ’08 – Winning In The New Economy is headed up by Eric Beck, founder of the Total Integration Executive Program.  The event is being hosted by the Southwest Florida Christian Chamber of Commerce, the largest organization of its type in the country. 

Hundreds of participants - mainly entrepreneurs and professionals - are expected to attend the event, which will deal with the critical issues facing business owners in the “new economy”.  The current economy, according to Beck, owes its troubles to greed.  ”We are so riddled with debt . . . it seems the age-old “buying & selling” model – one that has been largely founded on debt-spending, fear, and scarcity - is bringing a whole laundry list of undesirable consequences.”

And ideal economy, according to Beck, is based on “giving & receiving”; yet it will require a significant shift in concept, implementation, and sustainability.  “Everyone’s going to have to train,” says Beck, “because literally everything is being shaken, or will be shaken, very soon.”

Timpanaro said he feels privileged to be a part of this landmark event.

“Training is so essential, even at fundamental levels,” Timpanaro suggested.  “In order to embrace change, we’ve got to be trained to think and act strategically.”

For registration or more information, visit www.Power08.com

It’s no secret.  Small business owners don’t generally like the human resources part of running their business.  They think of it as drudgery, as overwhelming; an endless stream of paperwork; an administrative scourge.  Filling out forms for withholding taxes, workman’s compensation, health  and life insurance, payroll, work schedules.  And then there’s filling in when employees are absent, hiring new people, firing the ones that don’t work out, dealing with unsavory issues like theft, making sure everybody understands OSHA laws.  And on and on it goes.  No fun at all; just a drain on time and money.

And yet, every small business owner has heard that you’re no better than your people; that every business succeeds or fails on the basis of its people.  Everybody knows this, but it’s tough putting the maxim into practice when you’re dealing with that “admin scourge”.   One thing you have to do, according to Jeff Timpanaro, is to take yourself, as the business owner, out of the day-to-day battle and look at the situation from the nearest hillside.  From there you get a view of the strategic issues that may be holding your business back.  Jeff is President of Oberata Consulting, a Kingwood company which helps small businesses, and he says that getting the owner to do this is very tough work.  “It’s because they’re creative, high energy people who started the business by wearing all the hats, and they like working with all the nuts and bolts.  They don’t want to think about strategy or the softer side of people motivation.”

Timpanaro tries to get owners to think about “strategic vision”, a view of the company which can be shared by all the employees.  But the most important part of the vision is for each employee to act upon it; for each person in the organization to understand his unique capabilities and how each serves the customer, and how each makes a positive impact on the world through the company.  When this type of alignment is achieved and tied to compensation, Timpanaro’s clients have seen dramatic results.  “We help companies take their employees from ‘wage slaves’ to ‘job leaders’ and the transformation is shared by everybody in the company.”

Work provides a sense of accomplishment and belonging which is very important in most people’s lives, but money is what pays the bills.  So compensation is key in any business.  “We try to get our clients to get their staff to think like owners, and that takes cash, applied in the right places.  If it’s done right, the profits from a more successful business pay for it.”  That’s Stephen King, President and CEO of Growth Force, an outsourced accounting and financial services firm, located in Kingwood, with an emphasis on helping small businesses grow.  According to King, a common problem among small business owners is that they pay their people, often very well, but without tying compensation to the goals that are most important to the company.  There’s a lot of wasted effort in this approach; a lot of money left on the table.

Growth Force’s approach to improving this situation is what King calls “open book management”.   To put this into practice, the business owner must provide all the company’s financials to all the employees, in a form which is transparent and understandable by everyone.  No fancy accounting terms are allowed.  Once the financials are laid out in this way, key performance indicators, or KPIs, are identified and agreed to.  These are the main expenses or activities which have the biggest impact on the success of the business.  From these, goals are identified for each employee and compensation is paid basis how well the goals are met.  “If the small business owner will take the time to provide the leadership which is necessary to implement this type of plan, the results can be very dramatic; the difference between a losing business and one poised for profit and growth.”

