Business Mangement

BUSINESS MANAGEMENT - MANAGEMENT'S ROLE

This is the 23rd of a series of newsletters published on Business Management and Management Skills. Not all topics will apply to your business, but each section will be beneficial to establish company goals and objectives. By reading and studying these newsletter articles, you're taking the first step in achieving your goals.

* * * * *

Most people have weak management skills, regardless of their position or title. How well do you manage work processes and time? You need to keep up, read about management, attend management seminars, look at best practices, and take some courses. Get new management skills and document them for your resume.

Managers must undertake long-range planning to achieve their goals and growth expectations, and short-range planning to keep busy, pay the bills, and build up financial reserves. Know your objectives (what you want to achieve), and then establish your policies (how you're going to achieve it). Decide how you want to position yourself and chase only that kind of work.

In all your planning, recognize the time value of money for it's the fuel that keeps things moving, and the stalling effects that a lack of money can cause. Cash is king - you're out of business the day you cannot make payroll. Seek your level of competition. Some large firms have evolved to be very efficient and specialized. These firms tend to dominate certain types of construction, so choose your own field of battle. Determine the types of jobs where you have a competitive advantage, and then assign specific resources to obtaining this type of work.

Take an inventory of your tangible and intangible assets. How qualified are your field personnel, supervisors, estimators, sales people and office staff? Are they directed and motivated for maximum productivity? What kind of work can you compete for successfully and make a profit?

All of these words simply say that you must prepare, and that you must be prepared. Being effective, efficient and productive is not an option in today's business world.

Mike Holt's Comment: This newsletter article was extracted from Mike Holt's Business Management and Management Skills' Workbook. Watch for our next newsletter, and as always, we invite your comments and feedback. Send us your real-life experiences. We value your opinions and participation. Please respond to Barbara at bjparks@atlantic.net. And... be sure to visit Mike Holt's Website at http://www.mikeholt.com.

So, a network the Internet. It is not represented for the majority of us without concept a web site, and as of today - more fashionable, a portal. Actually, the web site is the located presence of the information at a wide-area network, that itself means both a data storage, and their display to the user on his search. Here it is important for us to understand, that there are three essences of work with the information, namely, a data storage (storehouse of the data), their processing (business logic) and display (performance, the interface). Certainly, any program has similar functional properties. However, in a case with wide-area networks, these three essences of an information component of business can be territorially carried. For example: the data the logic of their processing user performance, on my search is stored in the USA, business is in Munich, and, to be formed in Moscow. That is, in this case the technology of the distributed calculations is completely realized. Certainly, sources of the data can be much more one, and computer centers business of logic is in different parts of the world, it is important, that performance for me as the end user it is formed in one program - a browser (or special program the maintenance, frequently named as the "thin" client).

What purposes can be pursued at creation a web of a site? We shall start with a simple case. This performance in a wide-area network of the information on our activity (the company, state body and so forth). One or several web of pages which describe and advertise activity (production, services) which can contain including the information on the prices. In this variant a web the site acts some kind of the publication of the enterprise, operative from the point of view of the publication.

The following decision in a direction of development the Internet of technologies, is integration of performance of the information with primary activity. The direction of interaction can be realized as from business of logic to a site, and on the contrary. For example, we have certain system of automation where the price a sheet is formed. As soon as the manager updates price items the information and on a web a site, there and then, is synchronously updated. Feedback, it when the Internet user, having chosen an item interesting him on a site, can generate the order which is hereinafter processed by standard means for the company. If to unit these both technologies we receives system of the interactive order. But for the present not shop.

For realization the Internet of shop is required to us integration in our web a site of external Internet services, payment systems. As result, we receive interactive system of the order through the Internet, with an opportunity of interactive payment by means of information payment technologies (plastic bank cards, a web money).

The following logic step should be integration of internal services of the enterprise (accounts department, a warehouse, production, transport divisions, etc.) and systems of interaction with the client in the uniform information environment. Thus, time from accommodation and payments of the order before its fulfilment and the account in internal systems of decision-making (economic, warehouse, industrial and other) is provided minimum. Here we already speak about complex system of automation of the whole enterprise on the basis of a wide-area network which the Internet of shop and system of automation of primary activity consists in close integration of technologies.

However all previous reasonings concerned only activity of one company. In structure of many large companies there is some number of affiliated companies. Accordingly for the head company there is a problem of integration of information flows on all affiliated companies. It can be decided, creating or own global computer networks (that is expensive), or using a shared network the Internet (that is unsafe). But, having decided the given problem, we receive the operative control over all activity of association of the enterprises, and also an opportunity through a uniform information source to inform clients on processes which occur in all structure of holding, irrespective