Casual Articles - Business

Job Interviews - Six Blunders to Avoid
Everyone needs good interview question and answer advice. But just as important, you need to know what other interview mistakes to avoid. Based on my own 30 years of experience as a Hiring Manager, plus talking with many of my peers over the years, here are the most common interview blunders.These blunders will definitely turn off any Hiring Manager and very likely knock you out of further consideration. Please take them to heart and avoid them at all costs.Talking Too MuchMost of the Hiring Managers I know, myself included, put this high on the list of candidate turn-offs during the interview question and answer session. As a general rule, you should talk no more than half the time and one third of the time is best. Take your cues from what the Hiring Manager says and listen as much as you can. Your answers to questions will be much better as a result. One way to get the Hiring Manger to do more talking is to ask the questions you prepared in advance (you did come prepared with questions to ask, didn't you?)True story: Some time ago, I was part of a four-person team interviewing a candidate for a technical support position. We allocated 45 minutes for the interview and it actually took over an hour and a half. During the interview question and answer session, every time we asked a question, this candidate would talk for minutes at a time, soaring off onto side issues and meaningless detail. It got to the point where we'd all silently groan and roll our eyes at each other because this person would not stop talking. We had to end the interview without asking all our questions because we ran out of time…and were simply worn out. Needless to say, this candidate received no further consideration.Inadequate

able to minimise the lead-time from order receipt at her textile plants to final clothing receipt at the department stores from 18 weeks to 3 weeks.

Workflow Coordination

This section of IT-interaction enhances the worth of textile supply chain by integrating supply chain operations within the company and across the organisations after collaborating with vendors and customers based on shared forecasts. This is an indication of a new progress of IT applications in line with inter-organisation communication.

This Internet allows companies to take their alliance one-step further, by coordination, integration and even automation of serious business processes. Activities like procurement, order fulfilment, engineering change, design optimisation, and financial exchanges can be put under the tag of Workflow coordination. The outcomes are cost-effective, quick and unfailing supply chain functions.

Brand Presentation - Go Out of Your Way to Have Fun
Have you ever noticed the brightest colors, and the funniest scenes are the most memorable?A little old granny with her red hat and red vinyl purse looking at a teensy weensy piece of meat on a big round bun saying, “Where’s the beef?” comes to mind when I think of funny commercials. Everybody for years walked around commenting “Where’s the beef?” It became the instant putdown on every date, the end all of party conversation, and the choice location to have a burger.Splash yellow paint across the screen, zap it with a green jagged line, and add a pair of bright red lips talking from the depths of creation and you’ll get some attention. If the lips happen to have a quirk and say something funny, you’ll have people repeating your catchy brand slogan for months, or maybe years afterward.When the world learned to sing in perfect harmony a few years back, it was to the tune of the Real Thing, Coke Classic in a shapely bottle. Nobody needed to ask what the wave was when Coca Cola brought back an old favorite.For your new brand, strike up a funny pose, brightly colored, with a prime phrase, and keep the energy high. You’ll want everyone to remember your kick ass brand because it’s funny, its repeatable, and it captures attention. If it just happens to be a phrase that catches on and everyone uses for a variety of reasons, you’ll have a recognizable BRAND that presents your product every time it’s used.How many years did we walk around singing “Please don’t squeeze my Charmin?”Even my children, born twenty years after the fact, know that when I’m singing the ‘charmin’ song, I’m singing a jingle about toilet tissue. And, ya know what? I still sing it.When you create a new brand for your business, think presentation and have some fun!

Textile Supply Chain has been highly influenced by four important features of Information Technology; these features are: Information integration, Planning synchronisation, Workflow coordination and new business models. It is also come across that these IT applications facilitate the execution of several theories of supply chain management, like constant refilling, vendor administered refilling, planned postponement etc.

Taken in order, the first three stages stand for ascending degrees of harmony and balanced interaction among supply chain members ending up into completely new techniques of organising business in the fourth phase.

Sharing of Information

Information makes mention of the sharing among members of the supply chain. This takes in any type of information that could affect the actions and performance of other members of the supply chain. This method generally transfers demand data, inventory status, capacity plans, production schedules, promotion plans, electronic fund transfers (EFT) for payments, status reports and shipment schedules.

