| How to best prepare your business for the New Year | | https://www.businesspartners.co.za/en-za/entrepreneurs-growth-centre/useful-articles/business-wellbeing/how-to-best-prepare-your-business-for-the-new-year | How to best prepare your business for the New Year | While recent statistics regarding South Africa’s economy may be discouraging, many local business owners remain optimistic. This optimism is reflected by the 74% of South African business owners who said they are confident that their business will grow in the next 12 months, despite the challenges they face; as per the latest 2019 Business Partners Limited SME Index. | 2020/01/19 10:00:00 PM | | |
| How to maximise the holiday season rush for your business | | https://www.businesspartners.co.za/en-za/entrepreneurs-growth-centre/useful-articles/business-wellbeing/how-to-maximise-the-holiday-season-rush-for-your-business | How to maximise the holiday season rush for your business | Often the problem with businesses that peak in the end-of-year Christmas and holiday season is that it almost automatically feels successful - the business is running on all cylinders, staff are at full complement and customers are plentiful. | 2018/12/19 10:00:00 PM | | |
| If you won’t take a holiday for yourself, take one for your business | | https://www.businesspartners.co.za/en-za/entrepreneurs-growth-centre/useful-articles/business-wellbeing/if-you-won’t-take-a-holiday-for-yourself-take-one-for-your-business | If you won’t take a holiday for yourself, take one for your business | One of the quickest and surest ways for business owners to do a health check on their business is to plan a holiday for themselves, says Kevan Govender, Umhlanga area manager at Business Partners Limited (BUSINESS/PARTNERS). “It will show you where the weaknesses are in your operations, even if you just do it as a hypothetical exercise without actually taking the holiday,” says Govender. | 2017/12/13 10:00:00 PM | | |
| Quiet or busy, the festive season requires careful planning for all businesses | | https://www.businesspartners.co.za/en-za/entrepreneurs-growth-centre/useful-articles/business-wellbeing/quiet-or-busy-the-festive-season-requires-careful-planning-for-all-businesses | Quiet or busy, the festive season requires careful planning for all businesses | For most businesses, the festive season is either dead quiet or frantically busy. Even for those businesses whose sales remain as steady as an undertaker’s, just the number of public holidays in December is enough to disrupt the normal flow of things. | 2017/12/13 10:00:00 PM | | |
| Mentor brings tools, experience and empathy | | https://www.businesspartners.co.za/en-za/entrepreneurs-growth-centre/useful-articles/business-wellbeing/mentor-brings-tools-experience-and-empathy | Mentor brings tools, experience and empathy | When Roy Lailvaux started mentoring Bajith and Joshna Panday he immediately recognised the enormous stress they were under. | 2017/10/30 10:00:00 PM | | |
| Nine tips for boosting your business with the right mentor | | https://www.businesspartners.co.za/en-za/entrepreneurs-growth-centre/useful-articles/business-wellbeing/nine-tips-for-boosting-your-business-with-the-right-mentor | Nine tips for boosting your business with the right mentor | Growing a business is such a wide-ranging undertaking that no single entrepreneur can possibly be good at all aspects of it. Your weaknesses and blind spots will always manifest in the business you build, and entrepreneurship can become a very fraught and lonely experience if there is no-one to advise, counsel and guide you to overcome them. | 2017/10/30 10:00:00 PM | | |
| Mentor brings tools, experience and empathy | | https://www.businesspartners.co.za/en-za/entrepreneurs growth centre/Useful-articles/Pages/Mentor-brings-tools-experience-and-empathy.aspx | Mentor brings tools, experience and empathy | When Roy Lailvaux started mentoring Bajith and Joshna Panday he immediately recognised the enormous stress they were under. | 2017/10/30 10:00:00 PM | | |
| Batteries recharged? Now is the time to reflect and plan | | https://www.businesspartners.co.za/en-za/entrepreneurs-growth-centre/useful-articles/business-wellbeing/batteries-recharged-now-is-the-time-to-reflect-and-plan | Batteries recharged? Now is the time to reflect and plan | Business owners who have been lucky enough to pinch a week or two off in December are probably about as rested and fresh as they are going to be for the next twelve months or so. There is no better time for them to take a good look at their business and assess its readiness for the year ahead, says Jeremy Lang, regional general manager at Business Partners Limited. | 2017/01/26 10:00:00 PM | | |
