Great Reasons for Setting up a Home Business

Discover some great reasons to set up a home business. Then use them to keep yourself motivated when the going gets tough.

Keywords:

Small business,home business,internet business,business start-up

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Many people dream of setting up a home-based business, but it takes hard work, persistence and a willingness to wait for results. If you are thinking about starting up on your own, make sure you write a list of your reasons for doing so. When the going gets tough you can go back to your list to remind yourself of why you’re doing it and to reactivate your motivation. Here are some valid reasons for going it alone. Add your own to the list.

You want to make a lot more money than you earn in your present job

With so little job security around these days, more of us are finding we have to work long hours to keep the boss happy. And if we don’t toe the line, we know there are plenty of people who will be only to happy to step into our shoes. But is it worth all the hard grind, just to put extra money in someone else’s pocket? Achieving financial freedom is high on most people’s list.

You want to get a life beyond the office

Money isn’t the only important thing in life and what’s the point of earning it if you don’t have the chance to enjoy it? Work may play a significant role in our definition of who we are, but it certainly shouldn’t be all that we are. Whilst starting up a business is very time-consuming, the ultimate goal is to create enough recurring income to give ourselves more free time. This is not possible in a job, except for a very fortunate few.

You want to stop commuting for hours every week

Many people spend several hours a day getting to and from work. This is stressful at the best of times, but add traffic jams, overcrowded trains and bad weather and this is enough to exhaust anyone before they have even started work. Facing the same journey on the way home can lead to the inability to relax and enjoy what’s left of the day.

You want a more flexible lifestyle

Deciding your own working hours will enable you to fit in many other activities which you would otherwise miss – watching the kids perform in the school play or concert, taking part in a sport or other hobby, spending time with friends and relatives who are in town on holiday.

You want to cut down on childcare costs

In many families with young children, both parents are obliged to work in order to make ends meet, but often find that one of their salaries is almost completely swallowed up by childcare costs. If one partner is working online, hours can be fitted around those of the partner working outside the home, eliminating or at least reducing the need for paid childcare.

You want to something you really enjoy

How many of us really enjoy working for an employer? The job may be exciting at first, but it’s all too easy to get bogged down in paperwork, boring routine tasks and office politics. You might have to do all the menial jobs when you start your own business, but the day will come when you can hire someone else to do them!

The final reason is really an combination of the first six:

You want to take control of your life

As your business grows, you’ll find you have the power to make more decisions about how you live your life – where you live, when you take holidays, when you retire, how you spend your free time.

If you are thinking of setting up a business online, decide which reasons are most important to you, then write them in large letters on a piece of paper and stick it where you’ll see it every day. That way you won’t lose sight of why you want to change your life.

© Waller Jamison 2006

Electronic Medical Records – Are There Reasons for Low Implementation?

Electronic medical records promise to make the future of healthcare brighter for patients and medical providers, yet across the board, it’s estimated only 10 to 15 percent of doctors even use them.

Keywords:

electronic medical records, emr, ehr

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Electronic medical records promise to make the future of healthcare brighter for patients and medical providers, yet across the board, it’s estimated only 10 to 15 percent of doctors even use them. If the promises of EMRs are so grand, why don’t more healthcare professionals take advantage? While there are many reasons doctors have slowly adopted EMR technology, the top three are cost, data security and lack of uniform standards. This article will discuss these top objections to EMR implementation.

EMR Costs

Implementing an electronic medical record system can entail a significant upfront cost, especially if converting to a paperless medical office the first time. It’s not surprising then the segment of doctors most resistant to electronic medical records are those with the smallest amount of income. Large practices, hospitals and insurance companies are adopting EMRs at twice the rate of small doctors since they realize the financial benefits and have the resources for fast implementation.

