“It is only when the tide goes out that you can see who is swimming naked” a quote from Warren Buffet. This is becoming too true in the tough economic times as we begin to see those small business who have not done their foundation preparation in their businesses. As things get tougher some are becoming more exposed and are been found out by their Creditors, SARS and the dreaded banks and their customers.

I paid my bank manager a visit this week to discuss our current financial situation with him to keep him informed of what we are doing and what we had planned for the business in the next few months. He was taken aback that a customer was being proactive in their finances. He mentioned that most people only come in when it is too late and need some sort of rescue plan.

If you feel the tide going out, either wade in deeper or get covering, nobody wants to see you naked.

Once again Bruce Wade will address the business advantage clients at this months ABSA breakfast on Tuesday.

ABSA hosts regional networking breakfasts each month for business owners who have subscribed to the ABSA Business advantage programme that includes Quick books, Training programmes and Network education breakfasts.

Bruce will cover the early stages of the business life cycle highlighting the importance of building the correct foundation for your business in order to promote and enable growth. Without the correct building blocks businesses will often grow and fail as their support structure is not solid enough to support the capacity and expansion.

The Entrepreneur Incubator offers a step-by-step programme and tools to assist the business owner to identify and correct any shortfalls in their business structure. Some of these include:

1. Understanding the business owners strengths
2. Developing business ideas around your own passions
3. Market Research to get to know the lay of the land
4. Feasibility Study to see if your idea may work
5. Setting business goals to gain forward movement
6. Defining a niche to distinguish your business from others
7. Defining your business so you know what you do
8. Financial plan to keep track of cash flow
9. Marketing plan to develop customer relationships
10. Implementation plan to get it right first time

We look forward to a successful talk followed up with enthusiastic referrals.