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Entries Tagged as 'template'

Donald Trump’s Guide to Delivering Negative Business Messages

August 31st, 2010 · View Comments · Communications Plan

Ever watch the Apprentice? I enjoy waiting for Trump to pull the trigger and give it to them. ‘You’re fired!’ It’s nice to watch this from the safety of our sofas. We’re involved but also separate from it. And we can switch off.

In the real world, it’s not so cosy. Sometimes you’re the one that has to give the bad news, sometimes you’re the one that has to give negative appraisals. Sometimes you’re the one that has to fire people. In many respects, this may fall under the umbrella of your Communications Plan strategy.

8 Proven Ways to Deal With Critics

August 26th, 2010 · View Comments · Communications Plan

One of the hardest things about running your own business, especially if you’re trying to get it off the ground, is dealing with the constant flow of criticisms, negativity, and sniping. Part of this goes with the territory. When you try to start something, others will try to pull you back. That’s how they validate themselves. And that’s fine until their criticism begins to undermine your credibility and/or the quality of your products. One way to do this is to develop a communications plan so that all outbound messages express the same values. Another is to learn how to deal with critics in business meetings, workshops, and other public places.

Which Type of Business Plan Is Twice As Likely to Get Investment?

August 10th, 2010 · View Comments · Business Plans

Let’s say you’re about to write your first Business Plan. Or maybe write another one for a new business. Or maybe re-write a Business Plan that didn’t work in the past. And you have a choice… You can trawl the web and download some free Business Plan or get out the credit card and buy one. Tricky, isn’t it? There is so much out there, it’s hard to resist. Ok, why am I rambling on about this?

The Warren Buffet Nine Step Guide To Better Business English

July 29th, 2010 · View Comments · Business Development

Warren Buffet’s Annual Reports were the first annual reports I ever read. To this day, I go back and re-read them to remind myself what business writing is really about – making a connection with words. That’s it. The more you can connect, the more people will read you. They may not agree with you [...]

The Nine-Step Strategy for Writing Summaries That Intrigue Readers

July 20th, 2010 · View Comments · Business Writing

This article is about writing headlines, summaries and abstracts. Before we start, what is an Abstract? Philip Koopman, at Carnegie Mellon University, reminds us that, “Writing an efficient abstract is hard work, but will repay you with increased impact on the world by enticing people to read your publications. Make sure that all the components [...]

15 Ways to Write Better Business Case Studies

July 4th, 2010 · View Comments · Business case

Over the past few weeks we’ve looked at how to write business proposals (and business plans) to generate new business opportunities. One way to succeed in this area is to understand how the ‘Business Case’ is generated within an organization (as this is often written before the actual RFP is sent out) and the type [...]

Using Visio To Create Better Process Maps and Use Case Diagrams

July 1st, 2010 · View Comments · Business Model

Last week I showed you how to use Microsoft Visio to create business process maps, use case diagrams, flowcharts. org charts, and other type of documents. This week, we’ll look at text. How to add, change, flip and control the text in your diagrams. For example, if you have a lot of shapes in the same flowchart – and need to add text instructions – it can be hard for the reader to see the text clearly. This makes your diagram looks crowded and hard for business analysts to understand the process flow or use case.

How To Write a Business Plan Guy Kawasaki Style

June 30th, 2010 · View Comments · Business Plans

‘Simple and to the point is always the best way to get your point across.’ Guy Kawasaki Does this sound familiar? You’ve started a business, built products, made some sales, and started to scale. But your cashflow has ground to a halt! You need funds to drive the business forward and also ensure it doesn’t [...]

How Apple’s Setup Guide Shows that it Thinks Different

November 10th, 2009 · Comments Off · How To, Tips

Seth Godin believes that everything reflects what you stand for—right down to your technical documents. Ever looked at Apple’s tech docs?

Why do you need to develop a Capacity Plan?

November 3rd, 2009 · Comments Off · How To

Developing a Capacity Plan is vital if you want to understand how much capacity will be required to support your IT systems and, by extension, the infrastructure that supports it. Think about it. If you plan to install a new large-scale solution, for example, IBM WebSphere or SAP, you also need to consider the impact [...]

Instant Site Thumbnails for Your Blog with PageGlimpse

October 14th, 2009 · Comments Off · Technical Writing

Image via Wikipedia What’s the fastest way to take a screenshot of a website, turn it into a thumbnail, and get it on your blog? How about if you could automate this? Most of us hit print screen, take it into Snagit or PhotoShop, play with the size until it’s right and then save. Well, [...]