i'm already impressed by the discussion, because Catherine Austin Fitts has already checked in! wow. cool.

i'm looking forward to the discussion too.

A great initiative for hosting such a topic.

There are many NGOs like the one for which I'm a board member, which are experiencing rapidly decreasing income from philanthropic and charitable trusts (government and private sector), membership sourced fundraising, and are also?

Like any business, small businesses can't exist without staff. The more efficient and fulfilled your staff are, the better your chances of survival. If staff feels like?

Prepare for a very hard landing that lasts for at least 10 years, probably longer.

How hard? Icelandic-hard?

One thing I have found is that NZ companies are great at getting on together just as soon as we step on a plane and try to sell overseas.

Here in NZ it is a different story. I think we feel the market is so small we need to?

Or is it a case that some of the prosperous 1st world nations are simply rediscovering oily rag economics that less prosperous nations haven't been so lucky as to forget??

I?

Stephen: Thanks for your kind remarks

Catherine: Great to see you

Blake: That is indeed very sound advice. Creditors tend to be fairly understanding and reasonable in the current circumstances as long as they are not mucked about. I guess its pretty much a case of putting yourselves?

Our small business has been handed a rent increase – again, like last year. A year ago we probably would have griped and swallowed it. Now we're looking at office space elsewhere, and so are a few of?

Fixed costs (rent and other commitments) have got to be a major problem if income isn't up?

Our small business has been handed a rent increase – again, like last year.

Is Sir Bob your landlord? We gave notice that we are leaving our (really cool) office in town last year & we're converting our large front room into a home office – we lost a couple of?

Granny Herald 17/2/2009 – Don't exploit staff in downturn, recruiter warns

By 'don't alter' he means 'don't weaken'. And certain segments of the (big) biz community sometimes wonder 'why do they hate us?':

John Collinge: Don't alter competition law

nd have been collaborating with erstwhile 'competitors'. The last has been surprisingly successful

My wife, who is the business brains of the family by a mile, reckons that kiwis don't collaborate enough – we're all trying to reinvent sundry wheels.

Collaboration should be the next big thing she reckons.

Amazing?

How does collaboration influence revenue?

How do your clients respond to agency collaborations?

Marc was commenting in the credit crunch for tech companies. He had some great quotes around this time being the tail of the dog but the best quote was something like ...

Tech companies are normally?

Ange: Interesting question "helps maintain the readiness to spot opportunities, innovate and take risks?" The answer is definitely not business stress – but then when our businesses are under these stresses insight and innovation is what is required. Perhaps in theory we should be concentrating on our knitting in?

Al: Did you find a problem with clients? Did anyone not take you seriously because you were working out of your house?

Not really. But I suspect that is a bit of a function of the business we are in. Our clients did not as a rule come to visit?

Al: Did you find a problem with clients? Did anyone not take you seriously because you were working out of your house?

Will they even know? We're Wellington based, but we work across the country – we've got an Auckland phone number & many of our Auckland clients assume we work?

Not really. But I suspect that is a bit of a function of the business we are in. Our clients did not as a rule come to visit our premises and mostly they do not do so even now.

It's not such an issue for our little business — I'm?

• get dressed before lunch time
• leave the house every day, talk to someone

* get dressed before lunch time

I feel better in summer. Cargo shorts seem more defensible than tracksuit pants ...

We don't get that many clients visiting & in any case, our "office" will be a short walk from the CBD.

There are companies overseas that lease furnished and serviced office space on a pay-per-use basis, for the occasional important meeting or if you happen to be travelling in a city?

There are companies overseas that lease furnished and serviced office space on a pay-per-use basis, for the occasional important meeting or if you happen to be travelling in a city other than where you're based. Is there something like that here?

What I've noted a lack of is per-hour meeting?

A good coffee machine is essential.

Yes.

I would encourage small businesses to move their banking to Kiwibank and?

Favourite memory – being chewed out by a minister over a story I'd written and having my too-tired brain refuse to process anything other than "I'm getting a dressing down in my dressing gown".

Your brain was obviously plenty awake enough and attending to important puns. That's wholly commendable.

It was expected that the trend to working from home would accelerate, and fewer people would go into the city every?

