Give your business a Spring Clean – Things you need to do

Written on a plane from Singapore to Sydney 28 July 2010

Vales, Vision and Mission

1. Work out what your values are – trust, integrity, ethical, health, wealth, wisdom, excellence, loyalty

2. Go Back to Basics and ask yourself why you are doing what you are doing.

a. Is it to make a good living from your business?

b. Is it to help other people?

c. Is it to maximize returns for shareholders?

d. Is it to grow your business so you can exit it?

e. Is it something you love to do (a hobby that you are passionate about?)

f. Are you climbing the right ladder?

3. Identify your issues in your business and work out ways in which you can resolve these issues. Speak to Alan Milwidsky at www.bsi.com.au

4. Think about where you want to be 5 years from now. 4 , 3 , 2 and 1 year from now and identify steps how you are going to get there

GOAL Setting

Make your goals REAL, SPECIFIC, MEASURABLE, IDENTIFIABLE and TRACKABLE

Split them into Short, Medium and Long term Goals

Activating Goals – the 7 C’s

· Conviction - you and your team need to know your vision and believe in it

· Character – act with honesty and integrity

· Courage – you need big cahoonas to take action

· Competence – you need to be the “college of knowledge”, have the required skills, the right attitude and habits to be the best

· Commitment – you need to have the 4 d’s (desire, dedication, determination and drive )

· Creativity – you need to be innovative and think “that the glass is half full than half empty” A pessimist sees difficulties in every opportunity. An optimist sees opportunities in every problem

· Caring – you need to act from the heart.

Your Success is the Journey – NOT the destination

· (4 fs)Focused,Fast, Flexible, Fun

· (5ps) plan, passionate, persistant, profit

· Do NOT be complacent, arrogant and live in a state of denial

· Balance your life with business, family, community, spiritual, exercise, continual learning. Make a plan and set goals for each section of your life. All the plan will do is act as a guide. There will inevitably be deviations and plans will change…. That’s ok – as long as you have your values secure. They need to be your rock and foundation.

People

· Hire the best – speak to Michale Lynch at www.bsip.com.au

· Average people will cost you money

· Empower your team

· Invest in your team – comprehensive training and a workplace that they enjoy coming to speak to Graham Raspass at www.bsil.com.au

· They need to know and believe in the vision and mission and know the 30 second pitch

· You don’t need to motivate motivated staff – if you do, something in your business is missing.

Outsourcing

· What are you doing day to day that you can outsource for a fraction of your salary – that you can save up to 80% of your time.

PR Marketing

Set identifiable KPI’s for your PR Marketing Plan each quarter

· how many articles

· how many journalists you contact in 1 month

· how many events

· how many blogs have you written

· are you on facebook /twitter/linked in – how many contact on your social networks.

Database

This is your most important asset. Make sure it is clean, up to date and your members are contacted on a regular basis

Website

· Is it up to date?

· Is it current?

· Is it interactive?

· Are there call to actions?

· No Spelling mistakes – use “spellsrus”

· Do you regular measure how many people look at your website – use “google analytics” or “statcounter”

Grants/Government Programmes/Government Assistance

· Are you maximizing incentives that you may be eligible for? www.bsi.com.au

Find yourself a Mentor or Advisory Board

· This is key. There are a number of successful businessmen who want to add value and give back to others.

Wealth Creation

Your wealth plan is a journey – over the period, there will be ups and downs. Make sure you have a financial plan, that is continuously monitored. There will be deviations. Your financial planner will lead you in the direction that will enable you to achieve your goals. (www.arktotalwealth.com.au )

· Never over stretch your financial capacity.

· Cash is king

· Turnover is Vanity, Profit is Sanity, But Cash Flow is King and Queen

· Ensure that you have a budget

· Have proper accounting systems and reporting schedules – what you can measure you can manage

· Organise your finances

· Consolidate your loans

· Take your bank manager to lunch

· Ensure you have adequate facilities to take advantage of opportunities when they occur

· Find yourself an excellent mortgage broker that will go out of their way to look after you. (www.liquidityfinance.com.au )

· Tax plan well before the end of the financial year

· Are relevant agreements in place –

o if you have a partner , do you have a buy/sell agreement

o do you have a shareholders agreement

o have you got insurances to manage your risk

o is your will in place

Know your Economy

· Where are we in the economic cycle?

