All posts by MyOrbit-Team

Business Strategy, Finance, Jobs & Careers, Mobile & Telecom, People, Training

What Motivates You to Perform?

Here’s a great presentation by Dr Patrick Dixon for MTN Mobile & Telecom. Dr Dixon is a business thinker and futurist. His Web TV site has more than 10 million unique users. He is Chairman of Global Change Ltd, author of twelve books (455,000 printed in 22 languages) including Futurewise and Building a Better Business, has spoken to audiences in 50 nations, and has been ranked as one of the 20 most influential business thinkers alive today.




In this video, he speaks about: How to make things happen. Connect with passion. Managing uncertainty with rapid change. Leadership styles. Why people get out of bed in the morning. How to motivate teams at work to do great things. Business management. Secret of leadership and ultimate leadership speech. Business ethics and values in corporations. Secrets of business success and increased productivity. Cutting costs. Increasing output. Adding shareholder value. Sustainable business success. Work life balance and lessons from non profits / volunteering. Why building a better world is such a powerful motivation.

Finance, Jobs & Careers, Market News, People, Start-ups, Training, Venture Capital

Business School for Kids – guess we can learn too

If you thought business plan discussions with teenagers felt strange, think again. Here’s an amazing video by Lindsey Mills in which you can see how primary school students are being trained in business start-ups, and how they start talking about Seed Capital, Venture Capital Rounds, Debt Capital and Income Statements…things which many of us learned sometime during our first or second job! The Start Em Up Business program gives students an introduction to business. Students learn the basic business concepts through playing fun business games, starting a real business, and making money. It feels like training numerous Tiger Woods for business – very interesting. The potential of something like this is immense because in 5-10 years from now, we could see start-ups from kids. You can learn more here: www.simplyoutrageous.org

Artificial Intelligence, Business Development, IT Services, Sales & Marketing, Training

How to improve Software Technology Sales?




This video is about software solution sales and marketing, but equally applicable to other technology sales. There is a great pressure to achieve results fast by trying to qualify a buyer and trying to move ahead. And to make things more difficult, a Booz Allan Hamilton study found that 85% of a company’s brand value is projected through the interaction between the buyer and seller (so all the previous branding can fall flat easily)- that makes it very challenging to differentiate yourself when you have just about 20% of the buyer’s time.

So one of the biggest challenges facing today’s software sales forces is their ability to have “perfect conversations” with executive buyers. Too many conversations are centered around value propositions that are not aligned and not tailored to an executive buyer’s key business issues and personal motivations.

Chris Deren, CEO of SellMasters, was a keynote speaker at the SLAM (Sales, Licensing, Alliances & Marketing for Software Companies) 2006. He defines “the perfect conversation” and its essential ingredients — and how software companies can align and optimize their sales, marketing and product teams for them. In this video, Deren discusses how to:

  • See the world through the eyes of executive buyers – Avoid being delegated to—and filtered out by—procurement. 90% of all IT vendors are considered non-strategic by buyers. So how do you move into the elite 10% club? Become executive centric to understanding their motivations and their cherished initiatives. Its difficult but that’s the differentiator
  • Turn complex product portfolios into simple value-driven stories
  • Create “last mile” marketing content that salespeople crave
  • Achieve and maintain “trusted advisor” status critical to success

About the Presenter: Chris Deren is the CEO of SellMasters, which offers sales performance optimization (SPO) services. He is a high-tech industry veteran with over 25 years of experience in building entrepreneurial teams, leading world-class sales organizations, and identifying and executing against winning go-to-market strategies for companies such as IBM, Xerox and Dun & Bradstreet.

IT Services, Risk Management

SOX Compliance Experience Sharing

Thanks to SOX Television for sharing this video with us. Lane Butler and Adam Kaiser are doing a great job out there and we wish them great success.

In the following video, Ron Edmonds, the Global Accounting Director of The Dow Chemical Company, provides rare insight into how a Fortune 500 company with 30,000 internal controls tests, 19 finance systems and 4,500 self assessments manages its Sarbanes-Oxley and compliance programs. Topics discussed include organizational structure, team roles and responsibilities, communication, procedures, documentation and the use of technology.



And the following video features Sean Ballington, Regional Systems & Process Assurance Leader with PricewaterhouseCoopers discussing how companies can reduce compliance costs by working ahead of the auditor, correctly identifying key controls, and successfully employing these techniques to increase operational efficiency.

Automotive, Business Development, Business Strategy, FAQ, Finance, MyOrbit Blogs, New Media, Online Marketing, Retail, Sales & Marketing

McKinsey: How can businesses use Web 2.0?

McKinsey Quarterly, in one of their recent survey reports tells how businesses are using Web 2.0, or want to use it. As always, their survey is very well presented, and most points are valid. Now, here are our notes from it for you:

Over 75% executives who responded to the survey intend to maintain or increase their investments in Web 2.0 technology trends that encourage user collaboration, such as peer-to-peer networking, social networks, and Web services.

The report also talks about some executives wanting to these technologies for a sustained competitive edge.

Now, in our view, while ‘sustained competitive edge’ is unlikely by any people driven Web 2.0 technology, it is already bringing benefits and profits for those early adopters who are able to understand what to do.

For example, are you able to use your websites to pre-sell your services? Or are you collecting enough information from your online clients and prospects? Or do your teams collaborate enough, and also keep client in the loop?

All these things can earn more revenues while reducing costs = more profitability. And this isn’t not some textbook equation…it’s happening already!

So if you haven’t got a clue where to start in your business, contact us, and we will show you at least 2 ways to rapidly benefit.