Small Business Toolbox

A library of business management info


Editor's Letter from MyBusiness Magazine
  • Proving the Pessimists Wrong
    06/03/2008
    As we note in this issue of MyBusiness, small business owners are not very hopeful about the economy these days (see Leading Indicators on page 48). The NFIB Index of Small Business Optimism fell 3.3 points in March to 89.6—its lowest reading since the monthly surveys were started in 1986, and the lowest quarterly reading since the second quarter of 1980.
  • Editor's Letter: Cause and Effect
    04/02/2008
    In each issue of MyBusiness, we explore a wide array of issues and situations that affect small businesses. While this issue's primary focus is healthcare, we always try to include articles that touch on all aspects of a business' operation, from human resources to taxes.
  • Expect the Unexpected
    02/11/2008
    Almost every day for the past 20 years, I've read the business section of one or more major newspapers (or, more recently, their Web sites) to keep up on the economic trends and conditions that could affect my business. But no matter how prepared I try to be, I've noticed that my ups and downs don't always coincide with the trends I read about in the news.
  • Success That Matters
    11/30/2007
    The authors of the 2006 book Success Built to Last: Creating a Life That Matters set out to discover common characteristics and principles shared by the hundreds of successful individuals they interviewed. Their findings indicated success in life comes from aligning three elements: what you do must matter deeply to you; you need a highly developed sense of accountability, audacity, passion and responsible optimism; and you must find effective ways to take action.
  • Setting the Record Straight
    09/26/2007
    Editor's Letter
  • It's So Easy Being Green
    07/25/2007
    No offense to Kermit the Frog, but being green has gotten a lot easier.
  • Publisher's Letter
    05/30/2007
    One of the Barometers the editorial board and staff of MyBusiness magazine uses to determine the stories we cover is a survey called Small-Business Problems and Priorities. Conducted every four years by the NFIB Research Foundation, the finished product is a list of 75 problems, ranked most challenging to least challenging by small-business owners.
  • Editor's Letter: Talking 'Bout My Generation
    04/02/2007
    Months ago at a MyBusiness story development meeting, all eyes glanced toward me when someone suggested we work on an article about how baby boomers are changing small business.



    "Why are you looking at me?" I quipped. "The only thing I know about people who are aging is that we don't like to be called 'aging.'"

