Top tips on kick starting your New Venture

Starting a business from the comfort of your own home is a dream for many people, and although it can be difficult to navigate at first, it is doable.

According to Great Business, there are 2.9m home-based businesses in the UK, and they contribute £300 billion to the economy.

It’s far easier to start a business from home than ever before, and in this article, we’ve collated our top tips on kick-starting your new venture.

First thing’s first, you’ll need to decide what kind of business you’d like to start and figure out whether there’s a gap in the market for it. If there is, the next step is coming up with an in-depth business plan and working out what your profit will be.

When you take the plunge, unless you’ve got a lot of money behind you it’s worth building your business slowly. Most successful entrepreneurs don’t quit their day job straight away, they continue bringing in money while they’re building. Once you’ve started turning a profit, think about going full time, but to avoid going bankrupt before your business has a chance, it’s definitely worth staying in your day job.

Business site Forbes.com urges people looking to start a business to consider the costs involved. Once you develop your business idea, work out the costs and expenses. As well as notifying HMRC of your new business, you’ll need to do a yearly tax assessment and pay what you owe, so it’s worth saving as you go so you’re not hit with a hefty bill at the end.

Once you’ve looked into the finances, put together your idea and you’re ready to start, you need to prepare your home. If you haven’t already got a room that you can transform into an office, you may need to get planning permission to get an extension – particularly if you’re going to have employees working for you from home.

Your office needs to be kitted out with supplies to ensure its success, this includes computers, desks, stationery and printers. If you print lots of documents, for example, it’s imperative that you have a high-quality printer and an affordable supplier of toner or ink cartridges to ensure things continue to run smoothly.

Once your office is filled with the right supplies, business is growing and your finances are in order, you can consider becoming an employer. It’s worth noting that without a serious extension, it’s unlikely you’ll be able to have multiple employees working in your home. If you do take on employees, you’ll have more responsibilities, and GOV.UK notes that these include running payroll, paying for National Insurance and providing workplace pensions.

It is possible to start a successful business from home, and if you run it correctly, you’re likely to be searching for a bigger office in no time.

Global Connections: How Have Businesses Benefited From Global Databases?

Businesses have benefited from a number of technological advancements over the years, but with something as simple as a database, you can begin to streamline the daily operation of your business without having to spend a vast amount of money on organisation software. In this article, we will be providing you the insight into how a business can benefit from global databases.

Can Aid Business Expansion

Though it can be difficult to set up your business with access to a global patent search database this can help to aid business expansion into international markets. Not only can you keep an eye on a number of different elements in the business, but you can also look at other patents that have been filed by other businesses allowing you to avoid conflicts and get jobs completed as quickly as possible to the best of your ability.

Boosts Value of the Business

When a business has gained access to numerous databases, you can begin to boost the value of your business by making sufficient trades. Though this can take time to build up, boosting the value of your business will allow you to sell for more should you decide to in the future. In addition to this, it allows you to analyse data in a number of ways without having to crawl through a large amount of data that has not been organised as this can slow down the daily operations of the business as a whole.

Better Organisation in Businesses

Databases are also useful to reduce the amount of time managing data as well as helping to streamline the process when it comes to the analysis of data in a number of different ways. They can also be used to keep track of orders and other important company information making it worthwhile for businesses in the long term allowing you to find the data that needs to be processed with ease. Whether this is a database that is held externally or a database that is added to manually in store, this company information can be held easy and referred to when needed. Without the need of a filing cabinet.

Helps To Understand Target Audiences

Though it can take time to fully understand target audiences a database can be used to segment each specific section of an audience. Whether this is a database organised by age, gender or overall location, you can access data quickly and easily without having to search through a large amount of paperwork. Whether you are a small business looking to build up a business or you are looking to reorganising a filing cabinet, you can then begin to understand target audiences as well as target specific groups with the information that is collected.

Regardless of the reasoning behind using databases, you can be sure that your business will gain organisational skills as well as speed up a number of processes for the business. Will you be utilising databases for your business in the near future?

HyperGoGo’s new GoKart kit provides you with the perfect gift for hoverboard user this Christmas

With Christmas right around the corner, parents all over begin their search for the best giftfor their kids. While it’s hard to give recommendations since no two kids’ interests are the same, most do have one shared similarity; your kids most likely own a hoverboard.

