Tags:
Innovation,
Entrepreneur,
Growth
Catch a rising star
Quick: what’s one of the most frustrating aspects of running a medium-sized business? IT must rate pretty high. Successful growth creates a serious dependence upon IT in every mid-sized business. But the likelihood is that your IT infrastructure is –...
more...
Tags:
Innovation,
Entrepreneur,
Strategy,
Growth,
Data management
Ask the right question
Taken literally, "thinking outside the box" could mean saving serious money. Or at least, it can if you ask the right questions of the right people. Take all those hundreds – if not thousands – of separate bits of information that your business...
more...
Tags:
Strategy,
Growth,
Data management,
Security
Data basics
1. What is a data policy?It sounds like a bureaucratic nightmare, but a data policy is fundamentally a company-wide agreement on how and where data is stored, and who has access to which parts and for what purpose. By setting clear limits on how...
more...
Tags:
Change,
Growth,
Strategy,
Data management,
Innovation
Charity begins at home
Here’s something you may not have realised: charities are in one of the most competitive industries in the world. They have to fight tooth and nail for every bit of money that enters their books. Here’s another: they are among the most regulated and...
more...
Tags:
Data management,
Change,
Growth,
Strategy
What makes your IT special?
It was a nice problem to have. Three years after introducing CitySpace in 2003, a virtual learning environment for students, London’s City University found itself deluged by demand. Logins were running at more than 100,000 every month, courtesy of...
more...
Tags:
Collaboration,
Growth
When collaboration means business
How often have you heard a company claim it’s all about “relationships”? How many do you know that look for “partners” rather than “customers”? A wild guess would suggest quite a few – after all, when it costs more to acquire a new customer than reta...
more...
Tags:
Growth,
Collaboration,
Know-how,
Data management
Something to watch over you
Quick question for anyone whose organisation is growing: how many times have you, your customers or stakeholders heard the following: “Sorry about this, the system’s been slow all day”; “There’s a problem with the system – I think the IT people are...
more...
Tags:
Know-how,
Strategy,
Entrepreneur,
Change,
Collaboration,
Growth
Paint by numbers
When Firwood Paints, based in Bolton, won a DTI-backed e-Commerce Award in September 2005, it was as the region’s best end-to-end integrated business. The company’s new website (www.firwood.co.uk) forged a dynamic link not only between a...
more...
Tags:
Strategy,
Growth,
Innovation
The way we work tomorrow
Like the paperless office, the demise of the book is one of those future scenarios that was widely-prophesied a few years ago on the strength of IT and internet expansion, but hasn’t exactly come about as predicted.Instead, some of the more heartenin...
more...
Tags:
Security,
Risk Compliance Governance (GRC),
Data management,
Communication,
Growth
The email that roared
As small and medium businesses grow, they uncover a misnomer about their computer systems – file sharing does not always actually mean sharing. Instead, storage capacity can all too easily become clogged up with the same material being stored many...
more...
Tags:
Growth,
Know-how,
Strategy,
Security
Jumping the software hurdles
Start with a strategy: The right software can make a big difference to a company’s potential growth. So why are managers so often seduced by technology that fails to match their business needs, ending up with inappropriate, disconnected systems?Most...
more...
Tags:
Bottom Line,
Growth,
Change
Investing in a brighter future
Some businesses like to do things differently. Take BrightHouse – it’s a fast-growing business based on a “rent to own” concept that was brought over to the UK from the US a decade ago. The first store in the chain, which was originally called...
more...
Tags:
Strategy,
Growth,
Collaboration
Building blocks
Professional, determined and competitive – these are the values that led Travelex, the world’s largest foreign exchange specialist, to choose England rugby international player and world champion, Jonny Wilkinson, as its latest brand...
more...