Learning to Thrive While Your Competitors Flounder

In this era of uncertainty, with the fear of Chinese and Indian economies eclipsing the U.S., of Europe doing too little too late, what we need is some perspective. We need to lift our gaze from in front of our feet and look up, and think about the long term.

I got a precious opportunity to do just that last week at an investor conference hosted by a man who Forbes says is worth about $1.5 billion, who runs a series of funds valued at over $15 billion. I won’t give you his name because I have not yet formally interviewed him and would like to, but he laid out a formula for the few of us willing to look for opportunity in trouble. He has a long record. His formula must work. So it’s worth something.

I asked him how he identifies companies that will thrive during the slow-growth era we are operating in. Here is what he said:

1. Vision: He looks for leaders who have a compelling long-term vision and inspire people to pursue it.
2. Belief: These leaders believe so much in their companies that they are bullish, and see opportunities for growth.
3. Capital: These companies have the cash to invest when their competitors must cut back, so they can seize opportunities others cannot.
4. Advantage: They have a capacity or own something that is too expensive for competitors to duplicate. They own an historic building, for example, or have built a recognized brand that competitors feel costs too much to be worth building themselves.

I love that the first thing on his list was his interest in betting on leaders with a vision. The implications for investors are clear. For entrepreneurs they are equally compelling. To be one of the few who thrive, to sail ahead of your competition over the next five to 10 years, you want to remember “VBCA”--vision, belief, capital, advantage. You want to create an inspiring vision that you can believe in passionately, find or create the capital capacity to invest in this vision (take an inventory of your full assets and you may be surprised to find that you have an asset you are not thinking about now), and focus on building something that arms you with a competitive advantage (something competitors will choose not to copy).

By: Kaihan Krippendorff

Up to $9,600 in Federal Tax Credits Now Available to Companies That Hire Veterans

NEW Tax Credit for Hiring Veterans

On December 21, 2011, President Obama signed into law the VOW to Hire Heroes Act of 2011. This Act expands the veterans who qualify under the Work Opportunity Tax Credit. It also extends tax credits up to $9,600 to businesses that hire vets.

What is a Work Opportunity Tax Credit (WOTC)?
The WOTC encourages businesses to hire people from certain groups. Businesses that hire veterans who qualify under the VOW to Hire Heroes Act can receive a federal tax credit up to:

• $9,600 for hiring veterans with service-connected disabilities who have been looking for a job for more than six months
• $5,600 for hiring veterans who have been looking for a job for more than six months
• $2,400 for hiring veterans who have been unemployed from one to six months

How to Apply for Credit
To use the expanded WOTC credits offered under the VOW to Hire Heroes Act, a job seeker and business both must fill out a Pre-Screening Notice (IRS Form 8850) on or before the hire date. To find the forms, look for "Work Opportunity Tax Credit" in the "Businesses" section of http://www.labor.ny.gov/.

The Department of Labor must receive the completed and signed Pre-Screening Notice within 28 days of the first date of work.

More U.S. Companies Hurt by Imports May Now Qualify for Federal Help

Changes to the federal Trade Adjustment Assistance grant program may enable more companies to qualify for benefits.

According to the NY State Trade Adjustment Assistance Center (NYS TAAC), changes were signed into law recently by the President that:

• Extends the authorization of appropriations for TAA through December 31, 2013.
• Reincorporates the eligibility of service firms for assistance.
• Reincorporates the use of extended look-back periods for certification.

The NYS TAAC has helped over 1,200 New York firms recover from the effects of foreign competition and has provided more than $53 million in assistance. These changes let the NYS TAAC continue aiding firms throughout the state.

Your company may be eligible for TAA benefits if your firm has experienced sales and employment declines due in part to imports. The new law includes look-back periods that can extend to 2008

Benefits include funding improvement projects on a 75/25 percentage cost share up to $30,000 or 50/50 cost share on projects up to $150,000.

Projects can be in marketing, information technology, manufacturing/engineering and compliance areas like ISO Certification. Project assistance is delivered by independent industry specialists, consultants or other service providers.

For information about how AM&T can assist, contact: Jim Cunningham at 607-725-1225

Search is On for Suppliers That Enable Rail Equipment to be 100% US-made

The US Department of Transportation is working to re-establish a domestic supply base to support inter-modal transportation manufacturing in the United States. The objective of this effort is to have 100% of the supply chain in the USA.

The DOT is partnering with the national network of NIST MEP Centers such as AM&T to connect rail industry Original Equipment Manufacturers (OEMs) with a broader domestic supply base that includes both traditional and non-traditional rail suppliers.

We want to connect Southern Tier companies with the large car builders and OEMs that build railcars and locomotives. If you are interested in learning more about becoming a Rail Industry supplier, contact Jim Cunningham at 607-725-1225

Three Easy Steps to a Great Twenty-Minute Presentation

Although twenty minutes is a perfect amount of time for a presentation, it takes work to make it effective. You need to draft a narrative, carefully edit and refine the content, and develop compelling visuals. Let me take you through a 3-step process that will help you create your next pitch or presentation when you’re given a relatively short amount of time.