  • The Problems We Don't Anticipate
    02/02/2007
    In this issue of MyBusiness, we take a look at these two unanticipated facets of running a small business. We all hit periods of intensity in our business and personal lives. Some, like the rapid growth of your business, are positive. Other periods, like those that involve long and confrontational negotiations, are negative. As a small-business owner, these experiences are part of the journey.
  • Editor's Letter: Inspire Someone Today
    11/21/2006
    Running a business can run in a family, even for those who may not continue working in the business run by their parents. At least that's what we discovered while working on this issue of MyBusiness. In speaking with small-business owners for the article "The Entrepreneurial Gene" (on page 22), we heard similar accounts about childhood experiences that provided the foundation of future entrepreneurship. Most went something like this: Someone in their childhood, most likely a parent or older sibling or close family friend, served as an inspirational role model. Because of these role models, the business owners we talked to knew that one day they wanted to run their own small businesses.
  • The More Things Change
    09/20/2006
    What does it take for a business to survive a century? In this issue of MyBusiness, we went looking for the answer by talking with owners of several companies that have been around 100 years or more. What we discovered didn’t surprise us: It takes the same principles for a business to survive a century that it takes for a business to survive a year, five years or 10.
  • Editor's Letter: Getting Things Done
    07/25/2006
    Just do it. Nike's classic advertising slogan could also be the three-word business plan for many of the small-business owners we feature in every issue of MyBusiness magazine. While we focus on the how-to of running and growing a small business, we're also tremendously curious about what drives entrepreneurs to follow their passions in the first place.
  • Publisher's Letter: Problems in Your Own Backyard
    05/25/2006
    Sometimes, big policy issues seem to happen only to other folks in faraway places. In the June/July issue of MyBusiness, we tackle an issue that NFIB members everywhere are discovering right in their own backyards. In the wake of last summer's Supreme Court decision allowing local governments to invoke eminent-domain powers to force a private landowner to sell his property to another private landowner, a growing wave of local governments are using this power--and small-business owners are fighting back.
  • A Failing System
    03/31/2006
    A novelist I know says all stories worth telling have a failure to overcome. And so, when I talk to small-business owners and hear about their great successes, I often ask about their failures, too.
  • It's All About You: Listening, learning, responding
    01/23/2006
  • Storm Stories
    11/21/2005
    When we learned of the devastation left in the wake of Hurricane Katrina, the staff of MyBusiness magazine immediately began work on this issue’s cover story. We knew tens of thousands of small-business owners and hundreds of thousands of their employees would each have their own story of tragedy and loss, of despair and hope, of picking up and moving forward.
  • Welcome to Hollywood
    09/27/2005
    I recently read an interview with a well-known Oscar-winning Hollywood screen writer who was asked how he survived an infamous flop he’d written early in his career. “To succeed in Hollywood,” he said, “the most important skill is to figure out how to stay in the game.”
  • How to Decide
    07/26/2005
    Two of this year's most popular business books—Malcolm Gladwell's Blink and James Surowiecki's The Wisdom of Crowds—are about decisionmaking and its results: how wise or reckless actions occur.
  • Brushes With Greatness
    06/01/2005
    David Letterman’s “Brush with Greatness” is a long-running feature in which a member of his studio audience shares a recollection of a chance encounter with a celebrity. The show’s writers then offer a fictitious sequel to the encounter, enhancing the celebrity sighting into a dramatic and humorous event.
  • What a Difference A Decade Makes
    04/01/2005
    Ten years ago, during a luncheon presentation to members of a big-city civic club, I asked for a show of hands of those who had their e-mail addresses printed on their business cards. In early 1995, fewer than a dozen of the executives in the audience raised their hands. That’s how far we’ve come in 10 years of the Internet.
  • World of Changes
    02/01/2005
    Our readers have told us that “international business” is not among your top priorities. Yet as we delve more into the topics you tell us are important—growth, finding new markets, lowering costs—our writers keep bumping into small-business owners who have chosen to place international business at the top of their priority lists.
  • Controlling Your Fate
    11/19/2004
    A small-business owner I know recently told me he spends a lot of his time making himself dispensable. “Don’t you mean indispensable?” I asked. “No,” he said. “The less my clients and employees need me, the more our company can grow.”
  • Fear Factor Redefined
    10/01/2004
    In my journey as a small-business owner, I thought I had been through some fearful, even terrifying, moments. But in preparing this issue of MyBusiness, when we began to learn of small-business owners who were either in prison or facing the prospects of time in jail, I decided my moments of terror pale in comparison to the circumstances these individuals find themselves in.
  • Life's Lessons
    08/01/2004
    Most readers of MyBusiness know the old adage about the customer always being right is, well, something only a customer could have dreamed up. Customers are wrong all the time. However, trying to convince a customer he or she is wrong is a fool’s trap.
  • Sit Tight
    04/01/2004
    Fact or fiction, like all small-business owners, when given the choice of spending money or saving it, I know my preference.
  • Learning the Right Lessons
    01/29/2004
    This year marks the 10th anniversary of the date I first registered my companyÆs Internet domain name.
  • My Discovery
    11/26/2003
    As IÆve noted before in this space, one of the best benefits of my work is the opportunity to talk each day with small business owners in every industry and from all parts of the nation.
  • Perfect Balance
    09/29/2003
    These days, what small business owner doesnÆt believe he or she is juggling too many responsibilities? We all know the importance of balancing home and work lives, but our efforts to "balance" often turn into more weight all around.
  • Feeling Lucky?
    08/01/2003
    In his recent book, The Luck Factor, British psychologist Richard Wiseman suggests you may be luckier than you think.
  • In Praise of Plan B
    06/03/2003
    Hearing my plans for a recent household project, my wife asked, "What's your Plan B?" After 25 years of marriage, she should know better.
  • Failing Is Not Failure
    04/15/2003
    Nothing in oneÆs business life can be so difficult as closing their small business. I know.
  • In Sickness and in Health
    03/05/2003
    Ah, February and March. Valentine's Day. The arrival of Spring. Love is in the small-business air. Huh?
  • Image Matters to Champions
    01/27/2003
    Lesson learned from tennis rock star.
  • Getting Back to What's Real
    12/04/2002
    Look around and you'll see more and more attention being paid to the idea of simple living.
  • Famously Successful
    12/04/2002
    Examining the companies of former athletes, current movie stars and models, it became clear that those who are successful in the business world have much in common with our readers.
  • Be Creative by Being Yourself
    12/04/2002
    You can promote innovative thinking in yourself and your employees. It's a skill that can be learned, not something you either have or you don't.
  • Hip to Success
    08/26/2002
    To keep your company viable, you need to keep up with the latest small business trends.
  • Build Your Business by Getting a Life
    06/25/2002
    Too many small business owners struggle to have any sort of life outside their business. The reason? Most confuse building a business with just having a job.
  • Now Boarding: Better Business Trips
    05/07/2002
    Instead of an ordeal, look at travel as an opportunity. Not just for new business, which most company-related trips are, but for personal growth.
  • One Big Happy Business
    03/27/2002
    It's reported that anywhere from 75 percent to 95 percent of all U.S. companies are family businesses.
  • Schooldays Again
    03/27/2002
    Don't let the current tightening of the economy provide another excuse to cut back on or put off investing in training. Slow times provide the perfect opportunity to step back and assess your employees'--and your own--skill needs.
  • Main Street Pitches In
    03/27/2002
    Events of recent weeks have revived the "give back" spirit among many Americans.
  • When Bad Economies Mean Good Business
    03/19/2002
    It's a bit hard to believe, but if you've been in business for less than 10 years, you haven't experienced a national economic downturn.