So You Want to Start Your Own Business?

By Ronnie Green
Career Coach
Jewish Community Services

Many people dream of being the King of their world by starting their own business. No boss to answer to, no time clock to punch, just doing what they’ve always dreamed about.

But even, if you have an idea that “can’t fail,” slow down a minute. Everyone knows about the sinking of the legendary Titanic 100 years ago. You do not want your exciting new initiative to share the same tragic ending.

There are many issues to consider before starting your own business. Selecting the right time is essential. My nephew started a high level pocketbook business at the beginning of the recession. Unfortunately, it did not succeed.

On the other hand, the timing could be especially good right now, because of President Obama’s initiative to provide financial support to small businesses.* It feels counter-intuitive, but in a bad job market, which this clearly is, niche market opportunities emerge and jobs are often created with the start of new businesses.

But be cautious. You need a reality check to tell the difference between the vision of your dreams and what actually works. In an article by Nina and Tim Zagat, “So You’re Thinking of Opening a Restaurant,”** their opinion was: “Don’t do it!”  They maintain that in order to be successful as a restaurateur, you need to be a real estate wiz, a purchasing expert, a marketing guru, an incredible team leader and even a plumber!  Are you prepared to do what it takes, take on all tasks and structure your life around this enterprise?

It’s fine to have a dream, as long as it is firmly founded in reality. Here is helpful advice:

1. Is there a market need for your product or service? Are there many, many people who could benefit? How is your product or service different from what is already out there?
2. You need to create a business plan that forces you to answer important questions about marketability, sustainability, funding sources, pricing strategy, organizational structure, sourcing technology and measuring milestones. The Small Business Administration and SCORE are two valuable resources.
3. Be prepared to finance the venture yourself. Small business loans are unheard of today. Are you willing to do without a steady paycheck?
4. Speak to people and network with other professionals in the industry. Jewish Community Services hosts monthly Entrepreneur and Business Meetups, which give business professionals opportunities to network, share challenges and help each other.  New social media strategies are encouraged.
5. Get a job in the kind of business you’d like to start, and learn about it from the inside.

The best advice I’ve heard is to learn from the mistakes of other people. Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg approached his peers, Steve Jobs, Warren Buffett and Bill Gates and asked them, “If you could do it over, what would you do differently?”

A successful business starts with a good idea, followed by a successful plan. Do your homework and don’t let your dreams go down with the ship!

*Learn more about President Obama’s initiative to provide financial support to small businesses>>
**Wall Street Journal, April 7, 2011

The next JCS Entrepreneur and Business Meetup will be on Tuesday, January 29, 2013, from 5:30 – 7:30 p.m. at the Jewish Community Center community room, 5700 Park Heights Avenue.

Pre-register and learn more about future Meetups, visit http://www.meetup.com/JCSEBM or call 410-843-7433.

Have you Networked with THE ASSOCIATED Business & Professionals Group?

THE ASSOCIATED Business & Professionals Group kicked off the 2013 Annual Campaign year with another great event at a stellar venue right here in Jewish Baltimore. Home to DLA Piper, the emerald city development perched atop fall’s turning colors presented an incredible site for some powerful networking and delicious cocktails. The event, How Red & Blue Effects Your Green, brought together 80 professionals and five expert panelists around the topic of election and economic effect on business.

The panelists included W. Talbot Daley, Jill Gansler, Tim Hearn, Dr. Scott Rifkin and Paul Tiburzi. The charged conversation was moderated by Art Abramson, Executive Director of THE ASSOCIATED’s Baltimore Jewish Council. The main take away:

Does it matter from the economy stand point who is elected President?
The general consensus was that we’ll most likely be in the same position we are in today economically four years from now. The Presidency matters more for social issues and Supreme Court seating.

This event attracted folks from all business arenas including technology, real estate, financial services, marketing, sales and legal. For many, this was their first ASSOCIATED event.