Bar coding and Electronic data interchange (EDI) are the main information providing in this phase. Bar coding allows all-inclusive recording of business data in electronic frame. In turn, this data is transferred electronically from computer to computer among organisations, in a standardised layout through EDI system. Consequently, the communicated data are counted, tracked, analysed, and applied by computers to transform into relevant information for decisions. EDI specifically substitutes more traditional transfer of documents such as mail, telephone and even fax. Speedy transmission is possible through EDI-reduced order cycle variability, one of the major agents, which accelerates inventory in the supply chain.

Naygard International, a global apparel producer of US, with sales surpassing $ 300 million, copes with its supplies from fabric suppliers to retailer using EDI-built links triggered throughout its network. This EDI-built network helps the company in maintaining closer relations and immediate reaction in a global, fluctuating demand and supply atmosphere with its suppliers and customers, who are geographically spread from US, Korea, Japan, Europe and Indonesia. The company inserts inventory-data in electronic form through bar coding and transfer these 'digitised information' across its global network through EDI.

To connect design affiliated information with supplier through Internet linkages is another instance of information integration. Standardisation of software devices and the fast dropping costs of servers allow the smaller manufacturer and retailer to share latest designs evolved through CAD/CAM packages with the fabric manufacturers established in other parts of the world. Product design and manufacturing data can be transferred through the Internet to a distant factory so that manufacturing might take place.

Synchronisation of Planning

Planning synchronisation speaks of combined design and accomplishment of plans for product introduction, predicting and refilling. Planning synchronisation, explains how the information shared by the previous phase is to be utilised. By reciprocal coherence, members in a supply chain have their order achievement plans integrated through this phase of IT, so that competent refilling are possible to satisfy the demand of end user.

Within the company, several software devices such as MRP, MRP - II, APSS, MES ease harmonisation of planning between various operative silos. Evolution of combined and well-integrated ERP systems redefines the functions and conversions in quality of information sharing. Material Requirement Planning (MRP) system initiated using computer databases to amass lead times and order quantity. It applies logic to execute Bill of Material (BOM) eruptions to help in outlining orders across time-phased preferences in a distinct manufacturing atmosphere.

As a logical broadening of MRP system, Manufacturing Resource Planning (MRP - II) system is developed to deal with the entire manufacturing operation. This typically incorporates machine loading and scheduling in addition to planning of material requirement. It helps the mechanism to assess the usefulness of a production agenda under a given set of deadlines.

Due to classified database, computational logic with high processing power of computers, MRP and MRP - II are quite best-selling and add visibility into the areas earlier unseen. But with the evolution of multipoint-manufacturing, final assembly activities and packaging, vast material allocation requirements in an inconstant global surrounding, it has become essential to separate systems such as Distribution Requirement Planning (DRP). Moreover, textile producers require a structure that can simultaneously explain both capacity and material constraints and immediately spreads the effects of problems in both backward and forward direction through out the supply chain. The Advance Planning and Scheduling (APSS) catch both material focus of MRP and short horizon rapid response scheduling power of MRP - II.

However, though APSS and ERP systems allow textile companies to plan and to operate their resources, they do not serve the real-time input and actionable information required to respond to a continuously fluctuating supply chain. In the beginning, ERP has primary constraints like data-centric execution focus, poor flexibility and one-dimensional planning, and important up-front investment as well.

Milliken, a foremost textile company in US and founder of quick response concept, works with various clothing suppliers and leading department stores to electronically gather POS data from the department stores to synchronise their ordering and manufacturing plans. Internet technology helps Milliken in spelling out their business ideals to advance the comprehensive enterprise performance. Consequently, Milliken was able to minimise the lead-time from order receipt at her textile plants to final clothing receipt at the department stores from 18 weeks to 3 weeks.

