Report of Interest: Intuit Future of Small Business Report

The face of small business will dramatically change in 2017 as seasoned baby boomers, kids fresh out of high school, mid-career women, "mompreneurs" and new immigrants come together to create the most diverse pool of entrepreneurs ever. Those are among the key findings of the groundbreaking Intuit Future of Small Business Report(TM), a unique study that looks forward 10 years and examines the prospects, influences and profiles of small business.

Press release is here.

BusinessWeek article here.

Download report here.

Sound Advice: Can Focusing Too Much on the Competition Harm Profitability?

It is a common practice of many companies to focus their attention on grabbing market share from their competitors. But such efforts can actually be detrimental to the firm's profitability, according to Wharton marketing professor J. Scott Armstrong.

For years, Armstrong has been conducting research showing that competitor-oriented objectives, such as setting market-share targets, are counterproductive. After co-authoring a paper in 1996 that reached this conclusion, he and a different co-author, Kesten C. Green of Monash University in Australia, have written another paper summarizing 12 new studies that add additional weight to the original conclusion. Their study is titled, "Competitor-oriented Objectives: The Myth of Market Share."

Read more here and then ask yourself, "Has your objective always been to beat your competitor?"

Article of Interest: Smart Startup Ideas for '07

It's never too late to be where the action is. Check out this article where experts pinpoint emerging trends and tell entrepreneurs planning their next ventures which opportunities to consider.

If it's too much to digest at once, skip to the part at the end that reads: Click here for a slide show on nine-promising small-business opportunities on and off the Web. That will get you where you need to be.

Article of Interest: Women Entrepreneurs and Risk

Do you think women lack ambition?

Read the article, see what you think and weigh-in with your comments.

Article of Interest: Growing A Business Is Difficult, But Satisfying

Women face substantial handicaps, even self-imposed ones, and some advantages when they own businesses. Here's a snapshot from the article:

Of the roughly 23 million privately owned businesses in the U.S., just more than 1 million of them generate $1 million in sales or more, says Erin Fuller, executive director of the National Association of Women Business Owners. Of those companies, something like 850,000 are owned by men, and around 250,000 are owned by women, she said.

Learn more, here.

What Is Your Dream?

We know Dr. Martin Luther King's:
I Have A Dream.

Does your dream embrace courage? Have hope in the face of despair? Live up to your ideals?

If not, then start over to build a better you, a better business and better life for all.

Sound Advice: Management Innovation

Gary Hamel, our keynote speaker for the WPO Chicago Conference 2006, is back bigger and bolder than ever.

Here he talks about twelve noteworthy management innovations from 1900 - 2000. You'll also find a PowerPoint slide toolkit that you can download. If that's not enough, order his recent HBR article that was considered one of the must reads in 2006. And while you are at it, ask yourself this: Are you applying any of the innovation techniques he mentions to your business?

Report of Interest: Global Entrepreneurship Monitor

The Global Entrepreneurship Monitor is the largest and longest-standing globally focused entrepreneurship research. Researchers from Babson College, the London Business School, and a university team for each participating country, explore the role of entrepreneurship in national economic growth. More than 200 scholars and researchers are currently participating in the GEM project. The results of GEM data analysis are used as a key benchmarking indicator by a number of distinguished regional, national and supranational authorities around the world.

GEM’s unique ability to provide information on the entrepreneurial landscape of countries in a global context makes its data a necessary resource for any serious attempt to study and track entrepreneurial behavior worldwide. GEM’s renewed vision will allow researchers to further increase their ability to educate policy makers and make a difference in our economies.

Click here to download the report.

Blog Post of Interest: Tom Peters Sounds Off

A great post by our friend Tom Peters. Bottom line: "Put women leaders in charge!" And one of the authors he mentions is Marti Barletta who will be speaking at our annual conference in Scottsdale, AZ in April! Read more here on Tom telling it like it is.

Sound Advice: Einstein Is Right

May 2007 be disciplined, committed, and focused on fearless growth.

Best wishes from all of us at the Women Presidents' Organization!