Commercial Readiness

LATROBE’s Commercial Readiness portfolio helps business owners make their businesses more effective, more efficient, and more profitable. This is a great time of year to consider these things because 2018 is around the corner, and by setting your business goals now, you’ll be able to hit the ground running. So if you want to grow your business, here are some things to consider.

Plan

It’s common for business owners to go into business without first deciding what they want to accomplish and how they plan to accomplish it. Instead, these business owners—and I may be describing you—simply hope to sell their products and services and make money, and while this is a common business practice, it’s hardly an effective one.   

Business success requires planning, and you need a strategic plan, which lists your goals and explains how you will accomplish them. Your strategic plan includes strategies, and there is a comprehensive (overall) strategy for your business and strategies for each area of your business. Each strategy has accompanying goals, with short-term strategies (1 year) and long-term strategies (3 to 5 years).  

Your strategic plan keeps you focused on what’s important. You’re faced with a never-ending list of tasks to complete every day, but by keeping your goals in mind, you’ll know which activities will help you meet your goals and which will not, so it will be obvious which tasks you should spend time working on. Your strategic plan will answer questions like this:

• What are my profit-margin goals?
• What do I want to do next month? Next year?
• What is my sales goal?
• Which customers am I pursuing?
• Which customers provide the biggest profit margin?

Get Help

Nearly every small business (more than 96%) is run by one person: the owner. These are single-person businesses. The remaining businesses (less than 4%) are employer businesses, which means they employ at least one person in addition to the owner. Here’s why it’s important that you scale-up and become an employer business.

Annual revenue for single-person businesses averages $18,000; for employer businesses it’s $1.5 million. Scaling-up and expanding your business capacity simply means you’re not doing everything yourself. It’s not possible for you to go out and sell and market—and be the face of the business—then be expected to do all of the work. You can only do one thing at a time, so when you’re working on one task, another task isn’t getting done.

Do what you do best and get others to do the rest. If a business owner is an introvert, is it a good idea to have them make presentations before groups of people, with them sweating and stammering because they’re nervous? Or would it have been better for them to have spent that time doing what they’re good at while having a polished speaker make the presentations?  

If you want to grow your business, your strategic plan might have questions like these:

• How do I scale-up to become an employer business?
• What talent or expertise do I need on my team to offset what’s lacking?
• Who do I need on my team to help me accomplish my goals?

Conclusion

If your business strategy is selling as many of your products or as much of your service as possible, you don’t have a business strategy; and if you take pride in being a jack-of-all-trades, you’re probably not making much money. As 2017 comes to an end, create a 2018 strategic plan and assemble a team. Your business will need both to realize its potential.

Finally, have you ever said you’re going to take your business to the next level—but don’t know what level it’s on now? We can help. Few business owners view their businesses objectively, but in order to grow your business, you have to do just that. FLITER^® is a business operations and management assessment we administer that will assess where your business is and show you how to take it where you want it to go. To learn more, visit http://www.fliter.biz or  https://www.latrobellc.com/services.html.

Career Readiness

In this blog, while I’ll be talking about high school students trying to attend college, and community-college students trying to attend four-year colleges and universities, I’ll be talking to their parents. As a mother of a 17-year-old who’s considering college, by becoming familiar with the college-application process and aware of its all-important deadlines, I’ll be able to ensure my son does what he needs to do. When he needs to do it.    

Career readiness, as it pertains to your child, means preparing them for their career, and it requires that they answer some important questions. What kind of work do I want to do? Where do I want to go to school? Career readiness also requires that they attend a (two-year) community college, four-year college, or university.

More Tests

The 2018-2019 college year begins in late August (of 2018). If your child will be attending a four-year college or university, they’ll probably be required to take the ACT (American College Test) or SAT (Scholastic Aptitude Test). These tests determine how strong your child is in math, reading, and writing (for the ACT) or in English, math, reading, and science (for the SAT).

It’s a good idea for your child to take the ACT or SAT more than once because while they’re nervous before taking it the first time, knowing what to expect, they’re relaxed the second time and often perform better. In addition, while some schools require students to include all of their ACT and SAT scores in their college applications, most schools only require students to include their highest scores.

Prepare

There’s a simple way for your child to perform better on the ACT or SAT—take practice tests. There are books with practice tests in them, and there are free online practice tests. Remember: The school your child wants to attend will receive thousands—perhaps tens of thousands—of applications from students around the world. Your child will be competing with these kids. If you want to increase the likelihood your child gets accepted, make sure they prepare for the test.   

One Isn’t Enough

Imagine your child has had their heart set on becoming a Volunteer since middle school—what happens if their college application is rejected! Since the University of Tennessee (UT) is a public university, if they live in Tennessee, this probably won’t happen. But if your child wants to attend college out-of-state, or if they want to attend a private school (e.g., Vanderbilt), they’ll face tougher competition, and you’ll have a higher bill.  

UT accepts 76% of enrollment applications; Vanderbilt accepts 11%. UT’s in-state tuition is about $12,000 per year, and its out-of-state tuition is almost $31,000; Vanderbilt’s tuition (in-state and out-of-state) is almost $45,000 per year. My point? Have your child apply to more than one school, especially if they want to attend a private school.

How Will You Pay for It?