| Your employees are the first impression | | https://www.businesspartners.co.za/en-za/entrepreneurs-growth-centre/useful-articles/business-wellbeing/your-employees-are-the-first-impression | Your employees are the first impression | A major aspect of doing good business is that all-important "competitive edge". But don't look too far afield for ways to do this. Your biggest selling point could be the face your business presents to the outside world, and most often, that would be your employees. | 2016/11/30 10:00:00 PM | | |
| The positive power of mentorship | | https://www.businesspartners.co.za/en-za/entrepreneurs-growth-centre/useful-articles/business-wellbeing/the-positive-power-of-mentorship | The positive power of mentorship | In today's challenging economic environment, mentors play a key role in growing businesses, supporting entrepreneurs and enabling SMEs to survive and flourish in tough trading conditions. Business Partners Limited, South Africa's leading risk financier in South Africa, has witnessed businesses on the verge of bankruptcy recover, and be propelled to new levels of success as a result of some guidance from a mentor. | 2016/10/26 10:00:00 PM | | |
| Getting your tourism business off the ground | | https://www.businesspartners.co.za/en-za/entrepreneurs-growth-centre/useful-articles/business-wellbeing/getting-your-tourism-business-off-the-ground | Getting your tourism business off the ground | Even when other industries are taking a knock, the Tourism sector is still able to thrive, since business and leisure travel continues in good and bad. This does not mean that it's an easy option for someone looking to enter the market, as there are many things you have to take into account before you kick start the process. | 2016/08/24 10:00:00 PM | | |
| Stay off the road to burn-out by playing as hard as you work | | https://www.businesspartners.co.za/en-za/entrepreneurs-growth-centre/useful-articles/business-wellbeing/stay-off-the-road-to-burn-out-by-playing-as-hard-as-you-work | Stay off the road to burn-out by playing as hard as you work | Entrepreneurs know how to work hard. Almost by definition they are people who get themselves going, start all sorts of projects, and push through with a venture until it succeeds or crashes. | 2015/12/17 10:00:00 PM | | |
| Good mentors worth their weight in gold | | https://www.businesspartners.co.za/en-za/entrepreneurs-growth-centre/useful-articles/business-wellbeing/good-mentors-worth-their-weight-in-gold | Good mentors worth their weight in gold | here is no shortage of business advice in the world. It comes in the form of consultants, coaches, advisors, professors, management gurus and self-help celebrities. Each has its place, but for Christo Botes, executive director of Business Partners Limited (BUSINESS/PARTNERS), there is a special breed of business adviser who are worth their weight in gold: the business mentor. | 2015/11/23 10:00:00 PM | | |
| The five rules of survival in the tourism industry | | https://www.businesspartners.co.za/en-za/entrepreneurs-growth-centre/useful-articles/business-wellbeing/the-five-rules-of-survival-in-the-tourism-industr | The five rules of survival in the tourism industry | The tourism industry, replete with its constant messages and images of laughter, leisure and fun, does a good job of hiding its dark side. | 2015/09/28 10:00:00 PM | | |
| A patient but unbending will needed for gender equality in entrepreneurship | | https://www.businesspartners.co.za/en-za/entrepreneurs-growth-centre/useful-articles/women-in-business/a-patient-but-unbending-will-needed-for-gender-equality-in-entrepreneurship | A patient but unbending will needed for gender equality in entrepreneurship | South Africa is no exception to the world-wide phenomenon that women, who represent more than half of the population, are still in the minority when it comes to entrepreneurship. For every ten South African males who are entrepreneurs, only eight women are. | 2015/08/27 10:00:00 PM | | |
| Open communication can turn family into a valuable business asset | | https://www.businesspartners.co.za/en-za/entrepreneurs-growth-centre/useful-articles/business-wellbeing/open-communication-can-turn-family-into-a-valuable-business-asset | Open communication can turn family into a valuable business asset | In a sense, almost all owner-managed businesses are family businesses. The fortunes of even those run by a single entrepreneur without the direct involvement of other family members are heavily influenced by what goes on at home. | 2015/04/27 10:00:00 PM | | |
