The shortage of skilled IT workers is not like global warming. We are certain the worker shortage is real, and we are definitely feeling its effects now.

Heavy users of technology tend to focus on how the worker shortage is affecting them most directly; that is, their present inability to fill open technical positions. Perhaps less obvious is the impact the IT worker shortage has on organizations\’ use of outside vendors and consultants for their projects. Vendors and consultants are also finding it difficult to hire the talent they need, which is limiting their engagement capacity and growth opportunities.

Tips for technology buyers in a tight supplier market

If you are about to undertake a project that will rely heavily on an outside vendor or consultant (from this point I refer to both simply as “vendor”), consider the following tips and suggestions.

RFI/RFP Process. When you are ready to source any new project, think carefully about your RFI/ RFP process. In a tight market, vendors have less time for everything, including time for responding to RFIs and RFPs. Your goal is to get the attention of a number of qualified vendors, and now more than ever, you need to be creative in your approach.

The one-size-fits-all RFI (you tell a vendor very little about your project, but ask the vendor to tell you everything about itself and its products and services) is not an option. You need an RFI that is very specific and tailored to your current project. All-encompassing, fifty-page RFP documents are also not an option (except for agencies of state that must follow a statutory procurement process). Chances are that many good (busy) vendors, the very vendors you want to attract to your project, will not have the time to review and respond to an old-fashioned, one-shot, cover-the-world RFP.

As a continuation of a trend that started well before the current tight supplier market, you should try to break your RFI/RFP process down into smaller chunks that are more easily digestible by your vendor candidates. By “layering” your RFI/RFP process, you will win a first response and subsequent responses from a greater number of vendor candidates. Think of your RFIs and RFPs as living documents, subject to later amendment and supplement, and declare them as such to your vendor candidates. A layered approach maximizes vendor response rates and saves you and your vendor candidates precious time. You request the most detailed information only from the most qualified vendor candidates, and only the most qualified candidates have to prepare more detail.

Give prospective vendors a meaningful document, but one to which they can respond in a reasonable amount of time. Strike a balance between sufficient relevant content and the length of your document. Load up the most relevant information about your project and your needs in the first two or three pages, and save all the procurement boilerplate for later in your document or in a separate attachment (or better still, leave this clutter out of your document altogether and cite vendors to some private web pages containing this content). Limit the number of “exercises” a vendor must complete in order to respond; for example, self-scoring of base functionality for software. You may want this and other detailed information at some point, but be prepared to get it over time from select candidates instead of all at once from all candidates.

Pricing. If you are negotiating with a vendor for a new project, now is not the time to squeeze excessively on product price or a rate card. In many market segments, vendors are turning away work because they do not have the resources necessary to complete it. After a number of years of operating in recession mode, vendors are looking for higher margins, and they are getting them. They are in the enviable position of being able to choose which engagements they will undertake, and margin is one of their prime considerations. You could very easily, and perhaps unwittingly, ruin a deal with your preferred vendor because your costing expectations are more aligned with the recession period than the current market.

Different focus. If you accept that you do not have much pricing leverage in today\’s market, try to negotiate into your deal things that provide value to you but do not diminish your vendor\’s margins. The fact that your vendor cannot or will not budge much on pricing may mean that it will be more flexible on terms and conditions. Insist on more and better fee holdbacks, software buyback options, creative testing and acceptance models, penalties for milestone delays, etc. Whatever makes sense for your particular project. Simply put, if you are going to pay a premium price for your project, ask your vendor to put more skin in the game. Again, knowing that it has not offered you any real pricing breaks, your provider may put up less resistance to the buyer-side protections and vendor management tools you seek. Although these elements do not directly decrease your project spend, they may be valuable in terms of keeping your project on track, and they may be invaluable should your project run into trouble.

Bundling. If you are about to hire a vendor for a new project, and there is a chance you will need additional products or services from the vendor in the future, by all means, tell the vendor during the sourcing phase for your current project. The prospect of additional revenue for your vendor might allow you to obtain more favorable pricing for your current project, lock in a rate card and discounted product pricing for your next project, or both. You do not have to commit now to using this vendor for your next project, and you can reserve the right to renegotiate the rate card and product pricing for your next project (you are creating price ceilings, not price floors). When bundling is done properly, you have everything to gain, and nothing to lose.

Resources. It is fair to ask a vendor candidate whether it has the resources available presently to deliver your project on time and within budget (both are often a function of resource allocation). What is the vendor\’s present utilization rate? Will additional resources be released from another project in the near future? What resources will be dedicated to your project and for how long? If you get some uneasy answers to these questions, think about using another vendor. If you want to work with a particular vendor and your project is not mission critical, think about delaying your project.

