Office Max!

For technology projects, it’s a good idea to specify a warranty or support clause so that you are assured of some amount of continuing support from the vendor after the project is complete. It’s much easer to negotiate a support clause before the service provider begins work, rather than after the completion of the project. Even creative or business services can benefit from a support clause. Suppose you need some changes to a business plan based on feedback that you get from potential investors. Or maybe you find that you need that snazzy new logo delivered in a new type of file format. Specifying some amount of free support or negotiating discounted prices for future modifications can save you time, money and headaches later on.

These two bosses are the most visible examples of a growing army of mobile workers who are giving human resources (HR) departments a new sort of headache: how to track where they are and when, for tax and visa purposes. Brian Friedman, president of Ernst & Young's Institute for Global Mobility, says this is a major challenge for such departments. Gone are the days when working abroad was merely a matter of signing a formal expatriate package with an allowance for differences in the cost of living and the quality of life before waving goodbye for...

When you start at a company, you need to respect the organization. You may hate your new boss, but you have only two options. Quit, or pray that human resources takes care of him. In either event, regardless of the level of intrapersonal respect you grant him, you need to obey the situation you are in and DO AS YOU ARE TOLD.

Print out the jobs you want that you find on the internet. Make a list of the companies. Next to each company, make a list of people you know who work there. Include people who know someone who works there. Add a list of recruiters who can get your resume past HR (Human Resources) and directly to the hiring manager. Get into www.linkedin.com and see if you can find someone working at that company. Add those people to the list.

F+R Hugs is a soft Lycra shirt with embedded sensors and electronics that allows to feel the physical closeness of a distant loved one, bringing the sensation of a hug.

It seems as though the new dual-core CPU’s from AMD and Intel are causing a little bit of confusion for business software users. Some databases and financial software charge by the CPU core, meaning that some businesses may end up paying twice as much to run a program, even though it isn’t running twice as fast. Interesting problem. Lets see how these vendors get themselves out of this one. Obviously, Open Source doesn’t suffer...

Ten Rights: For Owners of Service Businesses

1. You have the right to price your business services right!

2. You have the right to raise your prices at any time.

3. You have the right to say no to those who only want to "pick your brain."

4. You have the right to set boundaries that are in line with your integrity!

Executives at office supplies company OfficeMax strengthened their hand against Hub hedge fund manager Abner Kurtin yesterday when quarterly results showed what could be a significant turnaround.

Once every couple years I make my way to Europe for vacation, and the past few times i've made it a point to stop by a Muji outlet whenever I do. I love Muji. While the IKEA experience is built to disorient you and trick you into overspending, Muji stores are small and well organized. When you enter the store you see three distinct sections - office supplies, home and kitchen furnishings and clothes. It's easy to find everything you want, nothing is overpriced, and everything is stylish and well made.

First I have to say I have an unhealthy love of office supplies. I’m like the dad in the famous commercial (but for different reasons).

Yahoo! Inc. a leading global Internet company, today announced a new feature on Yahoo! Local that provides free Web sites for small businesses. This free and easy-to-use feature builds upon Yahoo!'s leadership position as the number one online destination for local information and small business services. Small businesses can quickly and easily establish an online presence and connect with the increasing number of consumers using the Internet to find comprehensive local products and services. The service is available in beta at

"By bringing together our leadership in essential small business services, our vast consumer reach, and our local and search expertise, Yahoo! is uniquely able to help small businesses get started and be successful online," said Rich Riley, vice president and general manager, Yahoo! Small Business. "This new service complements our industry leading suite of online services that help small businesses get online, sell online and market online."

Dell and Hewlett-Packard cut fees for their recycling programs this week in advance of Friday's Earth Day observance.

Tech companies have come under growing pressure in the past few years to address the growing mounds of dangerous waste created by outdated computer hardware. Gear such as monitors and circuit boards are full of hazardous chemicals that can leach into the soil and groundwater if dumped into landfills. Groups such as the National Electronics Product Stewardship Initiative have successfully pushed computer makers to responsibly recycle more and more of their obsolete goods.