Banks Should be Clear on Govt. Guarantees costs

Banks need to be clear about which guarantee they are talking about?

Granny Herald 17/2/2009 – Don't exploit staff in downturn, recruiter warns

Juha had noted (via twitter)

http://bit.ly/cBlG4 Odd survey from BusinessNZ says firms are overstaffed all of a sudden after bitching about tight labour market for years

In my own experience working in NZ (a?

Your experience and strategies being employed is eerily familiar.

What are your magazine titles?

And while we are on the subject – what aspect of the advertising business are you in Andrew?

And while we are on the subject – what aspect of the advertising business are you in Andrew?

Eh? Moi? I'm in the corprate learning business – I think Mark, when he said this:

Given my business, like Andrew's, is advertiser driven

Was briefly mixing up the names "Andrew" and?

There are companies overseas that lease furnished and serviced office space on a pay-per-use basis, for the occasional important meeting or if you happen to be travelling in a city other than where you're based. Is there something like that here?

I recently went and looked at a space run?

I have some clients come here, but only for individual mentoring/career planning type sessions.

Hey Ange, I have a friend who could use services like those. How can I contact you?

I have a title called the Homeowner's Building Guide which is handed out free to people doing building work through councils, home ideas centres and a couple of?

This bit of your post left me wondering if you could expand a little more mark as it is very much what we have?

Basically as we continue to chase the sales in this environment we have been finding it necessary/beneficial to get much more personal and close to our clients

The big guys would appear to be doing the same. I have been getting regular attention from Google since late last year -?

Hey Ange, I have a friend who could use services like those. How can I contact you?

Thanks Michael, I have emailed you contacts. An unexpected byproduct of this forum.

I think that it illustrates a point – everybody is looking for solutions and so perhaps the we can take some lessons from that. This is the approach we have been taking to sales.

1. Make the calls – your clients are interested in hearing from you – and?

and while they're about it (and until we get that universal mobile charger thingy that the telcos are talking about) have a Charger Pole with many charger cords that folk can use to recharge their phones

and laptops too, just while we are wish listing.

Fortunately it's a nice space and we have now rented out our house and moved into the office.

Did that once. It was better than having a flooded ceiling collapse on us.

One thing we are terrible at is telling our customers and friends what we are up to and?

a Charger Pole with many charger cords that folk can use to recharge their phones.

Vodafone on Lambton Quay were good enough to let me use theirs yesterday.

And yes, David, steal that one too :)

For a competing show? You're too kind : )

My business is primarily online marketing and that is mostly for smaller companies. It is always hard getting them to invest in marketing work but now they often have difficulty with debt collection and that flows through to all service providers.

I still do?

It asks whether Britain's banks are doing enough to help small businesses, which are failing at a rate of 120 a day — even though the?

possibly a little hysterical, as Panorama can be these days.

A little hysterical, not the BBC's flagship current affairs show. It's some odd forces that have resulted in Panorama's current dire state.

Chapter 2 of this exercise has been kicked off http://publicaddress.net/system/topic,1685,speaker_surviving_small_ii_changing_process.sm in a thread started by Rod Drury – CLICK HERE

You are of course also welcome to keep talking here also.

Alastair

Lets try again.

Rod Drury's new thread is here

Lots of interesting ideas there....

One of the big differences between this downturn and others is that the news generally travels faster and there appears to be more flexibility and a more of a border-less economy approach.

From talking with other businesses who are in the online sector we?

BNZ (who do not deal with us "vermin" the brokers) are doing some ridiculous lending at?

regards
Alastair

I do have a service that might justify my making an add.?

It is a digital to slide film printer. I can take your emailed Jpegs, Tiffs or what ever and render them to 35mm photographic film at the same resolution as the Lord of the rings films, then have them in the mail within 24 hours.

How bizarre – converting to?

How bizarre – converting to technology that is no longer produced!

I can supply stylish magic lanterns.

Mr Key might want to contemplate US President Franklin Roosevelt's Depression-busting New Deal policies of the 1930s. He set?

Your reference to the great depression in America, started me thinking about criminal enterprise. Today I noticed that a new very large building sight parameter wall in wellington
has become a tag magnet. Its amazing how much paint is going on despite the heavy penalty deterrents.?