| Goldmine of business insight available to all SA entrepreneurs | | https://www.businesspartners.co.za/en-za/entrepreneurs-growth-centre/useful-articles/business-wellbeing/goldmine-of-business-insight-available-to-all-sa-entrepreneurs | Goldmine of business insight available to all SA entrepreneurs | Through financing small and medium enterprises over more than 34 years, Business Partners Limited (BUSINESS/PARTNERS) has built up an immense store of knowledge and expertise invaluable to any business. It has now found a way of giving South Africa's entrepreneurs quick and free access to that gold mine of information and insight. | 2015/03/18 10:00:00 PM | | |
| Five New Year's resolutions for entrepreneurs | | https://www.businesspartners.co.za/en-za/entrepreneurs-growth-centre/useful-articles/business-wellbeing/five-new-years-resolutions-for-entrepreneurs | Five New Year's resolutions for entrepreneurs | The number of unused gym contracts and abandoned diets by the first week of February is enough to make anybody cynical about new-year's resolutions, but David Morobe, Business Partners regional manager, urges entrepreneurs to think differently about it. | 2015/01/28 10:00:00 PM | | |
| Entrepreneurs may be born, but can be taught how to thrive | | https://www.businesspartners.co.za/en-za/entrepreneurs-growth-centre/useful-articles/business-wellbeing/entrepreneurs-may-be-born-but-can-be-taught-how-to-thrive | Entrepreneurs may be born, but can be taught how to thrive | Like so many entrepreneurship experts all over the world, Business Partners regional general manager Byron Jeacocks is unsure to what extent entrepreneurship can be taught, but he is clear about one absolute certainty – South Africa has to get better at it if we are to develop beyond our pressing economic and social problems. | 2014/12/17 10:00:00 PM | | |
| Taking back your life from the clutches of entrepreneurial burnout | | https://www.businesspartners.co.za/en-za/entrepreneurs-growth-centre/useful-articles/business-wellbeing/taking-back-your-life-from-the-clutches-of-entrepreneurial-burnout | Taking back your life from the clutches of entrepreneurial burnout | It is well known that few people in the world of work carry so much weight as entrepreneurs. Not only are they ultimately responsible for every single aspect of the business, from finances to quality control, but they must put food on the table for several families by making sure that there is enough money in the bank every month to pay salaries | 2014/12/17 10:00:00 PM | | |
| Riding the high-season wave | | https://www.businesspartners.co.za/en-za/entrepreneurs-growth-centre/useful-articles/business-wellbeing/riding-the-high-season-wave | Riding the high-season wave | Tourism insiders know that their industry is not for the faint-hearted. Every year, almost every tourism business faces a gigantic wave of seasonality which is thrilling to surf, but which can just as easily wipe you out. How do you get ready for the big wave? | 2014/10/06 10:00:00 PM | | |
| Growing your business | | https://www.businesspartners.co.za/en-za/entrepreneurs-growth-centre/useful-articles/business-wellbeing/growing-your-business | Growing your business | If your business is established, you already know the ins and outs of your business environment. However, with market trends changing as often as they do, it is important to stay abreast with these changes and keep your options open. | 2014/09/25 10:00:00 PM | | |
| Stay relevant to stay in business | | https://www.businesspartners.co.za/en-za/entrepreneurs-growth-centre/useful-articles/business-wellbeing/stay-relevant-to-stay-in-business | Stay relevant to stay in business | The way you run your business is often based on what you believe made it a success in the first place. Your plan of action is based on the credence that what worked in the past will work in the future. As long as this philosophy works its fine, but to what extent does is actually work? | 2014/09/25 10:00:00 PM | | |
| Avoiding the pitfalls of an uncertain business world | | https://www.businesspartners.co.za/en-za/entrepreneurs-growth-centre/useful-articles/business-wellbeing/avoiding-the-pitfalls-of-an-uncertain-business-world | Avoiding the pitfalls of an uncertain business world | As Youth Month comes and goes every year, the lamentations over South Africa's high youth unemployment reach a crescendo, together with calls on young people to start their own businesses. But somehow not enough is ever said about the serious survival gear needed by anyone venturing into their own business. | 2014/06/26 10:00:00 PM | | |
| Real cost of absenteeism in SA's workplace | | https://www.businesspartners.co.za/en-za/entrepreneurs-growth-centre/useful-articles/business-wellbeing/real-cost-of-absenteeism-in-sas-workplace | Real cost of absenteeism in SA's workplace | Absenteeism, an employee's intentional or habitual absence from the workplace, is a growing issue for many South African businesses due to the knock-on effect it creates for productivity, staff morale and a company's bottom line. | 2013/12/04 10:00:00 PM | | |