Workflow Coordination

Honesty In Business - Does It Pay? Is Honesty The Best Policy?
I guess you have heard it said that honesty is the best policy. Unfortunately, many of the people who say that are dishonest themselves. They only pay lip service to honesty. Consequently, they lie and cheat whenever it is convenient to do so.The truth is . . . many people are honest only to the point where there is the possibility of being caught and when sanctions are applied without fear or favor. Those same people will be dishonest whenever the chances of being caught is slim or where sanctions are hardly applied due to corruption of the institutions meant to apply the sanctions.The result?Explosion of corruption.Now to the business world. The goal of every business is to maximize profit. The more transactions a business engages in, the more the profit potentials. And the greater the profit margin per transaction, the greater the overall profit of the business. Hence, business managers seek to maximize the returns per transaction in order to maximize the profitability of the business.Honesty in business, on the other hand, means you lose opportunities to make more from each transaction because you tell the truth. Here's a typical example: Suppose you're an electronics technician. A client brings her electronics to you. The fault? The electronics equipment does not come on when she powers it. You do a routine check and find that the problem is a blown fuse. If you tell her the truth about the problem, she will pay you less because it will take just a few minutes to fix.Bottom line.Your earnings for this transaction will be small. Several small transactions like this will mean your earnings for the month will be small. And you have serious bills to pay! Therefore, you may be tempted to get more from this client by magnifying th

o transform into relevant information for decisions. EDI specifically substitutes more traditional transfer of documents such as mail, telephone and even fax. Speedy transmission is possible through EDI-reduced order cycle variability, one of the major agents, which accelerates inventory in the supply chain.

Synchronisation of Planning

Workflow Coordination

You Can Increase Your Profits Without Raising Your Prices
This Article Is Based On Proven Real-Life Practice The ideas, concepts and strategies I advocate for adoption in this article are based on proven practice. In fact, the case study and specific analogies used are based on real-life activities that I personally partook in over a period of six years, as a manager in a large blue-chip multinational brewing company. Read my article titled "Use Custom Automation Of Your Spreadsheet Reports To Drive Down Costs And Increase Your Profits" for additional details of my experiences in this area, while in paid employment.What you learn from reading the above mentioned article, will hopefully encourage you to seriously explore ways to put the information provided in this article to good use for your business. The principles described below can be successfully adapted to virtually any business operation - be it service or production based.If you need any help with thinking up ways/means of putting them to use, I would be pleased to help out.Case Study"Because its purpose is to create a customer, the business enterprise has two - and only these two - basic functions: marketing and innovation. Marketing and Innovation produce results. All the others are costs" - Peter DruckerWhat follows is a bit of a simplistic example, but it serves the intended purpose of providing a basis for the following discussion. The logic on which this analogy is based can be applied to any situation.African Arts Concepts Limited (a hypothetical company) uses three raw materials, A, B and C in producing their flagship brand Product Z – which sells for N14,000 naira (about $100 equivalent, using a N140.00 Naira to $1.00 US dollar currency conversion rate) per unit - in the followin

ning synchronisation speaks of combined design and accomplishment of plans for product introduction, predicting and refilling. Planning synchronisation, explains how the information shared by the previous phase is to be utilised. By reciprocal coherence, members in a supply chain have their order achievement plans integrated through this phase of IT, so that competent refilling are possible to satisfy the demand of end user.

Workflow Coordination

Executive Recruiters-Love 'em or Leave 'em?
Are you using or planning to use an executive recruiter? Better know what’s in store for you!The first step to considering a recruiter is to understand how they function. You can save yourself a lot of worry and enhance your candidacy when you take the time to learn how to interact with these professionals.Recruiters get hundreds of resumes in response to an opening they’re looking to fill. Typically they narrow them down to 20. And eventually wind up with four or five who become the primary candidates. You can see from the numbers what your chance are of making it as a finalist.You should also understand that to make it to the finals you have to send an extraordinary resume. Most recruiters have three questions in mind when they review those resumes.1. Does this candidate have the skills, capabilities, assets and education to do the job? No one will call you until you pass muster. Initially recruiters spend about 50 seconds scanning your resume to see if you have those basic qualifications. If not, your resume is tossed. Otherwise you will get a longer, more intensive reading.2. Will we like working with you? A good recruiter is looking for someone with passion. He/she is in the business of putting passionate candidates into the right roles. And then get out of their way. The recruiter reasons that if you get into the right role, that same energy and passion will be dedicated to the company.3. Can we get you for the right price? If you require twice the money a company is offering, there’s no match. Many factors come into play here-- from market forces and company budgets to employee benefits.In this regard, it’s important that realize that a recruiter does not work for you. Many job seekers make the mistake of th