The A-Team. We have all witnessed the situation where a project seems to move forward at a good pace when the vendor\’s A-Team is on site, but things bog down when it is not on site. If you have identified your chosen vendor\’s A-Team through referrals, demos, test or use cases, or by whatever means, be sure to ask your vendor how much time the team will devote to your project. A vendor\’s A-Team is its most valuable corporate asset, but it can be your most valuable project asset as well. It is not unreasonable to ask a vendor for presence of its A-Team at the launch of your project, for some stated period thereafter, and at other important times; for example, during unit testing or the commencement of a new project phase, and certainly during implementation. The promise of off-site monitoring and intervention by the A-Team is not as good as on-site presence. Unless you set expectations and get agreement from your vendor in advance, you may see very little of the vendor\’s A-Team during these times of high demand and short talent supply.

Fixed cost projects. Given current market conditions, think twice about fixed-fee arrangements. Depending on how your project goes, your vendor might smell the aroma of higher margins down the street and move good consultants off your fixed-fee project. In a fixed-fee arrangement, a vendor will typically require more project control, including control over its resource deployment. The vendor\’s A-Team may show up to start your project, and its B-Team may do the heavy lifting (as is usually the case). But if your project runs into trouble, or your vendor\’s margin is otherwise being threatened, you may find the vendor\’s C-Team showing up, then the D-Team, and then a subcontractor. You want a finished project, not a languishing project. This scenario happens with fixed-fee projects in all market conditions, but it may be more prevalent in a tight supplier market.

Outsourcing. Offshore outsourcing of all or a portion of your project might be a temptation during the current tight market given traditional vendors\’ lack of capacity and the current pricing they command. However, in addition to all the other negatives associated with offshore outsourcing, consider that the current tight market might make it more difficult for you to obtain prompt domestic assistance, or additional domestic assistance, should your outsourced project go south.

Build versus buy. Consider buying an OTS solution instead of a custom build. Further, for any OTS purchase, consider changing your business rules and requirements to match the OTS functionality (to the fullest extent possible), as opposed to customizing the OTS solution to match your existing business rules and requirements. Both strategies can reduce your project expense in this tight market, and they will certainly reduce your project risk.

© 2008 All rights reserved. Nuckles Law Firm

Tim Nuckles is a Wisconsin technology attorney whose practice is dedicated to technology transactions and the workout of troubled technology projects. You may visit the firm\’s web site at http://www.nuckleslaw.com

Timothy Nuckes is a Wisconsin attorney whose practice is dedicated to technology matters. You may visit the firm\’s web site at http://www.nuckleslaw.com

Once upon a time, the CEO of an outsourcing company decided to take an international tour to visit the company’s clients, prospects, investors and well wishers. Here are some excerpts from the CEO’s diary on his travels:

Breakfast with Client A

Client A: “We like your company because you’re so focused.”
CEO: Our goal is to always remain focused and provide you ‘value added’ services.
Client A: But, we feel your company is too small and we do not want to be a big part of your business…
CEO: Our goal is to grow this company aggressively so that you are one of ten large clients, not the only large client
Client A: But, we do not want you to grow that large, because we may not continue to get such customized service
CEO: Our goal is neither to grow so large that we cannot provide you with customized service nor to remain so small that you become a large part of our business
Client A: What size are you looking at then?
CEO: A couple thousand people over a couple years
Client A: Our other vendor with a few thousand employees is not able to provide us with the type of service you are providing, so we do not want you to grow too large. But we don’t want you to remain too small either…
CEO (sighs inwardly): You’ve had awful weather in the past few days with all the rain, snow, wind…
Client A: How is the weather in India?
CEO: Hot. We do have rain spells that cause havoc…
Client A: Will that affect my operations?
CEO: Not once in the last 6 monsoons. We provide transportation to all employees.
Client A: What if your transportation breaks down?

Lunch with Client B

Client B: We like your company because you are focused, and you provide value added services.
CEO: Our goal is to always remain focused and provide you ‘value added’ services
Client B: But, we have other vendors in India who offer to do this job for much less.
CEO: Have you looked at their track record
Client B: No
CEO: The outsourcing story is littered with failures of arrangements that went wrong because of people not having the right partner in India.
Client B: We too had a partner earlier, and we had to terminate that relationship because they had very poor quality, did not understand our requirements, had some billing problems, training problems, attrition problems, management problems…
CEO: I assume you do not see any of those problems with our company.
Client B: Not at all; your team is very dedicated, goes above and beyond to meet our volume spikes, and the quality and productivity are better than our in-house operations.
CEO: I am glad to hear that.
Client B: But, we have other vendors who offer to do this job for much less…
CEO: How can I help?
Client B: We want your quality and responsiveness at the price of those other vendors whose names I cannot recollect.
CEO: (sighs inwardly) you’ve had awful weather in the past few days with all the rain, snow, wind…

