Even today, honesty is still the best policy
Posted On September 20, 2018
In this age of instantaneous and global communication, where a lie or a bad review can travel, as they say, halfway around the world before the truth gets its boots on, how does a business control its own message? Our guest in this episode of “What’s Working with Cam Marston” is Kinnon Phillips, an accredited public relations professional who is experienced with crisis communications and what to do when the weight of the world – and the worldwide web – is crashing down on your business’ reputation. Social media is now our “town square,” Phillips says, and “word of mouth” takes… Read More
Categories: Advertising, Entrepreneurship, Podcast
Forestry and land management are more than a walk in the woods
Posted On September 4, 2018
When you drive up I-65 from Mobile to Montgomery or across I-10 from Mobile to Tallahassee, the acres and acres of pine trees along the roadside make for a rather boring drive. But to someone like Barrett McCall, it is a beautiful sight. McCall, our guest in this week’s episode of “What’s Working with Cam Marston,” is president of Larson & McGowin Forest Managers and Consultants, one of the area’s foremost land management firms. Most of the timberland managed by companies like McCall’s is owned privately by families who hire management firms to handle harvesting schedules, hunting leases and the… Read More
Categories: Entrepreneurship, Podcast
Saddle up for a ride into the wild, wild West of buying and selling a business
Posted On August 18, 2018
Say you’re a business owner who is ready to retire. You don’t have anyone in the family to pass the business along to, and you’re looking to sell. Do you know where to start? Or say you’re in the market to buy an existing business. How would you go about it? Buying and selling businesses isn’t like a normal real estate transaction, where a realtor puts a sign in your yard and lists your home on MLS. In most cases, you wouldn’t want your employees or your competitors finding out the business is up for sale until a deal is… Read More
Categories: Entrepreneurship, Podcast
Sticking to a succession plan and overcoming an ‘epidemic of spinelessness’
Posted On April 18, 2018
The first step to succession planning, as with so many other things, is realizing you have a problem. Succession planning expert Wayne Rivers, our guest in this week’s episode of “What’s Working with Cam Marston,”has seen it all play out many times: An aging business owner tells his son he’s going to turn the company over to him, but then can’t bring himself to let go of the reins and the company suffers in a self-inflicted limbo. With everything else in life edging out of his control – his health, his mobility, his kids’ lives, etc. – the business owner… Read More
Categories: Downloadable Media, Entrepreneurship, Generations, Podcast, Workplace
Fewer Family Businesses to be Passed to Next Generation
Posted On January 31, 2017
I’ve written in this space before about the need for succession planning. The long-term viability of your business may depend on it – particularly for family-owned business that want to maintain family control. But PwC’s annual family business survey found a decreasing number of owners who planned to keep their businesses in the family. Of the survey respondents who foresaw a change in ownership within the next five years – admittedly a small number at 17 percent – only 52 percent were planning to pass their companies down to another family member. That’s the lowest number since 2010, according to… Read More
Categories: Baby Boomers, Entrepreneurship, Generation X, Succession Planning, Work
Are Millennials More Entrepreneurial? One Question. Different Data. Different Answers.
Posted On November 22, 2016
It’s interesting how you can come to different conclusions about an issue simply by which set of statistics you choose to examine. Take, for instance, the issue of millennial entrepreneurship. A Fortune article in February hailed the generation as “millennipreneurs,” noting that millennials had launched about twice as many businesses as Baby Boomers at the same age. Citing the 2016 BNP Paribas Global Entrepreneur Report, Fortune noted that millennial entrepreneurs were also starting earlier, starting their first businesses at age 27, as compared to 35 for Boomer entrepreneurs. But Forbes contributor Natalie Bacon cites research from the Kauffman Foundation, which… Read More
Categories: Entrepreneurship, Generation Y / Millennials, Work
The dreams vs. reality of young entrepreneurism
Posted On February 10, 2015
With the near-extinction of “the company man” in today’s workforce, more and more workers dream of taking control of their own destiny. Generational research from the U.S. Chamber of Commerce Foundation indicates that half to two-thirds of Millennials are interested in entrepreneurship. Yet a recent study conducted by The Wall Street Journal shows only 3.6% of professionals under 30 own stock in a private company, down from 10.6% in 1989 and even 6.1% as recently as 2010. So why doesn’t desire equate to action? Where to begin… Money is certainly a key factor. With Millennials coming into the workforce at… Read More
Categories: Entrepreneurship, Generation Y / Millennials
Millennials making their mark in small business
Posted On December 26, 2014
When Bank of America issued its semi-annual report on small business owners this fall, the focus was on generations, specifically Millennials. That may have surprised many of you right off the bat – Millennials are the youngsters, how do they have sufficient trends as small business owners? Remember, they aren’t all fresh out of college anymore (the oldest are in their early thirties), their parents are often Boomers who are ready to retire and pass down the family businesses, and they are very entrepreneurial as a whole. As with everything they do, Millennials are approaching business ownership differently. When reviewing… Read More
Categories: Entrepreneurship, Generation Y / Millennials, Work
Texting while driving…golf carts
Posted On August 14, 2014
Golf courses have a problem. Young professionals simply aren’t hitting the links with the same regularity as their Xer and Boomer predecessors. The New York Times reports that in 2013, only 22 percent of travelers under 33 played golf when they stayed at a resort, compared with 42 percent of baby boomers. And resorts are working hard to determine the best way to attract them. From the article: Resorts are … making changes that would have been unthinkable even a decade ago, adding speakers to golf carts and Wi-Fi access on the course, building high-tech training centers and miniature golf… Read More
Categories: Entrepreneurship, Generation Y / Millennials, Product Design
Search funds: a fast track to the boss’s seat?
Posted On May 29, 2014
I was listening to NPR the other morning, and this story came on during the Planet Money segment. It tells of two young Harvard Business School grads who turned down job offers to instead solicit search funds, where investors back individuals in their efforts to search for a new business opportunity. Not very different from a private equity group paying a salary to deal finders, but different enough to take notice. These are young folks, Millennials, with very little business experience. Also, they are not just looking for leads on businesses ready for acquisition; they are looking for businesses to… Read More
Categories: Entrepreneurship, Generation Y / Millennials