· What does it mean to my business?

· What are the opportunities that we can take advantage of?

The 6 Reasons Why Property WIll Continue to Increase in Value

1. Property prices are already on the march: “The average period for saving a house deposit is 4.5 years
nationally, up from 3.7 years in 2009.” Sydney Morning Herald 06/07/10

2. There is a massive shortage of available property which will fuel increased demand and hence higher
prices.... “200,000 house shortage remains.” Sydney Morning Herald 07/07/10.

3. People who are sick of losing money in their superannuation have started transferring money out of their
super into property in higher numbers than ever before.... “owner-occupier buyers in Sydney are being
replaced by self managed superannuation funds who have taken money out of the share market” The
Business Spectator 01/07/10. Less than 2% of SMSF Assets are in Residential Property - this will change.
(currently >$300b in SMSF's)

4. Every stock market crash has been followed by a massive spike in property prices. Remember the dot com
crash of 1999? What did property prices do after that? They shot through the roof.... and the same thing is
about to happen again.

5. Population growth - migration into Australia will continue to increase demand for property which will in turn force prices upwards.

6. A change in Demographics, whereby the average # of people living in a house is now less than 2... meaning people will be looking to move into units that are convenient and close to amenities.

Singapore July 2010

Pulse Property and Allen Pathmarajah presented at the "Property Millionaires Seminar" hosted by Mortgage Academy and Rayney Wong. Heres hoping that we willll have a long and prosperous journey in the Singapore Market. The attendees were motivated, and ready to take action..... a recipe for success.

Your team is everything

If you want to create a very profitable business you need profitable employees.

The easiest way to get this is to hire motivated employees that can manage themselves to achieve results. This has been my most important fundamental focus the second time around. Developing a process for this and knowing who you want to hire have been two of my best upgrades to my second business.

Here are three key suggestions:

Don't hire average staff, or you will end up with an average company. Wait and slow down before hiring. It's better to just wait that much longer rather than hiring the wrong person. You don't actually need to hire a person if you are smart and just optimise the systems you are using at present.

Ask more questions, not less. The impact of who you hire impacts your other top performers in your company. Hire poor quality people and you say something to them. Hire high quality people and you breed greatness into your organisation.

You can't motivate people - you can only hire motivated people. Don't bother with motivational programs, just hire a motivated person. Do some personality profiling to figure out if a person is motivated or not and you will save yourself a lot of time from creating motivational programs and talking to staff members to motivate them.

If someone slips through your process, talk through it – perhaps they aren't suited to your company and would be better working in a big organisation where they want slow moving and predictable employees. Stop trying to motivate the average staff member in your company and just replace them instead.

Ark and Liquidity, celebrating 30 June 2010 with Kevin Mitchell of Kilacanoon Wines, Toby of Bacchus Wines and Rhys of the Vinepress.

Tuesday, June 29, 2010

R&D tax break farce: Business seeks clarification as Government fails to get new scheme in place for July 1 start date

Tuesday, 29 June 2010 10:24 James Thomson Smartcompany

Business groups are calling on the Federal Government to urgently clarify whether its controversial R&D tax credit scheme will come into force as planned on July 1, after the legislation backing the new scheme failed to pass the Senate last week.

But while the Australian Industry Group wants the Government to officially delay the implementation of the scheme until July 2011 and spend the next 12 months revising the scheme, Industry Minister Kim Carr says he is determined to press ahead with a July1 start-date, suggesting that he will introduce retrospective legislation when Parliament next sits.

The new R&D tax credit scheme, which will replace the current R&D tax concession scheme, was supposed to be debated and passed by the Senate late last week in order for the scheme to start as planned on July 1.

But the debate never occurred, leaving businesses in limbo.

In a short statement released yesterday, Carr laid the blame for the delay at the feet of the Coalition.