That’s where the new HyperGoGo Go Kart kit comes in, offering a unique accessory that attaches onto almost any hoverboard on the market right now to create an electric go kart.

Kart racing is a fun activity that most kids will enjoy without a doubt, but it’s not just for kids, the frame of the kart is built using high quality metal poles that can actually extend both its height of the steering wheel and its length to be able to adjust to both kids and adults. Who says you shouldn’t have fun this Christmas too? This is the perfect go kart for kids and adults currently around.

Safety should always be taken into consideration too, that’s why this gokart features suspension shock absorbers in the seat to reduce discomfort, and built in dual disk brakes in the front wheels for emergency braking. Those are just some of the many key features they’ve put into ensuring this meets all you parents out there’s safety needs, so you can be at ease and relax knowing nothing bad will happen to your little one. They even go as far as including a free helmet and eye goggles in the box. Safety belt included of course and a sturdy metal kart frame with ABS plastic bumpers to reduce impact, this is the full package for go kart racing.

Coming up to the Christmas holidays, HyperGoGo are providing plenty of opportunities for you to save on the hoverkart. Current promotions include a cashback program that can give you up to $40 back just by leaving reviews online of the product after you purchase. More information on the HyperGoGo Cash Kart promo here

https://www.hypergogo.us/pages/cashback

They have also just begun their Christmas Giveaway promotion, to enter all you need to do is share one of their posts to your social media of choice and you could win a free GoKart and Hoverboard. For more information about the giveaway head over to

https://www.hypergogo.us/pages/christmas-giveaway

30 Best Tech Companies in Asia 2019

Technology is nothing but science with human attributes. It can do nothing less than magic. The advanced tech is not only revolutionizing each and every element of our lives, but is making the society a better place to live. The latest technological achievements have triggered unexpected trends with broader impact on very business and human aspect. And in 2019, we expect drastic exponential changes in every possible direction. Advanced tech like AI will transform the entire industries, making way for infinite business opportunities.

More Details..

https://thesiliconreview.com/magazine/cover/30-best-tech-companies-in-asia-2019

7 Business Performance Management Tips for Tech Companies

With thousands of tech companies existing on the market, every company is trying to outdo the next in an increasingly saturated competition. There are really only two ways to guarantee that you’ll do well in any highly competitive industry – superior innovation or elevated productivity.  In other words, your objective as a medium enterprise should be to come up with something that is so radically unique that it instantly occupies its own lane, or just develop more productive processes than your competitors. While we can’t tell you how to be innovative or what exactly you should be inventing, the following seven tips will help your tech business win from the other angle – performance and productivity:

1. Createa Balanced Scorecard (BSC) and Track Key Performance Indicators

A balanced scorecard is a strategic methodology that looks at organisations from more than just a financial perspective. It recognises that all organisations have customers, internal processes and infrastructures. Therefore, these things need to be measured as well. Many tech companies, even medium and large ones, have started using BSCs to bolster their funding efforts, as investors often gravitate towards such reports as proof that a company will continue to grow and be profitable. If you want to learn more about BSC in action, Intrafocus (one of the leading suppliers of the software) has written up a useful guide on what it is and how it can be applied.

2. Define Peak Productivity Based On Current Output Potential

Optimising business performance means achieving peak productivity, but you can’t aim for something that you haven’t yet identified. The best way to assess this attribute is to time and measure the capabilities of your team on anweeklybasis. Once you know what everyone can do individually within the span of a week, you can realistically estimate how much should be done if everyone worked to their full potential throughout a typical month.

3. Find a Sustainable Balance and Pace

The problem with trying to aim for peak productivity on a weeklybasis is that it can become taxing on your team’s energy, creativity, and reliability. Thus, once you have defined peak productivity, it’s time to tone it down a notch to achieve a sustainable pace. As a general rule of thumb, you should only expect your employees to complete about 70 to 90 percent of what they’re actually capable of doing within the course of a week. This is an important concept for tech businesses of all sizes to understand because the development and maintenance of apps, websites, and electronic devices typically requires a concerted ongoing effort, as opposed to short bursts of intense work.