Dinner with Client C

Client C: We like your company because you are focused, and you provide ‘value added’ services.
CEO: Our goal is to always remain focused and provide you ‘value added’ services.
Client C: The recent migration of newer processes was extremely successful, and I am thankful to your team for going above and beyond in making it happen.
CEO: I am glad to hear that. Did you have a chance to review pricing internally, because it has been around 3 years since we discussed pricing?
Client C: Yes, we feel that you are definitely priced much better than our other operations in India.
CEO: I am glad to hear that.
Client C: I am happy to escalate the issue internally.
CEO: Thank you. You had mentioned you were to discuss internally last month.
Client C: Yes, I did. Everyone agrees that your price is very competitive compared to the excellent quality you provide.
CEO: Yes, this is why I am hoping for a review in the pricing
Client C: But our lawyers think that contracts cannot be amended mid-term
CEO: We just amended our contract last month to include the newer processes.
Client C: Yes, but that was the SOW (statement of work). Our lawyers say that pricing cannot be amended mid-term
CEO: Actually, it is just one line in Appendix C where we refer to pricing, so it is just one number that needs to change.
Client C: I agree. But, the lawyers say it cannot be done
CEO: (sighs inwardly) you’ve had awful weather in the past few days with all the rain, snow, wind…

Next Morning Board Meeting:

Board Member A: We’ve got some great feedback from some industry sources that our clients are very happy with your work
CEO: I am glad to hear that.
Board Member B: It seems you delivered your 6th year of profitable operations.
CEO: Yes, we always look at our bottom line.
Board Member A: Yes, but you need to look at the top line as well. We need to add a thousand people this year.
CEO: We are looking at acquisitions.
Board Member A: Think big, think large acquisitions. We need to add a thousand people this year…
CEO: That is our goal.
Board Member B: Most acquisitions fail.
CEO: We are building an experienced sales team as well.
Board Member B: Most sales teams fail and use up too much money.
CEO: We are building alliances with consultants and advisors who can recommend us
Board Member B: Most alliances fail.
CEO: We are on track to grow our current clients by at least 50% this year.
Board Member B: Yes, but you cannot be overly dependent on the few existing clients.
Board Member A: We need to add a thousand people this year…
CEO: We have figured out a way to add a thousand people this year without investing in a large sales team, alliances, acquisitions or growing our current clients too much.
Board Member B: Most ‘figured out’ ways fail
CEO: We are planning to hire a senior executive to run our operations so I can start selling more.
Board Member B: Yes, but that will increase costs, and most senior executives do not work as hard as you do.
Board Member A: We need to add a thousand people this year…We’re hearing great things from our clients.
CEO: (sighs inwardly) you’ve had awful weather in the past few days with all the rain, snow, wind…

And this is how the funny world of outsourcing plays out over and over again in boardrooms, client meetings and investor forums. And they all live happily ever after…

Kaushal Mehta, the author, is the Founder and Chairman of Motif, Inc. a specialized BPO (Business Process Outsourcing) company providing rules based and decision intensive back office transaction processing services, customized email response services and internet research & analytics to global clients.

A Virtual Assistant is a business owner who provides administrative support and specialized services to assist businesses and executives with their overflow. A Virtual Assistant can handle any task that is usually handled by an in house employee, but unlike an employee, a Virtual Assistant shares your goals to succeed in business; they only succeed if you succeed. But why would you want to work with a Virtual Assistant instead of having the physical presence of an employee?

No Hidden Costs
A Virtual Assistant takes care of all the usual employee related costs including such things as wage related costs, vacation pay, sick days, statutory holidays and benefits. Not only that, when you hire a Virtual Assistant, you are no longer required to pay overhead costs associated with an employee such as providing a computer and the associated software programs or even a desk. With an employee, these costs can add up to 50%-100% over the hourly rate of pay you are paying your employee. With a Virtual Assistant, what you see is what you pay; if the Virtual Assistant charges $35 per hour this is the price you pay.

No Time Commitments
Virtual Assistants can provide you with services on an as-needed basis. If you only require 1 or 2 hours of service this month, that is all you pay for. Where would you find an employee who is willing to work for just 1 to 2 hours per month? In most areas, labour laws require you to pay your employee(s) in 3 to 4 hour blocks of time. So even if you could find someone willing to work for just 1 day per month, you may have to find enough work to keep them busy for those hours or pay them even though they are not being utilized.

Experience/Expertise
Most Virtual Assistants specialize in a niche area where they have experience and/or expertise. This allows you, as a business owner, to work with a highly skilled and experienced person no matter the task at hand. As a business owner you could easily utilize the services of several VAs, each with their own specialty. You could have one VA handling your bookkeeping, one maintaining your Web site and another still planning your corporate events and meetings.

