Access Better Business Ideas in 2015

If you struggled to get better results in your business in 2010, it might be helpful to ask yourself: Did I have access to better resources that could improve matters? How does access to information influence my financial and social well being and how can I transform my small business ideas into opportunities in 2011?

Well, the idea that business people need to access various sources of information to conduct successfully their affairs and make better business decisions is well established.

As a matter of fact, access to information technologies along with internet are key solutions for helping organizations to access accurate information and remain competitive in business.

Interestingly, research by experts indicates that a good number of small business managers have access to a number of informal as well as formal sources of better business information on a fairly regular basis.

However, a study conducted for industry Canada (Campus Inc, 2001) among small firms involving 1000 interviews, revealed that almost one third of small business owners do not consider themselves as active in accessing relevant business information. In addition, although one third of managers claimed to be aware of better business websites providing free access to business related information and support, almost half could not identify any sites and expressed very low level of internet usage.

Truly, more than half of us have never had access even to our own bank website and other very important government websites too. We view these sites as sources with little or no importance.

Thus, in spite of many efforts by business Authors and business coaches to deliver business information to small business managers, most of us still show a lack of knowledge about these sources where you can access better business ideas.

The fact that small business managers look most often to informal sources-clients, suppliers, gossip and colleagues is an area of concern often raised by business analysts.

Although these sources seem to be convenient for most business managers, they do not always provide an efficient access to better business intelligence and the strategic information needed to achieve better results in 2015.

It`s a somewhat complex process to access the right resources online, but Africa report is one site that is dedicated to provide support and guidance for entrepreneurs in Africa. You will definitely access better business ideas.

Does Your Business Lack Intelligence?

When I first came across this term ‘Business intelligence’ I became so eager to know what it is and also understand what lack of this ‘Business Intelligence’ can do to a Business. After reading a number of topics relating to Business Intelligence, this is what I learned.

All of us make decisions everyday of our lives depending on our intuition. Most of the decisions we make are simple and straight forward, but financial decisions are difficult to make due to uncertainty, complexity and risk consequences of wrong decisions.

“Business decisions should be based on facts which you can explain rather than on intuitions- mare feelings about something which you can not explain”

Apart from the day to day programmed decisions, as a manager or business owner, you will also be faced with decisions that greatly affect the future out come of your business which are beyond your own scope of intuition.

Therefore, you can not always bank on your own intuition for sound business decisions. It is for this reason that you require Data analysis and reporting tools to greatly help you carry out detailed analytics of your business data to produce valuable information in form of summarized reports for the purpose of decision making.

Computer based applications and techniques used for gathering, storing, spotting, drill-down and analyzing data such as sales revenue by products, fall under this category of ‘Business Intelligence’

Interestingly, I found out how the integration of a reporting tool such as Pastel Business Intelligence into accounting software can enhance effective decision making in a business.

There are a number of business intelligence tools, among the ones I found fascinating is Oracle Business Intelligence but I will leave this for my next post. For now, l want to focus your attention on Pastel Business Intelligence Centre [BIC]

If you are very comfortable with using Microsoft Excel to share, analyze, present, manipulate and prepare reports then you will find this module very useful.

This module can be linked to your Pastel Accounting data and at a click of a button you can generate spreadsheets by extracting pastel Accounting data and converting it into an easy-to-read graphic format. The reports can be retained and made available in future with a drill-down functionality and further be customized according to your needs.

It is not that easy to make complex business decisions with out a fact based support system. Analytical tools provide detailed analytics of historical, current as well as predictive views or future trends of your business and support better business decision making.

Finally, ask your self this question, Does your Business Lack Intelligence? May be its high time you considered a reporting tool to change the way you make decisions in your business.