NYC Business Solutions

Professionalize Doing What You Love

Below is an interview with Taylor Erkkinen, co-founder of the Brooklyn Kitchen, about how he and Harry turned their passion into a business.

Sara: How did your business get its start?

Taylor: Preparing for our annual New Year’s Day Chili Party in 2005, we (myself and Harry Rosenblum) lamented the lack of a neighborhood kitchenware store. I was tiring of my job as a construction project manager, and Harry

Have you ever faced this small business paradox: too busy to NOT hire a new employee – while simultaneously too busy to actually hire a new employee?

Harnessing Educational Institutions for Your Business Growth

This summer there was a flurry of news (see U.S. News and World Report, USA Today, The NY Times) about the ways training providers misrepresent their services or abilities.

The coverage was sparked by the release of the Harkin report, a federal government report on for-profit colleges. Why am I bothering to mention this on a blog for business executives?

Because in the wake of the Harkin report, the New York State legislature passed The Quality and Excellence in Business and Trade Schools Bill. This new law modernizes the State’s authority to regulate proprietary (i.e., for-profit) schools. And, this is good news for business executives who often use proprietary schools to train their staff in new software, new equipment, and new processes.

Successes, Failures, and Ironies of e-Learning

Have you ever printed an email to save it or printed a document to edit? I did, just minutes ago. Despite writing this column on a smart phone, I couldn’t bring myself to edit it online. And that, in a nutshell, is the quandary of e-learning.

With the freedoms smart phones, iPads, and WiFi have provided us, information is more accessible than ever. In addition, online educational content has improved immensely – from lame recycled ’70s sales videos to premier services offered by educational institutions like Cornell (see eCornell), Harvard (see Harvard Distance Learning) and online content providers (see iTune U by Apple and Coursera, founded by Stanford Professor Daphne Koller).

All this begs the question – when and how is e-learning effective?

9 Tips for writing an EXCELLENT training grant proposal

NYC Business Solutions offers a grant to help businesses train their employees, build staff skills, and boost company productivity.

Training: It’s About Profits

In the past 5 years, I’ve read about 400 training proposals from businesses. They’ve spanned from the spectacularly creative to the truly terrible. What few businesses realize is that training can have a measurable, meaningful impact on the BOTTOM LINE.

Set Your Staff Up for Success

New York City’s businesses – retailers, restaurants, manufacturers, wholesalers, you name it and I’m talking about it – depend on their people to sell, produce, and run their business.

Paradoxically, few businesses do a good job of training their staff to perform at their best.

Restaurateurs: Get Your Staff to Help More

Restaurant owners are notorious for doing everything themselves – because

Posts tagged Strengthen Your Staff