No Wasted Time
Productivity inefficiencies are a huge concern for employers these days. Many employees, when asked, admit to wasting their employer’s time on such things as personal matters, surfing the Internet and socializing with other employees. With a Virtual Assistant you only pay for the time they are actually working on your job. When they are talking to their mother on the telephone, surfing the Internet or socializing, it is on their time and not yours. Many Virtual Assistants take this one step further and dedicate blocks of time completely to your job and will not even answer phone calls or emails during that dedicated time. When they are working on your project it has their complete and absolute attention until the task is completed.

Fellow Business Owner
Perhaps the most important consideration when comparing Virtual Assistants to employees is that unlike an employee, a Virtual Assistant is also a business owner like you. Both you and your Virtual Assistant are interested in achieving success because as your partner they only succeed if you succeed. VAs, more than employees, understand what it takes to run a successful business.

Remember, however the biggest advantage to working with a Virtual Assistant is that you are not limited by the talent pool within your geographical area. Thanks to technological advances, your Virtual Assistant can be the person that best fits your needs and personality, regardless of whether they are in the next state or province, on the other side of the country or even in a completely different country than you are.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Yvonne Weld is the owner of Canadian based ABLE Virtual Assistant Services specializing in providing administrative and bookkeeping support to busy entrepreneurs. She is also the author of The Ultimate Guide to Creating a Thriving Business which provides a step-by-step guide to documenting your business. For your free audio teleclass on the areas you should consider when documenting your business and for more information about The Ultimate Guide to Creating a Thriving Business, visit the Web site at http://www.thrivingbusinessmanual.com.

Yvonne Weld is the owner of Canadian based ABLE Virtual Assistant Services and the author of “The Ultimate Guide to Creating a Thriving Business”. For more information visit http://www.thrivingbusinessmanual.com

Life as an entrepreneur can be chaotic at times. You have meetings, deadlines, pay roll, damage control, and maintaining current customers, while trying to search for new ones. Dare I even begin to list the house hold responsibilities? If you are anything like me, I can waste a couple minutes a day trying to find my favorite pen!

Let’s face it, many of us have various responsibilities and we have to be honest with ourselves in regards to our ability to perform each necessary task. The cruel reality is your current productivity may only be an illusion. Think about ways to delegate some of the items on your to-do-list.

The to-do-list continues to grow, but how much is it costing you? Think of the desired salary you would like to make from your business. Please be realistic. Take that salary and divide it by 12 (months). Then take that number and divided it by 4 (weeks) and divide that number by 5 (or days of the week you work in your business). Lastly, take your answer and divide that by the daily number of hours you work in your business. Now you have your desired hourly rate.

For example, you would like to make $100,000 a year. That equates to $8,333 per month, $2,083.33 a week, $416.66 day (if a 5 day work week), and $52.08 an hour (if 8 hour work day). Of course these are rough numbers, but you get the idea. Based on this example, you can potentially lose $52.08 an hour for each hour you spend on a task that could have been delegated or simplified.

Here are some solutions I found that have worked me.

Grocery shopping on-line–
If you have never done it, don’t be afraid. I love it. If you use a commuter train to go to work, you can order your groceries while in route to work. You can order them on your lunch break, waiting in the doctor’s office, your abilities are limitless…unless you don’t have a laptop. I started this because I was spending too much time in the grocery store and by the time I got to the register I had know idea how I spent so much money. Many times I didn’t even have a complete meal in my cart! The truth of the matter is that I am a horrible grocery shopper, but that’s my own issue. The on-line grocery store has a running total to let you know how much you are spending. Not to mention you don’t have to worry about taking the bags to your car. They deliver to your door! If you are a home based business or a fellow single lady, you will definitely appreciate this service.

Couple of draw backs I have noticed. Sometimes they may not have one or two items and you may find yourself going to the grocery store anyway. Or the unthinkable, they may not offer this service in your area. Google “groceries on-line” and see what you come up with for your local area.

Growing your business with local colleges or universities–
If you need to decrease the items on that to-do-list, consider recruiting at the local colleges or universities. Many times you can find students that can run errands for you. If your business is discipline specific, consider contacting a professor in that discipline. Ask them if they know of any dynamic students that can use some extra money to work in their field of study. In some cases you can offer a free internship with your small business.

If your business is not discipline specific, you can put flyers up in the various student
“hang out” locations. Clear it with the school first. The great thing about this option is that it is typically very affordable and college students have flexible schedules to meet your demanding to-do-list.

What if you are limited on funds?
You can always consider bartering your services with other small business, friends, or family. Let’s face it, many countries where built on bartering services. Everyone was self employed and if they needed something they would exchange their expertise for the desired service or product. Now we have this concept that you have to buy everything and that is simply not the case. Maybe you can provide an hour of professional advice or a free product in exchange for the ability to cross off one more item on that to-do-list.

Good Luck!

Cinnamon McCann is the creative creator of Financial Fashion House, a financial education website for women. The purpose of the website is to provide financial education in a trendy and exciting format. It is also intended to provide an environment where women can network and feel inspired. Visit her at http://www.financialfashionhouse.com

Business software is software that help off line and online business owners. These are software that help in the various operations of a business, making work faster and easier.