ity into the areas earlier unseen. But with the evolution of multipoint-manufacturing, final assembly activities and packaging, vast material allocation requirements in an inconstant global surrounding, it has become essential to separate systems such as Distribution Requirement Planning (DRP). Moreover, textile producers require a structure that can simultaneously explain both capacity and material constraints and immediately spreads the effects of problems in both backward and forward direction through out the supply chain. The Advance Planning and Scheduling (APSS) catch both material focus of MRP and short horizon rapid response scheduling power of MRP - II.

Workflow Coordination

Benefits of Owning a Franchise
Franchises are popular amongst small business owners as well as entrepreneurs and people looking to get out of the corporate “grind”. There is good reason for this, as franchises offer the benefits of business ownership along with the support system and business model of an already successful business. When you take a close look at the benefits that go along with franchise ownership, its no wonder franchises are becoming increasingly popular.A franchise can be an especially good idea if you want to break into an industry that is extremely competitive, high risk, takes a decent amount of start up capital and definite industry knowledge. One such industry is the real estate industry, specifically real estate investing i.e. home buying or “flipping” houses. This industry is one that almost everyone has thought about getting into at one point in time or the other, but for whatever reason haven’t done it successfully. More than likely that reason (or reasons) is that the field either a) requires to much up front investment b) they don’t have the “know-how” c) its to risky to take on alone or d) they have realized it is HIGHLY competitive and most of the mom and pop investors get eaten alive. However, by purchasing a real estate investment franchise you can virtually eliminate or at least minimize the challenges you face when entering into the real estate investing industry. Real estate investing has probably made more millionaires than any other industry in the world. By following a proven system and having access to the type of support system franchises offer, you have a good chance at following in the footsteps of successful real estate insiders.Real estate franchises offer a proven business modelMost, if not all, new real estate investors, “flippers” etc. suffe

able to minimise the lead-time from order receipt at her textile plants to final clothing receipt at the department stores from 18 weeks to 3 weeks.

Workflow Coordination

Information technology allows Wrangler and Wal-Mart to practice workflow coordination to improve their business in highly inconstant apparel market. The daily sale of Wal-Mart's Wrangler jeans is 1, 00, 000 pairs. Wrangler copes with this requirement through Vendor Managed Replenishment or VMR, to unceasingly pile up Wal-Mart's store, by capturing all 100, 000 of these sales transactions from several Wal-Mart shops through web-facilitated communication. Then Wrangler categorises these real demand-data by style, size, fabric and colour to refill Wal-Mart's inventory, the level of which is pre-decided by both parties after reassessing history of sales by product and buying how of clientele. Thus, supplier (Wrangler) can better serve the retailer (Wal-Mart) after finding the underlying cause of exact selling current and keeping the best inventory at retailer's racks. Advanced fill-rate and higher customer fulfilment are the major results from this IT-participation.

New Business Models

This phase not only improves supply chain efficiency but also allows partners within supply chain to redefine logistics flows, so that the roles and responsibilities of members may change to develop newer business policies. A supply-network mutually generates new products, pursues mass customisation, and enters new markets and customer sections. New rules of the supply chain game come up as a result of integration nourished by the Internet.

Since textile supply chain grows into more closely associated with greater coordination regarding time and resources, Internet reciprocates with textile business with greater degree. New rules of the supply chain game come forth as a result of business innovation sustained by the Internet.

Information Modelling

This phase marks information modelling, data-analysis and decision-making concerning the various textile production processes as evolved by researchers at the College of Textiles. Computer integrated manufacturing, design of supply chain systems, knitting data model, enterprise modelling are some of the fields travelled in this stage. To confirm good fit into business process, applications of these information models make necessary anticipatory attempt, far beyond that needed to classify and categorise data.

Data Mining and Data Warehousing

This application of IT (in the textile industry) has primarily given attention to the recognition of data necessities and analysis of data to find the advantages of the several data components for process supervision and command. Data mining is the automatic extraction of patterns of information from historical data, allowing companies to concentrate on the most significant features of their business. On the other hand, data warehousing is an archive of data. These set of methods have focused on filtering and coordinating the data to make decisions.