HP announced Thursday that it was temporarily cutting in half the fees it charges customers to recycle old computer hardware. The promotion runs though May 31 and works in conjunction with a rebate program that gives customers as much as $50 off the price of new HP equipment if they recycle old gear through the company.

Most of us, when we think of Franz Kafka, the words “impulse buyer” come to mind. Well, we might also think of a quasi-cubicle drone so traumatised by his office environment he tweaks himself into a beetle and locks himself in his childhood bedroom whilst making high-pitched insect noises. This exquisite writing device would make either the doomed protagonist of that office ur-text, The Metamorphosis, or its author put a smile on his face. I’d go so far as to bet that if Kafka was on the Net job-blogging his way through a dead-end advertising gig right now, he’d buy, like, ten of these gaudy, eponymously named $725 Mont Blanc inkers and then blow off some afternoon cold calls to get a manicure and a Jamba Juice.

A WSJ editorial roundup (free) on the problems of SOX 404, apropos of an SEC Roundtable on this issue, makes many of the points that are in the Sarbanes-Oxley archive of this blog, and in my writings on this subject cited in these posts:

--the extra burden on smaller companies

--resulting going dark and delisting by small and foreign companies

--the fact that the main beneficiaries are the big accounting firms (see my recent response to Gordon Smith noting this)

Everyday office supplies I’ve discovered that you can hurt yourself with:

The witness list includes representatives of the Intellectual Property Owners Association (IPO), the Business Software Alliance, Genentech, and the American Bar Association.

To better understand its customers, leading office supplies distributor OfficeMax(R) Incorporated selected SPSS predictive analytics software for recent direct mail marketing campaigns. The customer insight data has helped direct mail sales climb 24 percent.

In late September, the ad agency I work for had an “Oktoberfest” party that used the St. Pauli Girl logo on a sign leading to the party. When the Human Resources woman saw the sign, she asked for the logo to be retouched so it wouldn’t reveal so much cleavage. Thankfully, calmer heads and common sense prevailed, and the St. Pauli Girl remained in her mid-riffed glory.

And where the slump has come is particularly interesting. According to today's Wall Street Journal, "Excluding sales of autos and parts, which are volatile, and gasoline, which reflects rising pump prices, sales declined 0.1%, the first such drop in almost a year. Sales of clothing, electronics and furniture, and sales in general at department stores and restaurants all fell." If people aren't buying more stuff, it will get ugly fast.

My mother is an accountant. In the process of becoming an accountant, my mother learned to divide the world into two kinds of people: People who get debits and credits, and people who don't. You can simplify this to: People who pass first semester accounting, and people who drop it.

No one fails first-semester accounting, except maybe the very, very lazy. You have to be really obstinate to fail Accounting Principles I, because what normally happens is, the people who've spent the first four weeks of the semester patiently explaining to their instructors that MY BANK DOESN'T DO IT THIS WAY, or (this was a personal favorite of mine) THE SMALL BUSINESS FOR WHICH I DO PENNY-ANTE BOOKKEEPING DOESN'T DO IT THIS WAY; the people inevitably concluding with the plaintive wail, "WHY ARE YOU DOING IT THIS WAY, WHEN THIS WAY IS SO CONFUSING!!!"--anyway, those people?

Now that the large companies are jumping into blogging, how can you, the small business owner compete with them? While you might not have the staff or the resources these companies might have, you can still create a professional blog, in which you can share your business news, ask for feedback on your products, and have your happy customers post testimonials for you. Your business blog is an excellent tool to toot your own horn and tell your target customers why they should do business with you, rather than your competitor.

Utter, utter farce. The start of the move is this afternoon, and all over the weekend. The office furniture and so on is there, but the company sorting out the router and networking have fucked up the router, so the one that’s in there needs to come out, and a new one go in.

Minneapolis Director of Business Services Bill Beck said the new wireless plan allows all the city's business to come under one service, which is cheaper.

I hadn't picked up this publication in years, but needed something to replace my subscription to the Wall Street Journal. I am impressed beyond works with the quality of this publications. Not only does it give me basic business news, but there are a lot of marketing related articles and profiles of business executives I respect.