An Example of a business software is the auto responder. An auto responder helps for example in the automation of sending emails to subscribers and storing subscriber information. If this is done manually it will take a lot of time more expenses.

There are different types of software, business software is a just one of them. These software are not different from other software. The only difference is that they are mainly used by business man and women. Automation is the key for a successful business that is why these type of software are so important. Business owners nowadays do not have a professional business if they do not use some type of software.

A software development company is a company that specializes in the development of new software. Business owners that need a new software to automate some tasks can contact these companies. The programmers that work in the company create the software. Sometimes business owners need certain type of software that do not currently exist in the market. So they hire a software development company. The business owners can even sell the same software they use if they wish.

Business software has to deal with business.

Programmers create the software. These have great skills and specialize in software development. They can create almost anything you can imagine. A real example of a business software is for example auto filling software. Software usually does not completely automate the job. In some cases software automate only a fraction of a job and these are called semi automated software.

An anti spyware software for example is not a business software, it is a software created for consumers. An internet security software.

Buying or operating a business is no easy task. Anyone who reads newspapers today can find home business opportunities. Home business opportunities are increasing. Small home business opportunities are just as plentiful as large home business opportunities. Money is the main success behind any business. Money begets money, this quotation is always right. To run a business successfully one should have the comprehensive business knowledge and understanding of your business strengths and its weakness.

Another option to save time is obtaining a business loan. These are loans sanctioned to provide the customer with sufficient financial stability by which he can launch a new business or expand his business. Secured business loans can be availed by placing security as collateral.

Collateral can either be your home, land, etc. Business finance loan is one of the easiest ways to avail funds for your business needs. If the applicant for a business loan has good credit, the approval process is very simple. Business loans to people who have good credit often require no collateral nor do they require that you submit a business plan. Commercial business loans are offered to people who want to start their own business or for a businessman who want to expand their business, etc.

Want to start a new business or to expand your business? Commercial business loans are like an asset for business people. Commercial business loans can be used for purchase, refinance, business expansion, or for other type of commercial investment. Commercial business loans can be obtained for the development and growth of your business.

Business brokers or business transfer agents are helpful in selling your business at higher prices. A business coach is a person who helps you grow personally and professionally.

So both business software and business loans are extremely helpful to start or grow your business. They save time and money which are both very important.

Copy Right All Rights Reserved

Karl Sultana sells popular software NoAdware. Articles related to Internet security are updated regularly on his blog. Download NoAdware to stop & block trojans today.

1. The traditional Chinese “handshake” consists of interlocking the fingers, waving them up and down several times. This greeting is rarely used today (except during festivals, weddings and birthdays of the elderly), instead using the Western-style handshake. A slight bow should often accompanies the handshake, but do not bow from the waist in the style of the Japanese. The Chinese prefer a gentler handshake than the firm grip expected in Western cultures. Physical contact other than a handshake is highly discouraged unless you know someone quite well.

2. Chinese names are “reversed” from Western names. The surname is said first and then the given name. For example, Bruce Lee’s name in Cantonese is Lee Siu Lung. Lee is his surname and spoken first, and the given name (Little Dragon) is spoken second.

Professional, social, and family titles always follow the name as well. Dr. Wong would be Huang Yi Sheng (Huang Doctor). Likewise, Xiansheng (Mr.) and Taitai (Mrs.) are said after the surname. Never call someone by only his last name, and unless specifically asked, do not call someone by his first name; always address your Chinese associates by their surname followed by their title.
Also, never address anyone as “Comrade.”

3. Business cards are routinely exchanged at the first meeting. Carry bilingual business cards with one side in Chinese, and the other in English. Include:

* Company’s name

* Job title

* Special qualifications

When receiving a business card, receive it using both hands and compliment the card itself. Instead of immediately putting it away like in the West, keep the card out during the meeting.

4. Color symbolism is very important in China.

* Red is considered lucky and used in many celebrations. However, do not use red ink to write correspondence. That symbolizes the demise of a relationship.

* Yellow is associated with prosperity, and gold is especially appropriate.

* White is symbolic of death, which distinctly contrasts with Western cultures.

5. Lavish gift-giving was once an important aspect of the Chinese culture. Official policy currently forbids gift-giving since such gestures may be considered as bribes. For this reason, approach gift-giving with discretion. The policy is softening, but sometimes a gift will be declined under all circumstances. Be gracious if this circumstance is to occur, and politely withdraw the gift. Smaller. Less expensive items usually avoid this scrutiny.

The Chinese will politely refuse a gift several times to reflect modesty and humility. Accepting a gift quickly is believed to make them seem greedy or aggressive. Opening a present in front of the giver is also judged the same.

