Ged Carroll

Category: business | 商業 | 상업 | ビジネス

My interest in business or commercial activity first started when a work friend of my Mum visited our family. She brought a book on commerce which is what business studies would have been called decades earlier. I read the book and that piqued my interest.

At the end of your third year in secondary school you are allowed to pick optional classes that you will take exams in. this is supposed to be something that you’re free to chose.

I was interested in business studies (partly because my friend Joe was doing it). But the school decided that they wanted me to do physics and chemistry instead and they did the same for my advanced level exams because I had done well in the normal level ones. School had a lot to answer for, but fortunately I managed to get back on track with college.

Eventually I finally managed to do pass a foundational course at night school whilst working in industry. I used that to then help me go and study for a degree in marketing.

I work in advertising now. And had previously worked in petrochemicals, plastics and optical fibre manfacture. All of which revolve around business. That’s why you find a business section here on my blog.

Business tends to cover a wide range of sectors that catch my eye over time. Business usually covers sectors that I don’t write about that much, but that have an outside impact on wider economics. So real estate would have been on my radar during the 2008 recession.

  • Getting burned

    Interesting article in Bambi Francisco of CBSMarketwatch’s regular email. It seems despite the dot.com bust, investors are still up for getting burned.

    SAN FRANCISCO (CBS.MW) – Sometimes, you do what you can to stay afloat.As many market watchers have already observed, there are companies out there that appear to be promising candidates in a hot business area, but make their money off of something entirely non-related.

    Some investors may have heard of a company called Mace Security International, whose shares traded to a recent high of $6.68 in mid-June after trading below $2 earlier this year. The stock went gangbusters because the company’s been touting its anti-terrorist, surveillance security products.

    One would think Mace housed a number of technologists in cubicles. Yet those techies weren’t techies at all, unless washing cars requires an engineering degree. Apparently, Mace generated 85 percent of its sales this year from being a car wash, which a big signal that investors will be getting burned.

    Mace shares eventually got washed up a bit as its true colors were exposed. Let’s face it, being a car wash isn’t a competitive advantage for a security company. (Now, if they were impersonating a car wash but were really a security company — I’d say that was impressive.)

    But here’s what we can learn from Mace. Sometimes you have to be creative if you want to stay in business. More related information here.

  • Counite

    I received an email today from the development director of a new social and business networking site called Counite based in Altrincham, a town in the Cheshire ‘stockbroker’ belt between Chester and Stockport. They had apparently culled my name from existing sites that I has subscribed to.

    In the mail I was offered “We will provide you with a free 12-month subscription and would just ask for you to visit the site on a regular basis after the launch, invite some of your business or social contacts along and provide us with some monthly feedback on the site performance. We can ensure you that you will be impressed with the features and functionality, and will greatly benefit from this membership.”

    I was a bit perturbed by Counite with regards the free 12-month subscription statement that implies Counite may get expensive afterwards unlike LinkedIn, Orkut or AlwaysOn Ziabatsu.

    Some of their own words about Counite “This exciting new site takes a global approach to networking using a complex contact management application that identifies your connection to other Networkers. We believe it will be the most comprehensive networking site ever launched with the industry’s most advanced communication tools including Voice over IP.” So the project is buzzword compliant for any vulture capitalist with some pennies burning a hole in their pocket.

    The sites launch follows the demise of some of the UK’s first generation of networking sites: BuddyNetwork and Pollen, so we’ll see how they go. More related content here.

  • Free party clampdown

    An old clubbing pal of mine from Birkenhead Si forwarded on this interesting article in the Western Morning News. According to the article police are preparing to use the wide ranging powers of the Anti Social Behaviour Act 2003 to clamp down on unauthorised open-air gatherings – a free party; in conjunction with provisions already made by sections 63 – 67 of the Criminal Justice and Public Order Act 1994. With its definition of music as an emission of a succession of repetitive beats, thus allowing unscheduled opera performances but not young peoples music.

    While I can understand people’s concerns over noise; I am more concerned about the right to associate, freedom of expression (by speech, music or visual media) and the two standards allowed in the law making free party attendees second-class citizens.

    And politicians wonder why so many voters are apathetic?

