Time Management Training – accomplish more in less time, addressing key results areas.

Skillkick carried out some time management training today for a group of students at a college.

SWOT – Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats

SWOT Analysis

Strengths: What we do well
Weaknesses: What we need to improve
Opportunities: What we can take advantage of
Threats: Who we need to look out for

Strengths (Internal) Used to identify what you / the business and its staff do which:
They are effective at Are well known for Make money Generate the business and reputation Cause customers to come back Cause other businesses to try and learn from them

Weaknesses (Internal) Identifies aspects that:
Cause the company to loose money Cause the company to do badly Cause the company to have a poor reputation Cause grievances, and complaints for the business

Opportunities (External) Directions a business could profitably take in the future Is there a new demographic online you could target? Can your brand grow? Can you branch out with new products?

Threats (External) Did you fail to take advantage of an opportunity? What is your competition doing? Are the competition taking your business? Are the competition offering something you’re not? Try completing a SWOT analysis and let me know how you get on.

Skillkick delivers training programmes ranging from half day to five days in length. All our courses include good practical exercises and plenty of interaction.

Courses are available per person, discounts are available for group bookings. The cost includes lunch, refreshments and comprehensive course notes.

Please Contact Us to find out how Skillkick can help you achieve your personal and business ambitions.

News alerts and desk top news are offered by most news sites, often for free. You install a piece of software to have new news alerts and news items produced by these sites delivered to your desktop. An icon will ‘pop up’ when there’s news alerts to report. These services usually refresh themselves on an hourly basis, although you have to be connected to the internet – as with desktop feedreaders, it’s perhaps best for if you have an internet connection that is always ‘on’, e.g. if you have broadband.

Social Bookmarking is a great way to keep up to date and is a useful follow on from our activity last week on RSS Feeds and Feed readers. How did you get on with this activity last month?

RSS Feeds are today’s focus at Skillkick. Read on for everything you need to know.

Firstly, watch this fantastic short 2-minute clip from commoncraft. We love their short films!

Skillkick often receive emails from people saying that they feel bombarded with information. This post focuses on an activity to help you explore tools available that can help you keep up to date with what is going on in your specialist areas of interest.
Firstly, make a list of how you find out about things. When our team did this, we were quite surprised by the amount of information that comes our way. We noticed that our use of information overlapped for professional and personal purposes and that we keep up to speed with more than we realised! Hardly surprising, then, that sometimes those ezines don’t get read for a while. In today’s electronic world, we can become flooded with new information and it is how to cope in terms of the quantity and quality of information coming in.
What does your list include and what are the ways in which you gain new information?

Our list included mailing lists we subscribe to; reading blogs and internet sites; emails; online newsfeeds; magazines; getting information from other people; newsletters and newspapers.
Tip: Whenever you use a new tool or sign up for something new, keep track of the site you register with and ensure you know how to unsubscribe. Keeping everything logged in a spread sheet is a good method to keep track.

RSS feeds supply headlines; links and article summaries from various websites. We can then decide whether we want to read further in more detail or just gain headline snippets. All information comes to you in one place by using RSS feeds. There is a feed for every aspect of your life! Just look for the orange button if the site offers RSS.
If you haven’t already, set up RSS feeds. Firstly, you need to choose a feedreader. We use Netvibes. Another examples include: Newsgator, XPrss for Blackberry, Flipboad for ipad, Google reader

There are a number of ways of getting feeds into your feedreader depending on which one you use. Right-clicking on the orange button might give you the option to add the link directly to your feedreader or there may be shortcut options built into your feedreader. Many have an easy subscription bookmarklet which appears in your bookmarks toolbar; whenever you come across a site you wish to receive updates from, you just click the button – easy!
You will also find that your feedreader will enable you to easily add feeds from their pre-selected content.

You can search for sites that offer RSS feeds at Syndic8

So to recap:-
Choose a feedreader
Add some pre-selected content
Set up a feed to the BBC or daily newspaper
Search for feeds at syndic8
Post a comment and let us know how you get on!

Growing business

• Green Business of the Year
• Customer Excellence Award
• Global Outlook and Expansion Award
• Young Entrepreneur of the Year
• The Stelios Award for Disabled Entrepreneurs

Applications are invited from independently-owned companies that have less than 1,000 employees. Entry to more than one category is permitted.

Winners will receive a certificate and television, radio and press coverage. The Stelios Award for Disabled Entrepreneurs offers a cash prize of £50,000.

Visit the site for more information

Benefits of sponsoring:

In 2010, The Growing Business Awards achieved approx £180,000 of media impact value across the national and regional press; as well as through core media partners Real Business and Business Voice magazines.

Benefit: Year-long programme of event sponsorship, brand promotion, editorial coverage.

Exclusivity. We can’t keep every possible rival from attending, but you can put your firm at the forefront of support for the UK business sector by becoming an exclusive sponsor from your market segment.

Benefit: Appearance of leadership in your field, ownership of the awards.

500 of the UK’s most successful businesses and entrepreneurs will be in attendance, including hand-picked VIP guests.

Benefit: An unprecedented networking opportunity with your core market.

The opportunity to present a major award in your sector.

Benefit: The opportunity to position yourself as a key champion of growing businesses.Branding around the stage set and all awards material.

Benefit: A strong brand presence helps you maintain the highest profile in the market.

Table at the prestigious Growing Business Awards.

Benefit: The ability to network at full capacity by covering the room.

Access to the delegate list.

Benefit: Allows you to plan meets at the event and make the best use of the time you will have with your core audience.

As a category sponsor, a senior representative will be seated at the top tables along with CBI director-general Richard Lambert, and other key VIPs.

Benefit: unparalleled networking opportunities at the very top of business.

Glasgow 2014

As with London 2012 Olympics, delivering the Glasgow 2014 Commonwealth Games will require the procurement of goods, works and services of all types and value from an extensive range of companies.
The Commonwealth Games Business Portal brings together contractors and suppliers and provides businesses of all sizes with the opportunity to find out about and compete for Games related contracts.
Interested suppliers can register their company details and receive automatic alerts when new contracting opportunities are available.
For more information please visit: http://www2.glasgow2014.com/BusinessPortal