Obama’s budget and small businesses

President Obama’s budget proposal was announced today and made available on the web.  Here’s a breakdown of how Obama’s budget will affect small businesses via the Small Business Administration (pdf):

1. Provide $28 billion in loan guarantees to expand credit availability for small businesses

• $17.5 billion in guarantees under the Section 7(a) Guaranteed Loan program, which provides credit for small businesses
• $7.5 billion to provide Certified Development Companies financing to support commercial real estate development
• $3 billion for the Small Business Investment Company debenture program
• $25 million in Microloans - allows intermediaries to provide small loans and technical assistance to entrepreneurs and other start-up businesses.
• In line with the stimulus package, the Small Business and Community Bank Lending Initiative will expand small business credit availability

2. Supports disaster recovery for homeowners, renters and businesses

• $1.1 billion in direct disaster loans
• In 2010, the Small Business Agency will implement a pilot program of the Guaranteed Disaster Loan program

Henry Ford on the Skills Every Employer Wants from their Employees

If you’re searching for a job or looking to hire an employee, you might be wondering what employee skills to focus on in your endeavours.  Every manager has their own preference and their own needs, so there’s certainly some variance across employers and industries. However, the advice of Henry Ford II could be considered a universal foundation of essential employee skills.  In his essay Business: An Introduction, Ford outlines several “qualities that make a man [or woman] an asset to business.”  Let’s review what Ford considers to be the essential skills every employer looks for when hiring an employee.

An Overview of Using Surveys for Market Research

Using Surveys for Market Research

Most of us, at one point in our life, have been asked to complete a survey. I know I have certainly been asked to complete surveys - most recently by a PhD student I encountered at the local Starbucks! Having personally never relied upon large scale surveys to guide new product design, I wanted to explore the role surveys could play in launching new ventures. Here’s what I have found.

From a pedagogical level, a survey is a short or long questionnaire designed to solicit feedback on a product or service. They are typically used to assess customer satisfaction, conduct customer segmentation studies, evaluate product usage, and, among other things, understand the perceptions consumers have of a business brand. The data gained through survey information are also descriptive; they are expressed in percentages terms and frequency counts, and sometimes cross-tabulated for the purpose of comparison. And while the aforementioned definition and uses of surveys are simplistic and intuitive, their execution is not. Just like business forecasting, it is part art and part science. And just like business forecasting, garbage in yields garbage out.

Update: How the 2009 economic stimulus package affects small businesses

We wrote earlier about how Obama’s 2009 economic stimulus proposal, the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, would affect small businesses.  Since then, it has been revised by the House and Senate and was signed into law by President Obama on Feb 18, 2009.  Given that the debate over whether or not to pass the bill has ended, let’s review how this stimulus package affects the small business community.

You can follow along by obtaining a full copy of the stimulus bill from either Recovery.gov or Wikisource.org.  Be warned - the pdf is over 100Mb and the bill is composed of 1419 pages (which is why we recommend the lightweight interface offered by Wikisource.org).  Small business provisions can be found in Title V, Section 4 of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009. 

Small Business Week In Review: 02/23/09

Economic News Roundup

Paul Volcker, former Federal Reserve Chairman, gave a talk on the economy at Columbia University.  Instead of providing a set of links & associated commentary for this weeks addition of the Small Business Week In Review, I suggest our readers click on the image below to watch the talk.

(image from the Associated Press)

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