"The Opposition deliberately prolonged debate on other Senate business to prevent debate on the R&D legislation. It did this because it knew the Government was close to securing minor-party support for passing the legislation."

However, Australian Industry Group chief Heather Ridout praised the Opposition and Family First Senator Steve Fielding for standing against the changes.

The AIG argues the "draconian and ill-considered restrictions on eligibility" under the new scheme will reduce business innovation.

"Clearly the R&D tax incentive Bill didn't pass muster with its failure to pass through the Senate before the winter recess. The delay is a chance to get core concerns resolved and the sooner we start working through this the better."

However, the AIG and tax experts want clarification on what will happen in the short-term, given the next possible sitting of Parliament does not happen until late August, but could potentially be much later if an election is called.

Do the current rules stand for now? Or does Carr's promise to have the new system in place by July1 through retrospective legislation mean companies should make investment decisions based on the fact the new system could come into place?

Tracey Murray, partner at accounting firm BDO, is advising clients that they should take a "business as usual approach and follow the current scheme.

"We're advising clients that you deal with the legislation that is in front of you," she says.

Murray, whose analysis of the new credit scheme shows many firms who currently receive R&D support would be ineligible under the new arrangements, says the Government needs to take the year to get things right.

"There would complete public outcry if they introduced retrospective legislation. Hopefully the might take the next year to have a look at what those issues are and address them."

Tax counsel for the Institute of Chartered Accountants, Yasser El-Ansary, has written to the Treasurer and Industry Minister saying they have no choice but to put the new system off for a year and "accept that timing got away from them on this occasion".

"Given Parliament was not able to pass the legislation it would be sensible and appropriate for the Government to announce a one-year deferral of the regime," he says.

"These changes are so significant that it would not be appropriate for the Government to expect that taxpayers would assume that the draft is final law."

El-Ansary says such a big legislative change would usually involve government departments – in this case, Australian Industry Group – providing taxpayers with guidance notes and other information products explaining in detail how the new system works.

"They simply won't be able to issue that guidance when that legislation is still in a draft form before Parliament. This is not a minor change where businesses can operate on the basis of press release announcements."

SmartCompany has contacted the Minister's office to find out whether there is any official advice as to whether companies intending to undertake R&D in the next few months should do so on the basis of the current system or the proposed tax credit system.

In this Ark Informer "Investing in Equities", we discuss a short term strategy utilising specifically designed instalment warrants, as well as a long term stratgey of regular investing in quality equities.

This enables you to take advantage of the potential short term recovery in the market over the next year, without risking large amounts of capital or making long term commitments. (Maximising your upside using leverage, and minimising your cash flow downside).

If you believe that the share market will increase by more than 6% in the next 12 months, I encourage you to learn more about the RBS Global Access Instalments (GAS).

For those of you who haven't downloaded the ebook "Investing in equities", please feel free to do so.

There is also an excellent whitepaper written by Russell Investments and the ASX analysing asset classes over the past 10 and 20 years.

We are holding 2 Webinars in the next few weeks explaining this strategy
Thursday 10th June 10am and Tuesday 15th June 2pm.
If you require any further information, please don't hesitate to contact me.

6.99% FIXED FOR 2 YEARS or 7.19% FIXED FOR 3 YEARS

If you are unsure about interest rate increases over the next 2 or 3 years, we have an option to lock your rate in for 2 years at 6.99% or for 3 years at 7.19%

The offer is with one of the top five banks in Australia and is currently the cheapest 2 and 3 year fixed rate in the market.

This offer is only available for a limited time, so please call Michael or Danny at Liquidity Finance on
02 9290 2777 for a home loan health check and to see if this offer is right for you. (their details are below).

If you pass this on to a friend, which results in a referral, lunch is on me!!

regards,
Ivan


LIQUIDITY FINANCE

Michael Luca and Danny Luu
Mortgage BrokersLevel 1
34 Hunter Street, Sydney NSW 2000
PO Box 54, Millers Point NSW 2000
P: +61 2 9290 2777
D: +61 2 9216 4023
M: 0405 113 543
F: +61 2 9262 5788
E: michael.luca@liquidityfinance.com.au