Collin College SEED

Develop These 7 Skills to Become a More Influential Person

Happy Valentine's Day love your friends at SEED!!!

Photography by: Clint Brewer | Photo
Event Sponsorship by: Park Place Dealerships
Joint Event with EO Dallas & Entrepreneurs' Organization - Fort Worth
Speaker: Becoming Your Best

Bringing ‘Ohm’ To The Office | KERA This hour, we’ll talk about how the corporate world would be wise to embrace meditation with David Gelles, author of “Mindful Work: How Meditation is Changing

Some of the most successful and inspirational entrepreneurs never set out with the goal of running a large company or employing scores of people. Many are simply men and women motivated to develop solutions to a problem they’re facing.

Looking for a NEW and exciting CAREER???
They have Career and Workforce Development courses Collin College for: Business Communications and Management, Business Finance, Business Intelligence, Business Writing. Lastly Collin Continuing Education courses teach Business Applications for computers.

Collin College Continuing Education Collin College Continuing Education is the leading career skills training institution for adults.

Check out Collin County's Small Business Development Center if you are a current or new business owner. They will provide FREE and low cost business training workshops weekly for the community!! CLICK BELOW!!

Collin SBDC www.CollinSBDC.com

DID YOU KNOW COLLIN COLLEGE HAS A PARTNERSHIP WITH A Small Business Development Center for Collin County?

The Collin Small Business Development Center, in Plano, TX, is a partnership between the U.S. Small Business Administration, the State of Texas, and Collin College. Through this partnership, one-on-one, strategic business consulting is provided at no charge to businesses and residents of Collin and Rockwall Counties. Low and no charge workshops and seminars are scheduled on topics that are essential to business success.

Growing A Business
•Grow revenue
•Marketing and business plans
•Buy/sell a business
•Business loans and capital
•Social media marketing
•Pricing evaluations
•Cash flow improvement

Starting a Business
•Business planning
•Determining corporation vs. sole proprietor (DBA)
•Start-up funds
•Liability and legal aspects
•Licenses and permits
•Competition
•Feasibility of a new business

Photo Credit: Collin SBDC
Works Cited: "About Our Program." Collin SBDC. The Orth Texas SBDC, 2016. Web. .

SMALL BUSINESS FACTS:
Small Business Ownership Represents Over 97% of all American Companies
Over 2.3 Million Businesses Exist in Texas
Over 80% of all Business is Non-Employer
Texas has the 2nd Largest State Economy in America
Texas has a Gross State Product in Excess of $1.6 Trillion
Texas is the World's 12th Largest Economy
Texas is the #1 State for Exports and Import Tonnage with Over 25 U.S. Customs Ports of Entry
Texas Government Budget for 2016 - 2017 is $209 Billion
Texas Government Agency General-Purpose Spending is $113 Billion for 2016 - 2017
Texas has the 4th Fastest Growth Rate for Woman Business Ownership
Texas Has a 0% State Income Tax for Residents
Texas Business Franchise Tax Maximum Rate is 1%
Texas Safeguards Small Business from Frivolous Lawsuits with "Loser Pays Tort Reform"

Texas SBA™, popularly known as Texas Small Business Association™, provides small businesses throughout Texas with woman minority business certifications, government contracting, loans, and other resources through their website www.texassba.org.

If you are truly interested in building your business, I reccomend talking to the Texas SBA for any help or advice you need. Thank you for your time, Have a great week!

Photo Credit: Texas Small Business Association
Credit: "About Us." Texas SBA Corporate HQ. Texas SBA, Inc., 2007. Web. .

Helpful Article: 5 QUESTIONS YOU MUST ASK TO BUILD A COMPANY THAT LASTS

Let’s face it, most startups fail. The chances of survival are slim at best, and there are countless examples of great ideas that just didn’t make it. As a former entrepreneur and now Partner at Greylock Partners, I spend my time thinking a lot about what makes a company succeed.

You’ve got the great idea. Asking these five questions will help ensure your idea can serve as the solid foundation to build a lasting company.

Related: 6 Telltale Signs It's Time to Become Your Own Boss

1. Do you have a great team?

There is a long-standing debate amongst many investors of what is more important – people, products or markets? I unequivocally put people first. The reason is simple: Great people build great products. Great people are great at selling the product. Remember, your team is the engine that will propel your success for the next 5 to 10 years, so make sure it’s well-built. Don’t get me wrong -- a strong product and big market is vital to building an amazing company, yet the road to success is a long and winding one, and people usually make the difference.

2. Does it pass the 10x test?

In addition to people, I am always asking if your product is at least ten times better than the alternatives. It has to be 10 times better, because anything less won’t stick. Few consumers are early adopters -- most prefer to stay with the tried and true.

And it’s not always about inventing a new product or category, but about being better -- much better. Dropbox entered a crowded field, but their delivery of a simple “Dropbox folder” that synched across all my computers and the cloud combined with their growth plan -- free storage if you invite your friends -- were more than 10x better. They were magical. You don’t need to be first -- just make sure you’re better in a big way.

3. Does it pass the 10-second test?

In this era of 140 characters and disappearing photos, capturing people’s attention is ever more challenging. One of they keys to success is if you can describe what you do in a proverbial ten seconds.