6. The Chinese will often avoid eye contact during conversations, especially when talking to the opposite sex or to strangers. Traditionally, it was considered impolite and aggressive to look directly into another’s eyes while talking, and as a sign of respect, the Chinese sometimes lower their eyes slightly when they meet others. The Chinese typically have a “blank” facial expression during introductions. This is not a sign of unhappiness, dissatisfaction, or unfriendliness, but reflects the belief that there is virtue in concealing emotions. Chinese communication is ambiguous, indirect and highly contextual. In conversation, the real meaning, especially if it’s negative, is often implied rather than stated. What is not said is often more important that what is said.

7. Chinese typically share food from a number of dishes placed in the center of the table rather than the Western practice of individually served dishes. Each party at the table will take food from the common plates. Sometimes, in order to show their friendship and sincerity, Chinese hosts will pick from dishes with their own chopsticks or spoons for you, and place food on your plate. Never place your chopsticks upright in a rice bowl; it replicates the bowl of sand or rice with two upright incense sticks that is traditionally
placed at the shrine of deceased loved one.

8. When meeting someone for the first time for a China sourcing business meeting, you should engage in general conversation before turning to business. Casual conversation topics in China differ from that of English speakers. It is not impolite to ask about:

* A person’s job

* Annual salary

* Marital/dating status

* Age

Your answers do not have to be extremely specific, but avoiding direct questions will be viewed with wariness and suspicion. The willingness to answer questions is the important take-away from the conversation. Questions about family tend to be deflected or avoided which is nearly the direct opposite of Western culture.

9. Six, eight and nine are considered lucky numbers, since their homophones have auspicious meanings. Six, liu in Chinese, implies that everything about you will go smoothly. Eight was originally deemed lucky by the Cantonese, since in Cantonese, the word for eight is fa, which means to make a great fortune in the near future. Later, the auspiciousness of eight was taken up by all Chinese. Nine, jiu, implies lasting forever, especially in friendship and marriage. Four and seven are unlucky numbers; the former implies death and the latter means gone.

10. Many common Western gestures are considered rude in China.

* Showing the soles of shoes

* Pointing with the index finger - use a face-up, open hand instead

* Beckoning someone with the index finger - use the hand with fingers motioning downward as in waving instead

* Whistling to get someone’s attention

* Finger snapping

Following the aforementioned 10 tips will add help build relationships with your Chinese business partners and greatly increase the prospects for success of your china outsourcing project.

Hubert Hopkins’ China Sourcing firm, US China Business Solutions, has negotiated outsourcing of products with a value in the hundreds of millions of dollars and has been involved with China outsourcing since the early 1980s. Outsourcing metal products to China can be easy and affordable with the correct help. US China Business Solutions is an independent sourcing agent with no ties to factories, is well-connected with key government officials and has “in-country” staff to oversee your projects in China.

The Benefits of Hiring a Freelancer

As competition in today’s markets increases, companies of all sizes are realizing that in order to be successful and remain competitive, they need to stay lean. Staying lean in today’s economy means trimming away excess expenses without compromising the essential needs of your business. One way to achieve this is by outsourcing certain projects to qualified consultants or freelancers.

Hiring an outside freelancer provides many benefits for businesses that can’t afford to bring in a full-time employee for things like web design, graphic design, marketing consultation, copywriting, and more.
Here are some of the benefits you’ll receive by outsourcing your content development to freelancers:

1. Freelancers are available when your company has an immediate need. Instead of bringing a full-time employee onto your payroll, hire a freelancer only when the situation calls for one. This will reduce the amount of compensation you have to pay, increase your profit margin, and allow your company to remain lean.

2. Freelancers have a small overhead, and can charge cheaper rates. Because many freelancers work from a home office or otherwise have lower operating costs, they can afford to offer you cheaper rates on your projects. This will obviously save you money on both long and short-term assignments.

3. Freelancers acquire a wide range of knowledge by working with many different industries. Because freelancers usually don’t cater to only one industry (although some do specialize), they are exposed to a wide range of information as they complete projects for their clients. This means fresh, creative ideas that may not have been used yet in your industry.

4. Freelancers can provide fast turnaround for most projects. For many freelancers, it is important that they complete their projects on time and in accordance with any deadlines that have been agreed upon. This allows them to assist your company and then move on to their next client. You’ll reap the benefits of fast turnaround and won’t have to wait long for high-quality work.

5. Freelancers can save you time for your main issues. Freelancers are used to working on their own, so you won’t have to hold their hands throughout the assignment. Many professional freelancers know what questions to ask and what information to gather at the start of an assignment. This means they won’t bother you with a million questions every day and won’t need in-depth clarification at every step of the process. This will save you time and energy that could be spent working on other projects.

Josh Geller is a freelance copywriter from New York. Visit Brainstorm Copywriting to see what a professional business writer can do for your company.