One of the best ways to get off on the right foot where human resources is concerned is to hire the right people in the first place.  Becky Resendiz is Recruiting Performance Consultant at Administaff, and she has a lot of ideas about how to hire the best people.  “There’s no single thing that a small business should do to be successful in hiring.  We help them set themselves up for success by using a variety of approaches, each customized for the individual company”.  For example, Administaff uses a concept called “employment branding”.  Traditionally, business people think of branding in relation to products or services, but it can be successfully used to create an identity for a company in the minds of prospective employees.  A well designed website, awards and scholarships, editorials in local newspapers, presentations at local schools and colleges, employee referral programs, a reputation for good pay and benefits, and a well understood strategy and plan for growth all help establish the employment brand.  “If you do it right, you won’t have to look too hard for applicants; they’ll seek you out!”

This is just one of the elements to a good strategic hiring process.  Other areas include workforce planning, and developing a recruiting infrastructure, which addresses, among other things, how applicants apply, behavioral interviewing, and background checking.

Each of these experts has a lot more to say, and they’ll do so at the upcoming seminar, “Creating a High-Performance Culture:  Making Great Teams & Great Profits” which takes place on September 25^th at the North Harris Community College from 8:00 a.m. – 10:30 a.m.  The seminar is part of the “Best Practices” Seminar Series for small businesses and is put on by the Humble Area Chamber of Commerce.

About the Author:  Hank Pierce is a Kingwood resident and a member of SCORE (R), Counselors to America’s Small Business and a Resource Partner with the U.S. Small Business Administration.  SCORE is partners with the Humble Area Chamber of Commerce in providing free and confidential counseling to small businesses in Kingwood, Atascocita, Spring, and Humble.

KINGWOOD, TX March 9, 2007 — With all the demands of modern-day business, leaders increasingly face the challenge of having too much to do, and not enough time to get it all done. Add in personal pressures, such as juggling time for family and other relationships, and you have a recipe for disaster.

“The overwhelming feeling that you are always getting further and further behind is not unlike dealing with financial debt,” said Jeff Timpanaro, CEO of Oberata Consulting. “You feel like you’re always making ‘payments’ but never getting ahead, no matter how hard you work.”

The key, according to Timpanaro, is to apply strategy to the way you’re working, and this is the principal focus of his firm’s March 20th training event for business owners and organizational leaders. The session, entitled “Eliminating Time Debt,” is an interactive experience designed to help executives rework their approach to schedules and have the leverage to say “no” to the tasks and projects that are of marginal value.

“Many business leaders are ‘can-do’ people, which is how they got where they are,” said Timpanaro. “Unfortunately, the down side of this positive approach is that they find themselves trying to do more than their schedules will accommodate. We have real solutions for them.”

Timpanaro will be joined by David G. Johnson, CEO of Sarasota, Florida-based Epiphany Consulting, LLC. for the “Eliminating Time Debt” event, which will detail strategies that are part of a program known as Total Integration™. Both Timpanaro & Johnson are Certified Total Integration™ Consultants, a designation belonging to just a handful of consultants in the U.S.

The event is organized by Oberata Consulting, a strategic consulting firm serving Houston’s small & mid-sized business community, and will offer a low-cost “sneak peek” at some of the solutions the firm is making available to local business leaders.

“When we take people through the ‘Eliminating Time Debt’ process, they come out on the other side freed from the tyranny of their ‘to-do’ lists, and empowered to work with significantly higher effectiveness,” Timpanaro said. “We’ve had business owners tell us they feel like they are able to enjoy their work again, sometimes for the first time in years.”

“Eliminating Time Debt” is being held Tuesday, March 20th, at 7 p.m. at the Homewood Suites Kingwood, 23320 Hwy 59 North in Kingwood. A registration fee applies. Online registration is available at http://www.timedebtevent.com.