Time

What time is it? If you could save time in a bottle, what’s the first thing you’d want to do?

As a small business owner, you may be thinking – and not totally unreasonably – that given the situation with the economy, it is time to make lemonade. And that if you could save time in a bottle, the first thing you’d want to do is take out the time when the economy was strong and small businesses were thriving, and you were making, hopefully, a truck load of cash.

But the times we live in these days, are posing a tremendous strain on most people’s pockets, no matter what the industry. We don’t even have to turn on the TV or log in to our P.C. to know it anymore. We can sense it in our REM sleep that something is terribly amiss.

What do we do, as small business owners, to, if not turn back time, use the time we have now and the resources we have now to our best advantage, and in such a way that when the tides turn, we will be well situated to capitalize on new opportunities? It’s hard to say. I think this will come down to the individual business owner and what his or her particular needs, strengths and weaknesses are, and his or her vision, mission and goals.

There is no question that it is time to live frugally. Like China,’s Mao Ze Dong advocated, it is time for guerilla warfare, time to live close to the land, and to capture the villages before the cities and really take things in smaller rather than larger chunks. It is time to “stretch our resources,” to saddle up and fight for our very existence not only as business people but as citizens of the world. It is time to reflect to see how we may have contributed to our own personal circumstances on a micro level, and to those of the world on a more macro level. It is time to assess whether we are using best practices, or whether the way we go about our every day – including our personal lives and of course, our business, is the best way to do things.

The one thing that is certain, is that time keeps moving on. It does not wait. It cannot be contained. Not in a bottle, not in anything. The current challenges that we face will either move with time, or remain with us in some capacity. But time will change. Time will surely change. This time that is now, will surely pass.

In the meantime, when life gives you lemons, what do you do? You make lemonade. Whether you are in the auto industry, the film industry, the legal profession, journalism, retail or art – whatever your industry as a small business owner, it is definitely time to cut those lemons and make yourself some lemonade. And may God be with you that there's a bit of sugar to neutralize the sour when you lift that chalice to your lips.

Crisis

The housing crisis shows signs of slowing down, but it is still very much a huge crisis that is spreading around the globe. Even China is experiencing a housing crisis of its own.

What does the economic crisis mean for small businesses exactly? It appears that for many small businesses, it means tough times. For others, it could be a bonanza. Donald Trump is hardly a small business owner, but he seems to think that the crisis is full of opportunity for entrepreneurs. He gives seminars all over the country, including right here in New York (at swanky hotels like the Roosevelt Hotel in Midtown)where super-energized real estate salesmen/investors try to sell small business owners and entrepreneurs on the idea in investing in distressed real estate. But it appears that exploiting these foreclosure deals is a very complicated scheme. No matter what Donald Trump's "professors" say. So investor beware.

At a time when many small business are finding it more difficult to obtain financing from traditional banks, it may strike some as counterintuitive, if not suicidal to get in on some of these schemes. And it could very well be. And obviously, if a small business is not in the business of real estate, but, rather, is a health food store, for example, the likelihood that such a person or entity could be persuaded to invest in distressed real estate is slim.

However, for those adventersome types, this crisis could be chock full of chocolate nuggets and opportunities to turn lemons into lemonade. You may want to sign up for one of Trump's classes - and maybe if you haven't yet formed your small business, this could be it - investing in distressed real estate. (By the way, when Trump purchsed 40 Wall Street, it was a foreclosure. He got it for $1 million. It is now worth over $400 million!)

At about $1,500.00 for a 3 day course, Trump's seminar sounds like a bargain - for what you could reportedly gain.