Check out photos from the event>>
Stay updated on Business & Professionals Group happenings on Linked In>>
Save-the-date for the upcoming MIDC Annual Holiday Networking Event December 19, 2012>>

Twenty Successful Years for Maryland/Israeli Business

 

 

By Barry Bogage
Executive Director
Maryland/Israel Development Center

The July 18 New York Times article, “Israeli Diplomat Is Man in Middle,” recounts the busy life of Israeli Ambassador Michael Oren and notes his role in the “ribbon-cutting ceremony in Maryland to open the North American headquarters of an Israeli military contractor.” This is the headquarters of Elta North America, the American branch of Elta Systems Ltd., the fourth largest radar manufacturer in the world.

Attracting Elta to Maryland was one of the biggest successes of the Maryland/Israel Development Center (MIDC). It will create 100 new jobs in the state, and as the company’s U.S. market share increases, it will help expand Elta’s R&D and manufacturing operations in Israel thus creating jobs in that country as well. In these times of high unemployment, there is no greater mitzvah.

Celebrating its 20th anniversary, the MIDC is a nonprofit “public private partnership” between The ASSOCIATED: Jewish Community Federation of Baltimore, Maryland’s Department of Business and Economic Development and Israel’s Ministry of Industry, Trade and Labor. Its mission is to help create jobs in both communities by promoting bi-lateral trade and investment. Essentially the MIDC is a shadchan, a matchmaker, between Maryland and Israeli companies, helping them find new business opportunities so they can grow and prosper. As MIDC Chairman Abba Poliakoff likes to say, “We facilitate the soft landing of Israeli companies in the U.S. market.”

Known as “The StartUp Nation,” Israel’s high tech entrepreneurs develop some of the world’s leading technologies including much of the inner workings of cell phones and computer chips. They also develop many of the products found in your medicine cabinet and local hospital such as generic drugs, heart stents and the “PillCam,” a miniature camera stuffed inside a capsule. A patient swallows the camera and it then beams out images of their insides for the doctor to diagnose. Amazing!

To help Israeli startups take root and grow, the MIDC also created a venture capital fund to invest in Israel’s exciting entrepreneurs. We spun off a for-profit subsidiary that partnered with Israel’s leading investor in startup companies, The Trendlines Group, to invest in biomedical, agri-tech, and clean-tech companies, all areas in which Israel excels. To date, the fund has raised over $4 million from 42 individuals throughout the state and has invested in 11 exciting Israeli companies. Three quick examples.

GreenSpense has developed an environmentally friendly alternative to aerosol spray cans. Currently, over 12 billion aerosol units are manufactured each year presenting extensive safety and environmental hazards. The market is crying for a new approach.

LapSpace Medical, is a true Maryland/Israel joint venture. While the technology was developed by a Johns Hopkins University scientist in Baltimore, the company is being set up in Trendlines’ Misgav Venture Accelerator in northern Israel (which was named the “best incubator in Israel” in 2010). The technology was developed to address a critical problem during laparoscopic surgery. Often organs block a surgeon’s view of the area to be operated on. The device creates a soft, umbrella-shaped basket to retract organs out of the way.

The company farthest along the development path is Stimatix which has developed an alternative technology for colostomy bags. There has been no major breakthrough in stoma care for ostomy patients in 50 years. Developed by two Israeli surgeons, this invention heralds great relief and comfort for the 1.3 million people who must use these devices daily. The company recently received FDA approval; it was also named “Israel’s outstanding startup company” by the Ministry of Industry, Trade and Labor.

Learn more>>

Techno-Savvy Grandparents Keep in Touch

By Irene Kushner
Support Services Coordinator
Service Coordination, Jewish Community Services

Last year, the nation marked the 65th birthday of the first Baby Boomers.  The rate at which this age group has adapted to technology is understandably lagging behind the generations who have come after them. But the rate at which their children and grandchildren are using technology is climbing very fast.

Today, millions of American families are separated by distances that are too wide to make day-to-day grand-parenting possible.   Just look around.  How many of your friends, colleagues or neighbors live in families with three generations present? How many grandparents live near their children and grandchildren?

The more family trees branch off — as children head out of state to college, Boomers relocate for work, and grandparents move to warmer areas — the harder it is to stay in touch.  Geographical distances strain the real life, face-to-face relationships that we value.   It’s very easy to take important relationships and slide them to the side if they are not in front of you as often as those on your computer or phone.