While there is a cost to EMR implementation, the financial benefits alone provide a strong return on investment even to the smallest practices. An article posted in the April, 2003 American Journal of Medicine examined the return on investment of EMRs for small practices and concluded the gains in productivity and decrease in denied or lost claims could gain an average practice $86,400 in a five year span. With an initial investment of $6,600 the return on investment is phenomenal! While larger healthcare providers need to spend larger sums for software, there are many EMRs and medical practice management programs available for small practices that fit into the $6600 cited by the study and even allow for computer and printer purchases.

EMR Security

Securing patient medical records is another big reason doctors are slow to convert to paperless medical offices. Many EMRs currently available utilize “client/server” technology…meaning that software is permanently installed on a server located in the doctor’s office and accessed through the network. This type of software clearly places the responsibility of backups and patient records security on the medical office. Web-based EMRs shift that responsibility away from the doctor and onto the software company who
are better equipped to secure electronic patient records. Though vigilant hackers can break into just about any system, web-based EMRs reduce that risk significantly.

EMR Standardization

Perhaps the biggest complication to widespread use of electronic medical records is the lack of standardization. One of the catalysts to the creation of EMRs is the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996. Commonly known as HIPAA, this law promulgated the creation of electronic patient records, but failed to implement standards for them. To be fair, technology has changed quite a bit since 1996 and Congress doesn’t own a crystal ball. Even Yahoo’s website looked quite a bit different ten years ago.

There is no real explanation why the components of modern electronic medical records haven’t been standardized. In fact, the name hasn’t even been settled on!

Electronic medical records have many AKA’s including:

PMRI - Patient Medical Record Information - US
ICRS – Integrated Care Record Services - UK
CMR – Computerized Medical Record – US, International
CPR – Computer-based Patient Record - US, International
PCR – Patient-carried Patient Record - Germany
PHR – Personal Health Record - International
EMR – Electronic Medical Record - US
DMR – Digital Medical Record - Asia
EPR – Electronic Patient Record
EHR – Electronic Health Record
LHII – Local Health Information Infrastructure - US
CCR – Continuity of Care Record

With a substantial upfront cost, both of money and training, the fear of having to change EMR systems due to government regulation is certainly reasonable.

EMR Implementation Summary

Doctors may soon have little choice but to implement computerized medical billing and patient record systems. HIPAA’s scope recently expanded to health care providers with less than $5 million in revenue. Insurance companies and other payers are increasingly requiring electronic filing. Even patients recognize the value of electronic medical records with a 2005 survey stating patients strongly believed widespread use of EMRs would decrease wait time, paperwork and reduce visit costs. Let’s hope small practice
physicians take note.

References:
http://www.acgroup.org/images/2005_ACG_Mid-Year_White_Paper_-_EMR_Marketplace.pdf
http://square.umin.ac.jp/DMIESemi/y2004/20040913_2.pdf
http://www.healthcareitnews.com/story.cms?id=3355

Great Reasons to Work Abroad

Working abroad is as easy as finding a job in an exotic location of your choice, getting the paperwork done, and buying a plane ticket. You obviously need to make some important lifestyle and living considerations before you quit your day job, but finding a job overseas is not as daunting a task as one may think at first glance.

Keywords:

job, jobs, abroad, job abroad, work, working, apply, application, jobinthesun, resume, overseas, overseas job, vacant, vacancy, work abroad, betameric

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Are you sick of the humdrum of your day job? Have you ever imagined yourself on a tropical getaway when you were supposed to be working? Have you ever wondered why your life is so monotonous and stressful even though you should be happy with your position? Maybe it is time you made a drastic change to your entire lifestyle, beginning with your environment. Perhaps you need to consider working abroad.

What if your daily commute included a walk on the beach? What if it was summer year around? What if your commute, instead of involving traffic jams, involved you cruising along the sunlit seashore with nothing but a warm ocean breeze obstructing your path? This may sound too good to be true, but it is not even close to an exaggeration of what is possible with a career abroad.

Working abroad is as easy as finding a job in an exotic location of your choice, getting the paperwork done, and buying a plane ticket. You obviously need to make some important lifestyle and living considerations before you quit your day job, but finding a job overseas is not as daunting a task as one may think at first glance.