1. Develop sound bites. Before you even open PowerPoint (or Apple Keynote) craft the key messages that you want your audience to remember. During our presentations at LeWeb, artists with a firm called Livesketching.com were creating one-page visual representations of the presentations. Looking at the one they created from my talk as well as some of the others, I noticed that the sketch artists were listening for key phrases as well as lists. Bill Gross, the CEO of technology incubator Idealab, delivered a presentation with 12 entrepreneurial lessons from the last twenty years. The sketch artists highlighted each of the key lessons (all of the sketches can be seen at http://www.slideshare.net/LeWeb/leweb2011). Lists are catchy and make the content easier to absorb. People like lists. Use them.
2. Storyboard the content. Speaking of sketch artists, it helps to think like an artist when preparing a presentation. Before you open PowerPoint, head to a white board or take out a good old-fashioned pen and paper and start sketching. Think about how you will visualize each of the key points and supporting messages. What pictures will you use? Are there abstract images that will reinforce your content? Remember that people process information more effectively when the content is delivered as words and pictures rather than words alone.
3. Practice the presentation. Nobody expects you to read extensively from notes for a 20 or 25-minute presentation. In fact they expect that you have the content down cold. I’m glad I did. When I went on stage I could see my slides in the monitor in front of me, but not my presenter notes. As it turns out I didn’t need them because I had practiced the presentation many times out loud. Most people save their practice time until the night before a presentation and it shows.

A 20-minute presentation is ideal for new product launches, investor pitches, employee updates, sales meetings, etc. Take the opportunity to craft, design and deliver a presentation your audience will remember.

By: Carmine Gallo

Considerations for Successful Strategic Planning

• Build a strong planning team. Involve key staff to provide input and ensure their buy-in.
• Find the right style of plan for you. There is no one-size-fits-all.
• Unless you are an expert at Strategic Planning, bring in an independent facilitator to guide your team through the process.
• Put your plan in writing. Without exception.
• Define your desired future state in measurable terms and determine what it will take to get there within your targeted timeframe.
• What gets measured, gets done. All goals and actions must be measurable and include responsibilities and timeframes for completion.
• Performance management is critical to success. Review your plan and all metrics on a regular basis and take corrective actions as required to stay on track.
• Formally renew your Strategic Plan on an annual basis or more often during periods of rapid growth or change. 

If you’re ready to develop your strategic plan, contact Jim Cunningham at 607-725-1225

Swift Glass Achieves ISO 9001:2008 Certification

Swift Glass in Elmira Heights recently announced that the company has undergone a 14-month quality improvement program that resulted in achieving ISO:9001-2008 certification. This means that a third-party auditing firm has certified Swift Glass as conforming to internationally accepted quality management standards.

Swift Glass is a family-owned business that employs 90 people to make high quality fabricated glass parts, primarily for the lighting, chemical processing, and diagnostic imaging industries. For example, their parts are used in the medical field in PET and CAT imaging devices, and in high-resolution mammography.

In August 2010 Swift Glass CEO, Dan Burke, asked AM&T for assistance in determining what would be required to achieve ISO certification. AM&T staff briefed the company’s management team, reviewed the company’s quality manual, and conducted a gap analysis that compared the existing practices at Swift Glass with what would be required to gain ISO certification.

Working closely with Gary Palmowski, Plant Manager, and the management team, AM&T led the creation of a new quality manual, an expanded collection of work instructions, and a set of procedures designed to insure continuous quality monitoring and improvement. This process eventually involved all employees, both through briefings and through their direct involvement in creating the new processes and documentation.

Once the new system was implemented in daily production, AM&T helped the company develop an audit process to insure that everyone was actually following the updated quality procedures. After the company operated for several months under the new system, an independent "registrar" organization visited the company to perform an extensive compliance assessment. Based on this third-party assessment, Swift Glass was deemed compliant with the ISO:9001-2008 requirements and certified to the standard.

Michael Meador from AM&T recently had a conversation with Burke and Palmowski about their experience with the ISO certification process:

MM: "Why did you think it was important for Swift Glass to become ISO certified?"

GP: "Our existing quality management system was actually pretty good but it needed improvement and better consistency.

DB: "Our customers required that we at least comply with ISO standards and the FDA has been pushing for medical equipment suppliers to be ISO certified, so we decided that the best choice for the business was to commit to the entire process. Achieving ISO certification has caused our customers to have a lot more confidence and assurance that we can consistently satisfy their needs. Many of our customers do their own audits of our quality control processes, and those outcomes are much better now – almost a difference of night vs. day."

MM: "That’s certainly a strong customer satisfaction story, but what about the cost to the company?"

GP: "We no longer accept the old model that we’re working with a fragile material and have to tolerate lots of scrap due to chips and scratches. Improving the quality control system has enabled us to measure the wasted labor and materials that go into scrap, and to create a feedback loop so that people on the shop floor have the information and motivation to reduce it. Those savings go straight to the bottom line."

MM: "Following new procedures or doing anything differently is like any change – people often resist it. What was your experience with the larger employee group?"

GP: "We have to give a "hats off" to Lloyd Johnson and AM&T, especially in how Lloyd worked with everyone here. All through the 14-months, Lloyd was patient and practical, and presented everything in a positive light to both management and employees. The employees were all involved in learning about the program and helping set the objectives, and that helped them realize that the quality system would help them and the company grow."

DB: "Our customers require defect-free products. We have always followed the policy that the customer is king, so they knew that we would do whatever was necessary to make them happy. All our people come to work wanting to do a good job, and one result of working with AM&T is that employees now understand better what is necessary and expected to achieve high quality standards."

AM&T has assisted companies of all sizes to gain internationally recognized certification of their quality system, to the ISO:9001 standard as well as others such as AS9100. To explore whether or not this type of certification would help your business to retain customers, find new ones, and control costs, contact Jim Cunningham, 607-725-1225.