4. Strategically Increase or Lighten the Load on Individual Employees

Instead of basing your allocation of duties on the productivity potential of the average employee within each position, speak to your HR department and ask them for reports onthe skills and shortcomings of your team members. This will help you determine who should be handling the brunt of the work. Keep in mind that the most prolific tech companies invest millions in talent recruitment, always searching for the best developers and innovators. As such, if you already have that kind of talent on your team, it’s wise to take full advantage of their services.

5. Consolidate and Centralise Software Management

Every tech company relies on a suite of software to manage their online affairs. Most likely, you can relate to this because the majority of business owners in any industry use at least 3-5 online tools or platforms during the course of the average workday. The problem is, you’re wasting a lot of time and effort by switching back and forth between account and software interfaces. Fortunately, there are dashboards that can sync all of these tools together into one management interface. Furthermore, taking a consolidated approach makes it easier to export data related to all of your tools in one shot, for a more well-rounded analysis and a more convenient daily routine.

6. Set High Standards and Initial Expectations Within Job Descriptions

When your employees know exactly what is expected of them before they even start their first day of work, you won’t have to check up on their progress as much because everyone will be on the same page. A thorough orientation and on-boarding process is important in the tech sector because employees need to be given clear guidelines about how to steer their creativity and productivity within their designated roles.

7. Practice Employee Monitoring and Refine Hiring Processes

Finally, now that you’ve developed a system for training staff and tracking progress, it’s time to assess the individual performance of each team member. Take your time to set up a good HR department, hire and reward the right people and your business performance will shine as a result. 

In conclusion, by heeding the tips above you can simplify business performance management into a predictable and replicable process that can be applied by any tech business to achieve desirable results.

Are Company Cars Worth the Cost?

Company cars used to be a highly tax-efficient perk for employees. In recent years the taxman has had other ideas, though. Now employees have to pay tax on ‘Benefit in Kind’, based on a combination of the value of the car, its CO2 emissions, and the employee’s income tax rate.

The net result is that company cars now represent a relatively expensive company perk, although in many cases the alternatives aren’t much better.

The employee could use their own vehicle and charge their boss for business mileage. These are amounts prescribed by the Inland Revenue and do not take depreciation into account. The other option is for the company to have a fleet of cars that are for the use of specified people at agreed times.

Running a Fleet of Cars

Running a fleet of cars can be the cheapest option all round. Once the vehicles have been purchased, they are made available to individuals when they need to use them. This way, the employee has a smaller ‘benefit in kind’ and will pay less tax from their pay packet.

From the employer’s point of view, they can generally do a deal with a garage to get routine servicing and repairs done at a reasonable cost because they own several vehicles.

And from an insurance point of view, they can look at fleet insurance as this is usually cheaper than insuring each car on its own. The simplest way to research the best insurance options is to take a look at a site like Quotezone.co.uk that uses multiple insurance companies and is very user-friendly, making it easy to find the quotes you need.

It might be an idea to find out a little more about fleet insurance first though. It can be a very convenient way of insuring all your vehicles, regardless of if they are cars, vans, trucks, buses or HGVs. One renewal date for them all makes much more sense than having to know when the insurance policy needs to be renewed on each vehicle. Most companies will not consider fleet insurance if you have less than five motors on the road, but there are a few that will do it with just two vehicles.

It can be set up however you want it. Specific drivers can be allowed access to certain vehicles for instance, or you can be covered for any driver with permission. All of these differences will become clear when you research the options. Your choice may be governed by the quotes you receive, as they can vary quite a bit.

The Losses Sustained on New Cars

A big problem with a company owning a fleet of vehicles is the instant losses the business suffers when the cars are driven off the forecourt. As soon as they touch the road, they become a used vehicle and their value drops dramatically.

If a company has several vehicles, this can make a difference to their profits for the year as the value of the vehicles has to be written down in their accounts. This is great for tax purposes as it will lower the tax bill, but not so good for resale purposes.

It is exactly why so many businesses now choose to buy cars that are a few months old. That first hit in depreciation has already been lost and although the vehicles will still go down in value, the company will not have to suffer that first big hit.

The Mileage Way

Some employers prefer to pay their employees mileage instead of owning the vehicles themselves. They can pay up to 45pencea mile for the first 10,000 business miles without the need to deduct tax from it, and 25 pencea mile after that. Those are the current maximum amounts that can be paid per mile tax-free and that the employer can still claim tax relief for.