When working abroad, you will have lifestyle opportunities that most dream about. Overseas, especially in the Caribbean, companies are always in need of skilled employees to fulfill positions which are as diverse and varied as any society in any city. Working abroad may offer brand new opportunities not only in regards to environment and lifestyle, but even in job position and promotions. A new career in a new country can mean a second chance for you to be the best at what you do.

One of the obvious benefits of working abroad is the vacation like atmosphere. You will react with people who are in a good mood and on vacation on a regular basis. You will probably meet tourists from all over the world, and your social life will be more fluid than you ever dreamed possible.

With an exciting new career abroad, you will have an opportunity to become who you want to be. The potential for a new lifestyle and career abroad are so expansive that you will only be cheating yourself if you do not consider it for your future. Have an intelligent, experienced company which specializes in finding people jobs overseas give you a consultation today.

Five Reasons to Use Customer Phone Surveys

Consumers are the life line of any successful business and you can learn a great deal of information from them. If you want to find out how good or bad your business is call the customers and ask them. They will give you straight answers and you can modify your approach if there are areas where you are failing to meet their needs.

Keywords:

customer experience marketing, monitoring, customer survey, mystery shopping, survey, IVR, customer feedback, customer satisfaction, employee survey, customer research, CRM, phone survey, surveys, mystery shopper, customer retention, telephone survey, customer loyalty, secret shoppers, call center, Mindshare, mshare, automated feedback, marketing research, employee retention

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Consumers are the life line of any successful business and you can learn a great deal of information from them. If you want to find out how good or bad your business is call the customers and ask them. They will give you straight answers and you can modify your approach if there are areas where you are failing to meet their needs.

They will appreciate the fact that you are interested in what they have to say, not just taking their money and then tossing them aside. Without really doing much of anything you have just made the bond between you and the customer stronger. Loyal customers will come back to make future purchases as well as refer others to you.

The fact that conducting customer phone surveys leads to retaining those relationships means that you aren’t going to have to work as hard in the future with marketing to have a successful business. It is harder to continually find new customers out there in the market so focus a great deal of your attention on those you already have. You want them to be repeat customers for life once they make an initial purchase from you.

Consumer trends never stay the same for very long so business owners are always trying to figure out what to offer them next. Some are leaders in this area and they control the biggest portion of the consumer market. Others simply follow along in their footsteps but they don’t reap the same volume of sales.

By talking to your customers on the phone you will be able to successfully forecast emerging trends. They will know better than any one else what direction they are moving in. With this information you can revamp your marketing strategies and offer them something new before your competition does.

You will find investing in a customer phone survey results in fewer customers that aren’t satisfied with what you have to offer. This will save your business a substantial amount of money. First, you won’t have to pay so much for customer service support because there won’t be as many issues. Second, those customers that are satisfied are less likely to return products and ask for a refund.

The data that is collected from customer phone surveys can help you determine if your business should expand. This could be to offer more of what you are already doing or to implement new products or services. Having such data available reduces the risk of jumping into such ventures and hoping the will be successful.

You will find phone surveys can be a very effective tool for your business. It doesn’t matter what types of goods or services you offer because consumers are going to dictate the success. Don’t let problems that you could have taken care of result in your business not being successful. It doesn’t take too much time or money to conduct phone surveys with your customers but the information is priceless.

Five Reasons Podcasting Might Be Right For Your Home-based Business

Podcasting has now become a very useful home-based business tool used today by many home-based businesses.

Keywords:

Home based business, podcasting, work at home moms, advertising, business tools

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Podcasting has been called the wave of the future. The truth, however, is that podcasting is the here-and-now and is rapidly gaining momentum across the world. There are podcasts available for just about any topic you can think of from cooking to video games to religion. As of February 2006, a Google search for the term “podcast” returns over 205,000,000 results. The amazing reality of this is that it is still, in effect, an untapped market that will continue its growth in the years to come.