A new article by my friend Kim Krawiec explores the problems associated with the law's current emphasis on corporate internal control systems:

... any internal compliance-based organizational liability regime is likely to fail because courts and agencies lack sufficient information about the effectiveness of such structures. As a result, an internal compliance-based liability system encourages the implementation of largely cosmetic internal compliance structures that reduce legal liability without reducing the incidence of organizational misconduct. » How Broken is the U.S. Accounting Profession? from Conglomerate

A Bloomberg report describes the folly that is the Sarbanes-Oxley Act. SOX has caused companies to divert resources from consumer-serving operations into the installation of new computers and the hiring of additional accounting workers. SOX forced Yellow Roadway Corporation to hire 10 additional employees and 20 consultants to help write new accounting software. The extra $10 million it spent could have purchased 130 heavy duty truck cabs.

You discover the aesthetic beauty of office supplies.

3. Had no Human Resources department to report to

Bob Stambaugh, president of the human resources technology consultancy Kapa’a Associates, believes that, as the numbers go up, and conflicts increase commensurately, instituting clear guidelines to employees will become commonplace.

HAL is the result of 10 years' work by Yoshiyuki Sankai of the University of Tsukuba in Japan, and integrates mechanics, electronics, bionics and robotics in a new field known as cybernics. The most fully developed prototype, HAL 3, is a motor-driven metal "exoskeleton" that you strap onto your legs to power-assist leg movements. A backpack holds a computer with a wireless network connection, and the batteries are on a belt.

But in the last years of his papacy the Holy See was back in the red. In presenting the latest accounting, the chief of the Holy See's economic affairs office cited Europe's sluggish economic recovery, poor investment climate and the rising strength of the euro against the dollar.

Much of those home based businesses you see advertised are scams. There are ads out there for being envelope stuffers. You call for more information, and come to find out they want you to send in a “one-time processing fee.” I don’t believe in that, much like I don’t believe in renting additional office space, buying additional office furniture, and paying additional utilities for my business. I just use my home. The fact of the matter is that you can start any business you want with virtually no capital. It just takes asking...

ICANN has given final approval to two new Internet suffixes - .jobs for the human resources community and .travel for the travel industry. It could take months for the domain names to start appearing in use, as companies running those names now must set up registration and other procedures.

But Equitable is suing Ernst & Young for 2.05 billion pounds ($3.9 billion), claiming that the accounting firm was negligent and in breach of duty when its signed off on its accounts without warning Equitable of the problems that led to the crisis. Equitable claims that had it known of its true position, it would have put the company up for sale in 1998.

Financial Management is not accounting. Accounting deals with the classification of income and outgo (expenses). Financial management is the diagnosis and operation of your finances. Excellent accounting is the first step in the process. Certainly, if your accounting is performed haphazardly then the financial management will be poor.

Cash Flow from Operations as a % of Cash Receipts from Customers – Net income can be distorted through the use of aggressive accounting methods such as recording unapproved changes orders as revenue that have little probability of collection or that hide cost overruns. Receivables that have little chance of collection may be kept on the books instead of written-off as bad debts. This results in higher net income on the income statement. However, there are fewer things that can be done to manipulate cash. That is why cash flows traditionally...

Gross profit margin should ideally be analyzed for trends since many varied factors, such as accounting methods can affect it. An increasing gross profit margin may indicate an expanding market with the promise of increased competition, or it may indicate effective use of job costs reduction efforts. A decreasing gross profit margin indicates a declining market, strong competition, or inefficient job management.

Accounting / Finances Less than 10%

Business Buzz will be providing information on business news, company news releases, new technology and trade show news.

We will look forward to your comments and business news imput.

San Francisco's commercial real estate market showed signs of improvement in the first quarter, with prime office rents up 6 percent from the same period last year and the office vacancy rate down 3 percent.