The problem arises when a vehicle breaks down, or the motor they are using is an old wreck. If they are representing your company, do you really want them turning up in a battered old car? Their vehicle should be reliable and respectable, but unfortunately going the mileage way does not give a company any right to insist on this.

Vehicles That Are a Must

There are some businesses where owning a fleet of vehicles is a must. Delivery businesses and emergency services are just two examples that could not operate without them. These vehicles tend not to be available for private use though, which can help to make the running cost of them a little less.

When it comes to company cars and if they are worthwhile, only the owners can make that decision. There are advantages and disadvantages that have to be weighed up, including their cost vs. their convenience.

How Parents Can Get Special Education Services for Students

We all wish the best for our children; therefore, we want them to do well at school. But sometimes, despite all our efforts, children may start falling behind. What can we do if this happens? How can parents help a child who is struggling at school? The very first thing parents should do is to try and determine the reasons. It is very important to understand why your child lags behind at school because it may be necessary to consider special education.

Recent NCES study found that 14% of all public school students, which equals 7 million, now receive special education services under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act. Such a high proportion illustrates that although parents want their children to do well at school, they can’t always resolve the education-related challenges on their own. They need extra support from school or university staff, and they can get it.

What is Special Education?

At times, parents can improve the grades of their children simply by providing some additional explanations or homework assistance. Access to technologies that make the educational process more efficient also may be helpful. But in many cases, only special education services can help students stop lagging behind. The concept of special education has been introduced as a means to address individual needs and differences of specific students. Thanks to it, those who have one or more disabilities that affect their studying can use adapted equipment and materials, participate in learning in accessible settings, and visit the school in accordance with the individually planned arrangement of teaching procedures. Depending on circumstances, children with disabilities may qualify for either IEP (individualized education program) or 504 educational plans. If the school district can’t address student’s needs adequately, it may offer placement in a special school or program as an alternative.

Law suggests that every student’s IEP is unique. It contains information about the level of academic achievement and overall performance, sets specific annual goals, lists special education and related services, and measures progress. With an IEP, your kid may learn apart from typically-developing peers during some part of the day. As for 504 plans, they ensure that children with special needs receive additional support in the context of a regular classroom. For instance, they may have some extra time to work on tests or homework, they can receive aid in the classroom, or they can use special keyboards for notetaking. Both IEPs and 504 plans eventually enable students with disabilities to succeed. So what can you do to help your child receive individualized educational services?

Getting It for Your Child

Not every student who is struggling at school is eligible for special education programs and services under IDEA. This law lists 13 different disability categories under which children may be found eligible. These include autism, deafness, deaf-blindness, developmental delay, emotional disturbance, and intellectual disability among others. As for the rest, the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act will not protect them, and parents should look for viable alternatives on their own. For instance, they may consider hiring a tutor or they can help their child find a professionalteam of essay helpers. Even if your children fall behind at school because of circumstances that are not related to IDEA disabilities, this is not the reason to punish them. Instead, you should equip them with additional resources. Online expert help can be very helpful here. It will not only significantly improve your child’s grades but also provide additional explanations and high-quality examples your child needs so much. Every special education student may need such assistance at times because too challenging assignments should not become obstacles for them. They should find out they still can win no matter how challenging the circumstances are. It is just about finding the right resources.

Parents of children with disabilities listed in IDEA can and should demand special education in public schools. Upon noticing that their kids are struggling, they should contact the school and request an evaluation process. During the evaluation, children pass different tests. Upon parents’ consent, school representatives and qualified professionals observe them and collect various health and education-related information. They also document parents’ ideas about children’s school experiences and needs. And if the child is found eligible under IDEA, responsible school representatives write and implement an IEP upon parents’ written agreement. In addition to individual learning arrangements, the school may suggest valuable related services. For instance, children can receive access to occupational therapy or speech and language services.

There Are Always Options

Even if your child struggles at school, this is not the reason for a panic attack. Instead, equip yourself with knowledge and go help your kid. We hold the responsibility for our children; therefore, we should not wait until school representatives contact us. Upon noticing any struggles, we should reach out and ask for help. Special education can become a really good option because it effectively addresses every child’s individual needs. It makes modern classrooms truly inclusive and protects equal access to high-quality education for everyone disregarding any possible disabilities.