Small Business Resources
The Fort Worth Business Assistance Center, 1150 S. Freeway, offers services through nine providers. Info: 817-871-6025, [email protected].
Startup help
Help with business plan, counseling and training, choosing location, finance, legal structure, registering business name, obtaining tax ID, registering for taxes, obtaining licenses and permits, and understanding employer responsibility.
M/WBE certification
The BAC runs workshops that help firms learn more about certification available to small businesses 51 percent owned by a woman or minority.
Financing
The Alliance Lending Corp. provides assistance through the SBA 504 Fixed Asset Loan Program, Revolving Loan Fund Program, and Micro-Loan Program. The William Mann Jr. Community Development Corporation assists small, minority and women-owned businesses at least two years old with debt/equity financing.
Business advice
Free counseling on topics such as writing a business plan, marketing and certification. – FW Inc. staff
ROCKET FUEL
The One Essential Combination That Will Get You More of What You Want From Your Business
ROCKET FUEL IS THE LATEST IN A SERIES OF MANAGEMENT BOOKS FOR ENTREPRENEURS FROM GINO WICKMAN that develops his view of the entrepreneur's sixpoint operating system: vision, people, data, issues, process, and traction.
This one - following Traction and Get a Grip - goes into the relationship between visionaries and integrators: "what the relationship should look like, how to find each other, how to work together most effectively, how to maximize and constantly improve the relationship."
If you're the company visionary, Rocket Fuel is right for you if you're "stuck, frustrated, overwhelmed, out of control," or if you want to maximize your relationship with a key integrator, say Wickman and co-author Mark Winters.
The book is good for integrators who are already a "great second in command," have the characteristics of a "great No. 2," are a No. 2 who wants to take the organization to the next level, or are a partner to a visionary and the relationship is "strained, frustrated or just not working right," the authors say.
Wickman and Winters go on to define visionaries and integrators and lay out the differences between the two.
Visionaries see clear ideas and vision, and have great imagination and "unusual foresight." Integrators unite factions, keep things on schedule, and create focus, accountability, and alignment, the authors say.
But visionaries have clear challenges, the authors say. They get bored easily, have too many ideas that can create "organizational whiplash," aren't good at "sweating details" and aren't good at managing others.
That's where integrators come in, the authors say. They're good at running the day-to-day, obsessing over organizational clarity, and filtering the visionary's ideas. The integrator's strengths: clarity, communication, resolution, focus and accountability. - FW Inc. staff