So you have partnered with a Virtual Assistant and now you are trying to think of ways to truly utilize them to your benefit. Here are twelve ways you probably have never thought of:

1. Internet Research

Want to stay a step ahead of the competition? Have your Virtual Assistant (VA) research what your competition is up to and provide you with a detailed report. Maybe you want to have an interesting and original corporate party this year, have your VA research a theme and provide you with a list of ideas. Maybe you want to know the best bang for your marketing dollars. Your VA can put together a detailed report including Internet rankings, costs and associated benefits.

2. Off-Site Data Storage

Ever wondered what to do with your computer backups? Have your VA store a copy of your data files at their offices. Now your business files and data will truly be protected from fire and theft.

3. Organizational Tasks

A VA can assist you in implementing new office systems that will assist with the information flow within your office. They can keep you on track so you no longer miss important dates or meetings. Ask your VA to provide you with some great tips to help you and your business become better organized.

4. Follow Up

A VA can follow up with your clients – send thank you notes, conduct surveys, etc. They can ensure your client doesn’t feel that the service ended once they paid you. A VA assists in making your clients feel they are important.

5. Business Support

Whenever you want to bounce ideas off of someone or get a second opinion, your VA will be there for you and your business. Ask your VA whenever you need a helpful hint on how to do something more efficiently or even if you just don’t know how to do something; they can assist you to complete the task. After all they too are a business owner and know what it takes to run a business.

6. Directions

A VA can provide you with directions to any location – be prepared before you leave for your business meeting and know exactly how to get there. Perhaps you are lost and in the middle of “no-where”, putting a call into your Virtual Assistant can help get you back on track and headed in the right direction.

7. File Conversions

Word to PDF or PDF to Word – a VA can assist you in converting documents to a format you can amend/edit or distribute without the fear of it being edited or amended.

8. Purchasing and/or Supplies Management

Your VA can assist you by ordering your supplies/inventory items and having them delivered directly to your office.

9. Business Card Management

So what are you doing with all those business cards you collect at networking functions and corporate events? Why not have your VA input them into a spreadsheet or contact management program so they are usable to you?

10. Human Resources

A VA can assist you with your staffing needs – they can take care of placing advertisements, screening resumes and applicants and conducting reference checks.

11. Reminder Calls

Ensure you are never left waiting again. Have your VA contact your clients and remind them of upcoming events. Perhaps it is you that needs the reminding; have your VA remind you of important meetings and dates.

12. Event Planning

Be it a conference, a seminar or a meeting, your VA can assist you with all the details from concept to on-site coordination – they can ensure all permits, licenses and equipment are there and ready for your use and that location, snacks and registration are accounted for.

As you can see there truly are many ways to utilize a Virtual Assistant over and above those tasks you are utilizing them for right now. The tasks your Virtual Assistant can complete are limited only by your imagination and their skill set.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Yvonne Weld is the owner of Canadian based ABLE Virtual Assistant Services specializing in providing administrative and bookkeeping support to busy entrepreneurs. She is also the author of The Ultimate Guide to Creating a Thriving Business which provides a step-by-step guide to documenting your business. For your free audio teleclass on the areas you should consider when documenting your business and for more information about The Ultimate Guide to Creating a Thriving Business, visit the Web site at http://www.thrivingbusinessmanual.com.

Yvonne Weld is the owner of Canadian based ABLE Virtual Assistant Services and the author of “The Ultimate Guide to Creating a Thriving Business”. For more information visit http://www.thrivingbusinessmanual.com

“Quality is the most important thing.”

“A translation must not sound like a translation – it should sound like an original text.”

“We only ever allow translators to work into their native language.”

It’s time to dig around some translation industry clichés. For many buyers of translation, the quotations at the top of the page will be very familiar – and in many ways the statements are absolutely right. You would be unhappy to receive a translation that was low quality, that sounded like a translation (and not an original), and had been written by a non-native speaker.

Yes and no.

Yes, you would be unhappy if high quality, polished translations by native speakers was what you required.

But the assumption that high quality, polished native speaker translations is the only requirement is false, and a buyer of translation should be even more unhappy to have been sold an inappropriate service, especially when the service they were sold would have been considerably more expensive than the service that they actually required. Mis-selling is restricted to the world of door-to-door insurance salesmen.

So the question is: when would we use non-native language translators? There are five overlapping factors that will point towards some answers: price, quality, speed, content, and purpose

The “umbrella” reason for using non-natives is purpose. What is the translation actually for?

If a translation is purely “for information” (for internal use only, just to know what something means), then it doesn’t really matter how beautiful the translated language is. The key to such translations is accurate rendition of meaning – and this can (usually) be done absolutely as well by a translator working into a language that is not their mother tongue. In fact (and this now brings in the content reason), the most accurate understanding of any source text is likely to be achieved by a native speaker of the source text. So for a highly technical source document, when the translation is only required “for information” maybe we should after all consider using source language native speakers.