Podcasting can have many uses for the home-based business owner. It can be useful not only advertise, but to also communicate your business message. Below are 5 tips on how to use podcasts to benefit your business:

1. Reach your niche market – Depending on your product, podcasting can be the perfect way to reach new groups of people in your market. Believe it or not, there are people out there looking for the product you provide and this enables them to easily find them.

Podcasts are quickly becoming a new advertising venue as well. A podcast that is listed in podcasting directories such as iTunes can reach thousands, even millions of listeners. This can be a very inexpensive method for advertisers on a budget.

The popularity of podcasts is a steadily growing trend. Many people who are just beginning to learn about podcasts will search for topics of there interest. This is a great way to reach customers that you would not have been able to reach before the advent of podcasting.


2. Share your passion – Podcasting is a great way to share what you love. If you are excited about a topic or product, chances are that others out there are, too. A podcast on the topic you are passionate about is a great way to connect with others who also share that same passion.

People can hear your excitement over the “airwaves.” I always enjoy listening to a program when the speaker is obviously energized about whatever it is he’s speaking on. So, when recording your podcast, keep a smile on your face and allow your excitement to show.


3. Share information – Many home-based businesses have begun because they are filling a need. A podcast can help this information reach the people that it will benefit. For example, CWAHM.com was created to help women be at home with their children while still contributing to their families financially. Many of the sites’ visitors are buys moms who may not have the time to scour the hundreds of pages the site contains. Our podcast, Christian Work at Home Moment, airs once a week and is 24 minutes long. It’s an easy way for moms to learn more about working from home without spending hours on their computer.

Make it a point to research your topic and find all of the interesting and little known facets of passion. Keep your listeners interested and they will want to hear more!

4. Become an “Expert” in your field – Creating a podcast can help to establish you as an “expert” in the area your broadcast covers. You must be willing to take the time, do the research and share information that is valuable and useful to your listeners.

Just as authors become experts by researching and writing on specific topics, podcasters become experts by sharing the information they find with their listening audience. There is a big market for podcasts in a multitude of areas – the next expert could be YOU!

5. It’s easy - A podcast can be started with virtually no cost or investment. In most cases, there is no need to be “tech savvy” to be a podcast creator. It can be as simple as using a phone to record your podcast through a service like Odeo.com. There are, of course, more complicated set-ups, but to begin you truly just need a topic, a phone and a quiet spot to record.

Podcasting is easy for listeners as well. A podcast can be listened to directly from a website or downloaded from iTunes and put directly on an MP3 device.

There are many reasons that a podcast can benefit small and home-based businesses. This growing market is an entirely new way to communicate information to the world. When it comes to podcasting, the sky’s the limit. So take your business to new levels and start podcasting today.

Five Reasons to Make Meetings More Fun

The average person spends more time in meetings than they’d like to. The average manager spends the majority of their workday in meetings. Given these facts, shouldn’t meetings be more fun?

Keywords:

meetings, meeting success, fun meetings, productive meetings, leading meetings

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The average person spends more time in meetings than they’d like to. The average manager spends the majority of their workday in meetings. Given these facts, it isn’t surprising that you can read lots of books, articles and tips about running and managing meetings more effectively. Seldom will you read that you should make your meetings more fun.

In this article I will give you five reasons why you should purposefully inject more fun into your meetings.

Increase engagement. Let me state the obvious. People like things that are fun. They engage mentally and emotionally in things they are enjoying. Ask yourself: Would you like people to be more fully engaged in your next meeting? Do you want people to be more mentally involved in the problem you are solving or the issue you are discussing? You’ve brought people together to benefit from their presence, not for them to fill a seat. Making your meetings more fun will increase their engagement in the meeting and help you produce better outcomes.

Increase communication. You can’t take advantage of people’s knowledge and experience if they don’t share it. Including an element of fun in your meetings will get people more comfortable with speaking up and sharing their ideas.