Your child has decided where they want to attend college, and they’ve scheduled the ACT or SAT (or both)—now you have to figure out how you’re going to pay for college. If you’re like most parents, you and your spouse can’t foot the entire bill. Fortunately, you don’t have to.

There’s lots of money available to pay for college: grants, scholarships, and student loans.

Grants place more weight on need, and scholarships place more weight on academic performance. Some scholarships, though, are reserved for specific groups. The Tennessee Society of CPA Scholarship, for example, is only awarded to students who are Tennessee residents majoring in accounting. Students often assume they need lofty grade-point-averages to qualify for scholarships. They don’t. So make sure your child researches them.

The financial aid packet is critical, and it should be completed as early as possible because most schools award aid on a first-come-first-served basis. The earlier your child applies, the better their chance of getting money and the better their chance of getting more money. Also, by applying for financial aid early, if your child has left some important information out or has made a mistake, they’ll have time to submit the correct information before deadline.

Clock is Ticking …

The financial-aid application period began on October 1^st (2017), so if your child will need aid for the 2018-2019 school year, which will begin in August of 2018, have them begin applying now.

What’s great about the process beginning on October 1^st is, you can include your 2016 tax return in the application. Since you probably earned more in 2016 than you did in 2015, and will earn more next year than you will this year, by using your 2016 return, you’ll have less income (than you’ll have next year) to report. As a result, your child will have greater financial need and will probably receive more aid. 

On-the-Job Training

Companies are desperate for talent, and in their scramble to attract high-achieving students, they’re offering yet another way to help your child pay for college. Work-versed learning programs like apprenticeships and internships are more popular than ever, allowing students to earn money while getting valuable work experience. This experience looks great on a resume, but more importantly, it gives the student an opportunity to decide if this is the kind of work they want to do for the rest of their life.

Conclusion

You don’t have to be rich for your child to attend college. There’s plenty of money out there to pay for college, but to get it, your child has to take the initiative and do the work. I’ve attached two links that will help. BetterMakeRoom.org, which is Michelle Obama's program, helps students prepare for college. Steps2College.org has information about everything your child will need to know as they prepare for college, and it’ll make the process easier by sending text messages to notify you both about upcoming deadlines.

Reforming Good Works

October 31^st, 2017, was the 500^th anniversary of Reformation Day, a movement that brought greater religious freedom and greater freedom of expression. The Reformation decreed that we are saved by grace alone, and our faith—not our works—is evidence of our belief. In light of this, I felt compelled to begin communicating again to explain what’s happening with LATROBE and show how our journey has evolved.

For the last two years I have worked with the Greater Memphis Alliance for a Competitive Workforce on an initiative to connect people to educational opportunities and employment opportunities in Memphis and throughout the Mid-South. The project focuses on career education and technical education through our two-year community college and short-term certification training.

This project provided insight into what Memphis needs, and it made us rethink LATROBE’s role in the community. We’ve expanded our services and now specialize in three areas: career readiness (workforce development for hard-to-place individuals), commercial readiness (business development for individuals who need help starting their own businesses), and, our newest specialty, campus readiness, which is safety and security development for organizations and institutions.

I have over 25 years’ experience in engineering, manufacturing, and workforce, and James, my vice president and husband, has over 25 years’ experience in education, safety, and security. His education and experience is invaluable, though, because it has taught him how to get hard-to-place people (i.e. people with backgrounds) back to work.

LATROBE isn’t alone in providing training and job-placement—the Arkansas Workforce Center, Tennessee Workforce Development Center, and local non-profit organizations provide similar services and training—but our advice to anyone we meet is this: Find an organization that provides case management. Why? Because you need someone to help you navigate the process. If you’re returning to the workforce but don’t have a qualified, skilled, experienced professional helping with your job search and serving as your advocate, you likely won’t find a job. 

We use assessment tools to determine unique interests and skills, and knowing that it takes more than training to land a job, we also hold your hand and walk with you every step of the way. LATROBE isn’t a staffing company. It’s part of the community.  We use technology, proven practices, and community relationships to help you get the job you want. Stay tuned for future posts on how we use technology to find solutions for job seekers through our Career Readiness portfolio.

Most parents would love for their child to be able to attend an elite college or university. Our son has the grades to attend any school in America, and we can afford to send him. But, he might tell us that instead of going to college, he wants to get his certification. We are okay with that because James and I know getting a college degree isn’t for everyone. In fact, in today’s job market, you don’t need a degree to jumpstart your career.

Earning a college degree is a great way to start your career, but as a community, we need to get back to being entrepreneurial and find ways to start our own businesses. Sometimes, learning a hands-on skill (i.e. a trade) teaches what you need to know to start your own business. LATROBE’s Commercial Readiness program can help you with this very thing.

I’m from Stuttgart, in the Arkansas Delta. James and I moved to the Memphis area when he, an associate warden at the federal prison in Forrest City, was transferred to the region. We relocated near Memphis because it put us squarely in the middle of everything: what’s happening in eastern Arkansas, and what’s happening in western Tennessee.

Memphis is our home—we’re going to retire here—so we’ve decided to get more involved in community affairs. LATROBE allows us to do that. By training job seekers, introducing them to employers, and helping individuals launch their own businesses, not only are we helping make the Memphis economy stronger and more diverse, we’re doing the same for the entire Mid-South economy! And, we’re helping reform our community.