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Have you got what it takes? Business skills training
- You may or may not have any experience of working in let alone running a business.
- Most people will find that there are things that are potential barriers to their success such as finance, however, not acknowledging that you need to get some help with skills development, training and how get get things done is probably the biggest one!
- Just take a look at this list below and ask yourself honestly - do I have zero, poor, fair or good knowledge of these topics?
- Which ones are most important to your business either in the beginning or longer term? Do you need to know it all yourself? Can you buy that expertise in? Can you consult an expert for free?
- It's like conducting a personal inventory of your skill strengths and weaknesses so that you can prioritise, exploit and rectify them.
- The nature of your business will probably necessitate your having some other specialist knowledge but these are common to most businesses.
Business Activity
- Researching your idea or market
- Finding premises
- Preparing a business plan
- Preparing cash flow forecasts
- Bookkeeping
- National insurance, tax and VAT
- Costing and pricing products and services
- Designing or commissioning promotional materials
- Dealing with customers
- Selling and marketing
- Dealing with staff - hiring, leading, managing
- Purchasing and supplier management - stock, services, equipment, premises
- Inventory management and stock control
- Shipping and distribution
- Business communication
- Health and safety
- Insurance and other legal requirements
- Ecommerce
- Raising finance
- Using technology to run your business
What next?
- Once you have completed your inventory, write down an action plan about which gaps you need to bridge and how you might go about it. Then just get on with it.
- You will find that you never stop learning when you run your own business and your needs may change over time!
- You can visit the Business services directory, the training section, bookshop, and other areas of the site to build up your portfolio of helpers.
Where to get business skills training and help - Business Link run or sponsor lots of start-up courses, and you can sign up on their website for updates and information on legislation that may affect you.
- Your Bank may provide free advice, NatWest offers a pretty good and free ecourse.
- Government department websites like the dti are rich sources of information, downloads and briefings.
- A good Accountant will always keep you on the financial straight and narrow
- Out-Law is a great source of legal information.
- You may have friends or family members with specific experience, skills or expertise that can help.
- You can research much of what you need on the internet - to find out how to surf properly go to using computers and the web to find out about the free Intute course.
- You could buy a few key books to help you study in your own time - browse in the New Life Bookshop for ideas. See our selection of titles in great books for budding entrepreneurs.
- You could enrol on a course - online or classroom based, visit our training help course finder pages to consider your options
- The Trade Association Forum may help you to find training relevent to your industry sector.
- Networking groups - the British Chambers of Commerce and other business support groups often offer free or low-cost workshops and seminars - you can sign up to various industry body and special interest newsletters, most of which are free, to stay up up to date.
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