Improve relationships. If people know each other better and are more comfortable with the others in the meeting, they will more likely share their ideas. So anything we can do to improve the relationships between people is a positive step. Does this mean that everyone in a meeting needs to be best friends? Of course not! What it does mean is that as people know each other better they will be more open to the ideas of others and more willing to share their own. Fun can make all of this happen.

Increase energy. How many meetings have you attended where the energy level feels like it is at zero? People’s minds are elsewhere or on other projects. People aren’t interested in the topic of the meeting. People don’t understand why they are there. And all of this shows up in somber, lifeless body language and effort. Of course there are many ways to remedy this besides injecting fun into your meetings, but fun is still a wonderful tool to improve the energy level and attention to the meeting topics

Increase memory and retention. We remember things that are more enjoyable longer. When we make our meetings more fun, we increase people’s ability to remember the content and remember the decisions. When people remember the meeting’s events better it improves the likelihood that they will complete their action items, share the results of the meeting more accurately with others and much more.

The five reasons above are excellent in themselves. But beyond them individually, the overriding reason to make your meetings more fun is that they will be more productive. We have meetings to get people with different opinions, perspectives and experiences working together. Our whole purpose in doing this is to create valuable outcomes. When we can find ways to make the investment of time and energy for all of those involved more productive, we should implement these ways!

This does not mean to add an item to your agenda that says fun. Nor does it mean that you should change the focus of your meetings – you are meeting for a important purpose and that should still be your focus.

Just remember that when we can make our meetings more enjoyable, even fun, we can enhance the productivity of those meetings – and productivity and results are why we were meeting in the first place.

Hats Off To Technology: Five Reasons Why

The next time you send an e-mail to your family, plan a vacation online, or send a photo of your newborn to your parents, you may want to tip your hat to technology.

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Hats Off To Technology: Five Reasons Why

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The next time you send an e-mail to your family, plan a vacation online, or send a photo of your newborn to your parents, you may want to tip your hat to technology. Technology, and its use, is an integral part of our everyday lives. It is so pervasive, we would be hard-pressed to live in a world without it.

When Sandra Johnson was young, she thought an engineer was a person who drove a train. A few years later, she became the first black woman in the U.S. to earn a Ph.D. in electrical engineering. Now a Chief Technology Officer and Senior Technical Staff Member for IBM's Systems & Technology Group, Dr. Johnson believes it is imperative for black families to incorporate technology into their daily lives. "There are any number of reasons blacks can't live without technology," Dr. Johnson says. Here are her top five:

1) Technology Levels the Playing Field: From small and medium-size businesses to visual, literary and recording artists, to information dissemination-technology brings the world to our fingertips. This offers a special advantage to members of the black community who have traditionally encountered obstacles to success in these and other areas. Technology levels the playing field, so that black voices can be heard, black offerings can be marketed and creativity and innovation can flourish.

2) Economic Empowerment: Technology enables blacks to do some incredible things at the click of a mouse. They can shop for just about anything, pay bills, plan vacations, purchase entertainment, wine and dine at reduced cost and use online services to find the best banking services.

3) Strengthens Family Ties: For many who are no longer living in physical proximity to their closest relatives, technology enables them to communicate on a regular basis in a cost-effective manner. They can exchange photographs, share videos, send e-cards, text message and call from one place to another at a fraction of what the cost was just a few years ago.

4) Careers in Technology Are Awesome: A career in a technology-related field can be extremely rewarding. It can also improve your quality of life. Technology skills are unique and in short supply, the work is exciting and gratifying and the financial rewards are relatively high.

5) Great Futures for Your Children: Through technology, the world is literally at your children's doorstep. Technology enhances the education of black children. Just imagine what could happen if black children spent time designing or improving games for the Xbox 360 and PS2, or used their ingenuity to create videos, films, music and literary works. The possibilities and opportunities associated with technology are endless.

According to Dr. Johnson, there are a number of programs available, including Black Family Technology Awareness Week, that provide technology access and training. "If America is to maintain its competitive advantage," she says, "we must encourage our children to join the next generation of innovators, scientists and engineers, and our adults to build and improve their technology skills."