Translations “for information” might be assumed to be chunky texts, maybe a manual, or a tender document that needs to be understood to prepare a response. A classic cause for non-native “for information” translations is in the field of market research. Imagine you have respondents in 20 different languages to a questionnaire. Many of the answers on the questionnaire will be fixed choice responses but perhaps you have some open-ended questions as well: questions to which the respondent could write anything up to several hundred words. You need to know what they are saying, but only so you can incorporate the responses into the overall data for analysis. So you just want to know what has been said, and you don’t even care if the translations have the odd spelling mistake or typo. It simply doesn’t matter (in fact the answers of the respondents will probably have spelling mistakes anyway). You may not even want a record of exactly what they wrote – just for the answers to have been categorised to allow for analysis, with the linguists coding the answers against a code frame, created either by you or by the specialist market research translation company. It absolutely makes sense to consider breaking the “rules” about translators only working into their native language. Here you don’t care if the translations sound like translations. Natives of the source language will almost always be cheaper than English native speakers, just as good for the purpose, and the accuracy and consistency could be higher, especially if the linguist is coding directly.

Price of course can play a big factor. As mentioned above a non-native English speaker will almost always be cheaper than a native English speaker, and dramatically so if the source language is from a region with very low costs e.g. China, India, Eastern Europe.

Supply and demand links into the price, quality, and speed reasons for using non-native translators. This is particularly relevant for translations into English from anything other than the major world languages.

Let’s suppose we need to translate a technical manual from Vietnamese into English, and we want to stick to the rule of only using translators working into their native language. How many native English people learn Vietnamese to professional fluency AND decide to be a professional translator AND happen to be available when we need them AND have relevant sector expertise? Not many, if any, will be the most common answer. And if there is somebody suitable you can be sure they won’t be cheap.

One solution is “translation by committee”. We find a native Vietnamese translator who can provide his best effort at an English translation. An English native (no Vietnamese skills necessary) proofreads and cleans the English text whilst in constant contact with the Vietnamese translator. The result is an accurate, English native quality translation dome at the speed we need it and at a price that reflects the supply of Vietnamese translators who have good English skills rather than a price that reflects the almost non-existent supply of native English Vietnamese translators.

Lingo24 Translation Agency London

Jack Waley-Cohen is the Operations Director of Lingo24 Translation Services UK.

In today’s competitive world of business, every software company wants to make an outstanding position in the software outsourcing business. Since, the aspect of outsourcing came into being, more and more companies are tending towards this. Outsourcing your work is the part of information technology and also information technology enabled services. In fact, software outsourcing India is the most desired destination of outsourcing and this is because of the quality work done by the highly skilled Indian professionals. The outsourcing has proved advantageous for most of the software companies as their business has seen a huge run-up and became profitable, so this is also one of the reasons for its ever increasing popularity and huge demand.

Studies reveal that in software outsourcing, the cost of hiring professional is about five times less than that needed in European and American countries. The software outsourcing India provides quality work in less time and also at cheaper rates. Hence, in this way you are saving the revenue of your company. There are various factors on which you can outsource your work and hire professionals. You can also hire professionals on individual basis or also from the companies who are client oriented. Most of the companies around the globe prefer software outsourcing India to be its offshore destination for its projects. The complexity of the projects is the deciding factor for which you can think who is efficient to do your work.

Software outsourcing is not only the service provided by Indian companies, apart from this they also provide different types of businesses and knowledge. The widely accepted fame is due to the enormous talent pool that India has. United States is the major client of Indian IT companies and others are UK, Germany, France and many more. Even the world’s biggest software companies like Microsoft and Oracle are outsourcing their major work from India. A study says that more than forty percent of software development services and also information technology enabled services is outsourced from India. The companies are grounded firmly on the basics of trust, teamwork and use of latest technology in providing quality service to its client. The cost savings is the main reason behind outsourcing your work and further the company can invest those saved money on the growth and expansion plans.

There are various factors to consider before you hand over your entire project to an offshore destination. You must look for the knowledge pool that the vendor has about the industry vertical on which your project depends. If the vendor is skilled then only offer the project to him. You should also look for the track record of the vendor as to know in what fields they specialize. Their specialization is also important for you to consider as it will help you to relieve on their services offered. Many software companies are working towards quality certifications that will help them to give an outstanding position among its competitors. ISO certification or SEI CMM level certification should be considered when you are looking for an offshore vendor. The outsourcing services needs a good infrastructure and sufficient back-up to over come any kind of problem. The vendor’s experience in this field matters as it shows how efficient they are to handle your work.

Allies Harbor is a writer for http://www.ifrstaffing.com - IFR Staffing offers services for Accounting outsourcing,Business Process Outsourcing,India outsourcing accounting. You can have benefits of SEO outsourcing India,Outsourcing SEO Services,Article syndication,software outsourcing India.