The information structures evolved over the past thirty years have been thoroughly technology based, while decision-making continued to be a human thinking process. The worse thing is that as business has developed more complicated and the system can produce growing size of information, the discerning power of the user to choose and understand the 'right' information is extended to the limit. This inspires expansion of information engineering attitude in textile. This tool can be described as a method for bringing out 'meaning' in information to allow the knowledge needed by the user to take a 'right' decision. Thus, information engineering can be looked at as a crossing point for technology-based data trapping, processing systems, and human-based decision-making structures. The intention of information engineering is to basically enhance the decision-effectiveness in textile manufacturing by creating a new and proficient decision-making system using the Data-to-Decision Cycle model.

E-commerce primarily consists of B2B and B2C commerce. Business to Consumer or B2C commerce is the direct selling of merchandise to consumers through Internet. While Business-to-Business marketplace can be defined as neutral Internet-based intermediaries that focus on specific industry verticals or specific business processes, host electronic marketplaces, and use various market-making mechanisms to mediate any-to-any transactions among businesses. B2B appears much more promising than B2C and sets to far exceed B2C financially. It is expected that more than 25 percent of all business-to-business purchases will be carried out over the Internet by 2004.

E-auction

Express evolution of Internet technology brought it in to being. Electronic commerce also enables textile mills to correspond directly with internationally based buyers of wholesale fabrics. For instance, Phoenix Textiles, US-based buyer and distributor of textiles, employs the Internet to buy its fabrics from mills around the world. Then, through its website, Phoenix Textiles sells to individuals and small and medium-sized companies as well as large corporate bodies. The company banks on the Internet to refill its inventory as needed.

E-retailing

The textile-retail panorama has been transformed with many 'brick-and-mortar' retailers putting an Internet shopping-component into their offering. Enter 'click-and-mortar' heavyweights Wal-Mart, K-Mart, Target, Barnes and Noble, to name just a few. With the allocation and storehousing infrastructure in place, these retailers have an upper hand over their 'brick-and-mortar' counterparts.

As a result of going online, 'click-and-mortar' retailers have altered the path of their supply chain policy. They store high volume products with constant demand in local warehouses, while low-volume products are stored up centrally for online buying. The low-volume products have extremely volatile demand levels and thus need high levels of safety stock. Combined stocking in this case effectively mitigates ambiguities by accumulating demand across geographical place and thus minimises inventory levels.

Wal-Mart, the world's biggest retailer, swimmingly includes this e-retailing in their supply chain through electronically empowered stock-refilling. This surpasses fill-rate and satisfies customers; these two things are essential in surviving today's uncertain market. It has been at the foreground of stock refilling, giving buyers more than a 98-per cent opportunity of finding a full range of selection. Wal-Mart uses Retail Link, a software system that gives vendors in-vogue gateway to point-of-sale price

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It might look strange but it is a fact that your looks or appearance does affect your career or profession - it does (To an extent) affects the selection or rejection of your candidature. You might argue that it's the knowledge and experience of the candidate that is important and I agree with you. It is knowledge and experience that is important and that's the way it should be. You might have read that in last election Tony Blair spent close to 5 million pounds on his beauty parlor…no his looks and appearance. Similar was the issue raised in USA during the last election when Hillary Clinton’s opponent talked about her cosmetic surgery. It is a well known fact the people who look good get a mileage and they do really well in their career … compare to those who are not that good looking. Yes, exceptions are there.

I once had a boss who informed me there was no such thing as company politics. At the time, I decided that depended on whether you were the person wielding power or influenced by it. In my career experience, I'd categorize self-serving antics, sabotaging behaviors, information hoarding and artful manipulation under the heading of company politics. I'd throw in veiled threats, perpetuated mistruths, finger-pointing and coercion.

What is your new year's resolution as an entrepreneur? While most people will resolve to lose weight, stop smoking, stop drinking or find true love, most entrepreneurs will seek business success and more profits! What will you do differently this year and will positively impact your business? How will your business improve this year?

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