Geoffrey Moore, in the classic entrepreneurship book Crossing the Chasm, suggested a framework that I’ve always used to help articulate: Who is your target customer and what’s the truly compelling reason to buy. What is your product’s key benefit, and how is it undeniably different than the competition -- or why is it 10x better?

Articulating your identity in 10 seconds gives you a framework for making tons of difficult decisions such as where to invest, how to go to market and more. It also gives you a simple and powerful vehicle for explaining your focus to your customers -- and investors.

Related: No Shortcuts: How One Stylist Built His Beauty Powerhouse

4. Am I building the next billion-dollar company?

Not all entrepreneurship requires venture capital (VC). There are lots of entrepreneurs around the world building interesting business without VC funding. However, if you’re going the venture-backed route, top-tier VCs are looking for those founders focused on big ideas. From the Greylock portfolio, think Workday, Palo Networks, Facebook and Linkedin.

The reason is because venture capital is driven by the 80/20 rule -- actually, it’s more like 95/5. A very small number of investments are very successful and produce the vast majority of returns. If a firm has a $1 billion fund and the firm targets a return of 5 to 10 times that to its investors, then it’s tough to do with small outcomes. If a fund makes 50 investments, maybe five or fewer deliver the vast majority of results.

5. Why now?

You have a great idea -- but is the world ready?

In 2000, I personally invested and was on the board of a company called Backplace -- different than the Lady Gaga-backed company of today. The idea was that in the age of the cloud and a move to recurring revenue models, building a software as a service (SaaS) platform for billing would be like selling shovels to the gold diggers. The problem was that in 2000, there were not enough SaaS providers. Today, we are seeing the success of companies like Zuora as the number of companies relying on recurring revenue models has soared over the past decade. Timing matters.

By asking these five questions, you can take an idea and transform it into one so compelling and powerful, it can make a lasting impact for years to come. And never underestimate the last ingredient -- luck. It’s hard to plan for it, but all of the above will prepare you to take advantage of Lady Luck when and if she appears.

Thank you for taking the time to read this amazing article from Entrepreneur Magazine! I hope this will help you in your future as a successful entrepreneur!!

Photo credit: Shuttershock

Article Credit: Ansanelli, Joseph. "5 Questions You Must Ask to Build a Company That Lasts." Entrepreneur. Joseph Ansanelli, 2016. Web. .

Helpful Article: WHAT MAKES A SUCCESSFUL ENTREPRENEUR?

A paper from Ernst and Young dug into the qualities that make a successful entrepreneur across all different types of companies.

"While start-ups often attract considerable public attention and are critical to building the entrepreneurial ecosystem, it is high-impact entrepreneurs who are the power behind our economy." This is, at least, the conclusion of Ernst and Young's annual paper called "The Vital Entrepreneur."

For the paper, Ernst and Young combed through the company's 250 Entrepreneur of the Year finalists to identify common traits. The paper broke down the group into six company categories--private, public, family-owned, women-owned, venture capital backed and private equity backed companies. The paper then identified the strengths unique to companies in each category.

Here is a breakdown of the paper’s findings for each category:

Private companies

Of the EY Entrepreneur of the Year finalists, 88 percent were private companies. This group experienced 33 percent revenue growth and 26 percent job growth on average over the past fiscal year. According to the paper, the factors most important this success were independence, flexibility and freedom. The paper continued that as private companies are not required to disclose financial information to the public, these companies had greater freedom to focus on long-term goals with less pressure to deliver short-term performance.

Venture-backed companies

The VC-backed finalists saw 70 percent revenue and 47 percent job growth over the 2012 fiscal year--probably part of the reason the paper identified the VC model as “one of the best options to fund the early and scale-up stages for innovators that are disrupting incumbents and creating new market niches.” The Ernst and Young paper identified that beyond the funding, these companies receive from VCs, the relationships with VCs offer companies expertise, connections and experience.

Private equity backed companies

Though the revenue and job growth percentage in this category was lower than the VC-backed business, the paper stressed that these companies are rewarded by the partnerships with private equity companies--such as geographic expansion, access to broader networks, and standardization to name a few. Additionally, of the entire pool of finalists the PE backed firms as a group had a higher median revenue than 50 percent of all the finalists.

Family-owned companies

This category accounted for 50 percent of tall the finalist in the EY Entrepreneur of the Year competition. Why? According to the paper, resilience. Of this group, most of the companies were private, so they were free of the short-term pressures of the public markets and able to adopt a longer-term view, which affects their decisions as well. Another important thing to note is that 61 percent of these companies reported funding their companies through bank loans, 58 percent through re-invested earnings while 12 percent reported using private equity and two percent reported using venture capital. The emphasis on bank loans required most of the companies in this category to manage growth relative to cash flow.

Public companies

“The Vital Entrepreneur” highlighted operational rigor as the greatest strength of the group. It added that the commitment to continual advancement reflective of market changes and goals by the public companies is what led to continual growth by these companies. Additionally, public companies are able to attract and hold on to top talent by being able to offer higher compensation and better perks (think stock options and equity) to employees that other types of companies cannot.

Thank you for reading this helpful article for all of you entrepreneurs who crave success substantiously!!

Works Cited:
Tracy, Abigail. "What Makes a Successful Entrepreneur." INC. Staff Reporter, Inc., 2013. Web. .