Business software maker Oracle Corp. said Wednesday that 83 percent of retail software maker Retek Inc.'s stockholders had accepted Oracle's $11.25-per-share acquisition offer, which topped an earlier bid by another business software maker, Germany-based SAP.

"Leading the pack of cutting-edge home office desks is the Biomorph line from I.D/Design (www.biodesk.com). Biomorphs are built around a concept the company calls the "center of power." Cheesily named but elegantly executed, the idea is that the desk curves organically around the user, situating everything radially within arm's reach. The keyboard and monitor surfaces crank to the ideal height for all but the most hulking or diminutive user. Some models even allow users to adjust from sitting to standing modes. Space-age beautiful and ergonomically intelligent, the Biomorph designs have shown up in industrial design exhibitions and museum shows. Prices range from a $695 basic desk to over $4,000 for a fully accessorized, "my-workstation-has-more-knobs-and-doodads-than-your workstation" model. "

One of the things that makes me incredibly happy is office supplies. Oh yes, they completely get me off. A new notebook, some fabulous pens…file folders. It’s hard to explain the way they make me feel…a bit giddy perhaps. What spurred this confession? I finally received a new…well new to me…filling cabinet since ours is incredibly filled to the brim. I have hands covered in paper cuts from trying to shove files in their place. So I just moved around the new cabinet and now Krista and I are going to figure out how we...

Global organizations across multiple industries such as retail, automotive, industrial manufacturing, electronics, consumer goods manufacturing, pharmaceuticals, entertainment and financial services are using product information management software. Some of IBM’s global customers who are currently using IBM WebSphere Product Center include AlphaPurchase, Corporate Express, Conforama, El Corte Ingles, Unilever, and West Marine.

Six Sigma and Kaizen are two business methods that are used for business improvement. Now someone is comparing these approaches through nine different methods. The results can help companies make the right decision for their organization. The researcher is hoping that the study will reveal the definite differences.

Testifying before a Senate Banking Committee hearing today, Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) Chairman William Donaldson today said the SEC will issue guidance on how to value stock options for expensing this month. No word on if the SEC is going to go the way of the Financial Accounting Standards Board (FASB) who basically punted on the valuation issue by saying that a company could use the Black/Scholes method, the binomial method or by consulting with your teenage nephew, Bucky, who by all accounts is a math whiz.

Senator Bob Bennett (R-UT), who, while a proponent of expensing, has questioned the FASB's logic on valuation was quoted in a leading DC policy publication as saying, ""What in the world kind of accounting standard is that, when FASB says, 'You have to expense [stock options] but we don't particularly care what value you put on them." Ummm, I'd like to be the first to second that.

My husband works for an office furniture company, so desks and chairs have been freebies throughout the years.

About a week ago, the Aeron chair in my home office started doing something not so high-tech and comfortable–it started surreptitiously lowering while my ass was in it. The pneumatic cylinder that adjusts the height of the chair had apparently developed a leak; its gaskets were failing.

Jeff Nemcher, the producer and host of the site, appears to have just started the venture. Jeff owns? works for? Van Gogh Communications, so this could be a marketing tool for his business or a revenue generator, I can't tell. But so far, it's an interesting mix of daily blogging and podcasts featuring interviews with local business folks. To me it looks like an interactive chamber of commerce combined with a cool local radio show and daily business news updates. ...

We're trying out office chairs here at Ogged's work, and I'm the one choosing which ones we'll try and buy, so I take the demo chairs to everyone, show them how to make adjustments and get feedback after a day or two. So far, we've tried the Humanscale Freedom, Vitra Meda, and Steelcase Leap chairs (we have a Keilhauer...

It appears that the growth in the human resources outsourcing arena is growing, at really tremendous rates:

I’ve been in business for myself since 1999 owning my own web design firm in Hawaii. Is was originally suppose to be a hobby while I recover from knee surgery. However, I realized that in this extremely competitive job market to pursue my passion, which is human resources, was to run my own business, thus creating my own career. So shut down Raging Bull Designs in Hawaii, and moved back to Florida. Now re-established it as Webitude eBusiness, and operate it out of my home. However, I do not classify it as “home-business.” For example,...