    May it have something to do with:

    • the persistent erosion of voters rights?
    • a lack of clear differentiation between many of the social policies of both major political parties?
    • legislation that no longer represents the social mores of much of the electorate?
    • a collectively small amount of life experience amongst professional politicians, the significant majority of which are trained lawyers?
    • a cynical political process that means that politicians go after softer targets rather than dealing with the big policing issues in the UK, such as organised crime, rise in violent crime, white collar and corporate crime?

    Si also generously included a link to lots of information on where there might be a local free party here, just remember its free as in speech; the parties do cost money to put on. More culture related posts here.

  • Unskilled and Unaware of It?

    I came across research on unskilled hubris, whilst reading the latest article by Bob Cringely.

    Bob Cringely’s column for PBS.org, the online version of America’s undervalued public broadcasting service usually provides an unusually clear window into tech industry issues that affect us all.

    Microsoft vs. Burst Networks

    This week Cringely is talking about a court case between Microsoft and Burst Networks about alleged sharp practice and intellectual property theft by Microsoft (glass houses and stones seem to spring to mind).

    Unskilled and unaware

    What was of more interest however was a link to an American Psychological Association publication: Journal of Personality and Social Psychology – Unskilled and Unaware of It: How Difficulties in Recognizing One’s Own Incompetence Lead to Inflated Self-Assessments by Justin Kruger and David Dunning Department of Psychology at Cornell University

    People that would fulfil this category are not new. Peter Ustinov was quoted as saying that he got in his career because he wasn’t good enough to be held back. In his case, this was self depreciation, but the  humour of it taps into an essential truth. 

    Office based sit coms are usually based on this premise. The talent but put upon underlings with an unskilled boss who thinks that they are they are under. This can be seen from the Mary Tyler Moore Show and 9 to 5, to The Office. 

    Conversely many capable senior people that I know suffer from feelings of impostor syndrome. More consumer behaviour related content here. 

  • Dance Music Industry

     Many dance music labels have closed down, particularly those owned by the majors like Strictly Rhythm and Credence. Cream runs festivals and restaurants rather than clubs and looks to Latin America and Eastern Europe for growth, Home is looking to be let out as retail space and the giant screen on the side of the building sits there in darkness

    – Young people are listening to rock now, yes they are but they also have varied taste – which is why dance music festivals are doing well

    – People want live music, the amount of live music venues in the UK dropped way below what it should have done and it is good to see it come back

    – People want R&B, R&B has always been popular

    – The dance music scene has stagnated, much of it has and UK record labels have been guilty of churning out more rubbish than most. The mash-up is a classic sign of creative bankruptcy in the industry and Hoxton’s tastes do not play well thoughout the rest of the UK. I cannot remember the last record I bought from a UK label, I suspect it was probably this time last year. I have however, kept buying imported records from the US and Europe

    – US labels like Nervous, Guidance or even going back to Trax Records and DJ International, survived in a hostile home market by selling abroad, why can’t the UK labels

    -US labels on the west coast are surviving an onslaught on to their scene by police using draconian crack house laws to shut the parties down and send organisers to jail for ten years, they are still making good music and selling records worldwide successfully

    – Young people are drinking and not doing drugs: that’s why cocaine seizures are up, MDMA is plentiful and cheap

    There are labels that are thriving: Defected is licensing American content from the likes of Miguel Migs. While there is much of the input like Junior Jack that is not my cup of tea you have to hand it Simon Dunmore that he is managing to walk the line between quality and commercial success for his label

    AATW – all around the world. A label based in Blackburn, Lancs that realised what Pete Waterman discovered twenty years ago. You can run a record label on single sales. Like Pete Waterman the records are well produced tat that know their target market really well. They are down market and the listeners are disparaged as ‘Northern Pill Monkeys‘ by London based record executives, and their acts are criticised as ‘a plumber with a tired lap dancer’ but they are getting out there and buying the singles.

    I personally don’t believe that you have to provide customers with a ‘crap’ product, that a well crafted one will sell, but you have to know your marketplace. Many of the tastemakers within the industry have lost sight of that and need to move on.

    One person that seems to have it right (all be it on a small scale) is my friend Nick Lawrence’s label Altered Vibes that has gone from strength to strength by not compromising on quality and developing its artists. Something that is hard to do when the majors like EMI are dropping 30 per cent of their rostered artists in one fell swoop and putting less and less each year into development. More media industry related posts here.