Many grandparents will tell you they’ll do everything they possibly can to communicate with their grandkids.  Most Boomers understand they must jump on the Facebook/Skype/texting bandwagon, or be left permanently out of the loop.  Grandparents are using their own ingenuity to keep their grandchildren emotionally close, and more and more are embracing the new technology.  They reap enormous emotional benefits through online communication with family and friends.  The Internet uplifts their spirits and creates new life for them, making them feel young again. Video conferencing is the most satisfying experience that enables seniors to see and talk with their loved ones in real time.

Here’s what seniors are saying:

“I’ve got 2 grandkids. If I send them a text, they will respond 10 times quicker than they’ll respond to a voice mail.”

“I can log on to Facebook to see what my grandkids are doing through their posts.  I love seeing pictures of their activities and travels.”

“You can write messages any time to your grandchildren without disturbing them.”

“I get a thrill out of impressing my granddaughter with my technical know-how.”

We grew up with lined paper and the heft of a fine writing instrument.  But now there is an entire generation of kids growing up who have never experienced what life was like before social networking sites.  There are a million arguments for completely ignoring Facebook and other social media:

“Why can’t they just…?”

“What was wrong with…?”

“Hand-written this or that…”

And nobody under the age of 40 cares about any of it.  None of it matters anymore.  We are old dogs who must betray the saying and learn new tricks. We must commit to keeping up with the way that communication happens today, or else it will be happening among all the people we care about, without us.

Do you think it’s the adult children’s responsibility to make sure seniors or grandparents don’t feel they are left behind, to set up the various communication lines and make it happen?  Sure, it takes time and a little patience to do this.  But isn’t it also one way of showing that we value and care for our elders, and that we want our children to enjoy special relationships with their grandparents?

Want more articles like this one? View our Seniors Blog>>

Technology and Teens

By Renée Goldfarb
Jewish Volunteer Connection

Over the last two weeks, it’s hard not to think of technology and its’ advances over the last few decades.  The mourning of Steve Jobs, a technological pioneer, and last week’s release of Apple’s newest iPhone has given me the opportunity to pause and think about how far technology has come in my lifetime.

My first computer class in middle school was learning the “BASIC” text-based language on Apple IIe computers.  My high school’s computer lab, filled with boxy Macintosh computers, sold 3.5-inch floppy disks so we could back-up our school work.  If I wanted to contact a friend, I used the only option that existed at the time: a landline-based phone.  I mailed letters to my out-of-town camp friends to save on long-distance charges.  And, in order to see my photos after youth group events, I had to wait three to four days for the film to be processed.

I come from a different generation than the teens I work with.  Today’s teens don’t know what life was like before cell phones, texting and social networking.  Technology allows teens to communicate with each other 24/7, instantly share pictures from life-changing experiences and now they can even zone in on a friend’s location using their cellphone’s GPS.

Adults working with teens have a choice when it comes to technology and Jewish education:  Ignore it and stick with old-school methods of learning.  Or use technology as an opportunity to connect to our Jewish teens.

The staff of THE ASSOCIATED’s Teen Leadership programs believe that it is our responsibility to meet teens where they are.  Each of our teen leadership programs embraces technology, using safe and secure methods to work with our teen leaders.  Diller Baltimore Teen Fellows, Students Taking Action for Change (STAC) and the Teen Giving Initiative (TGI) each have a private Facebook page so our Jewish teens build community with each other outside of our seminars.  Our Diller Baltimore Teen Fellows use webcams and Skype to connect with their teen counterparts in Ashkelon.  Even our seminars limit frontal learning and focus on experiential learning, utilizing internet-based learning “triggers” such as YouTube videos, Wordle text clouds and SMS (text message) polling.

Last summer, our Diller parents were tied to their computers or smart phones anxiously waiting for their teen’s latest blog postings or tweets from the Israel Summer Seminar.  Our STAC fellows learn about using social networking to raise awareness and advocate for important communal issues.  And for the first time, TGI will use an on-line platform to promote their fundraising efforts and secure donations.

One of the goals of THE ASSOCIATED’s Teen Leadership programs is to provide teens with the necessary tools to be the future leaders of the Jewish community.  It’s now time for the adults working with teens to step out of the past and use technology to help teens connect and embrace a vital Jewish future.