VSAPAC - SMILE BUSINESS OPPORTUNITY

VSAPAC - SMILE AFFILIATE PROGRAMME

We are inviting you to be part of our international Scorecard Management and Licensing Ecosystem (SMILE) Affiliate Programme. The VSAPAC-SMILE Affiliate Programme provides you with great opportunities with an intriguing business model that is scalable, sustainable and profitable. You are eligible to participate as long as:

With no upfront cost, you are given the following support from us

·         1.5 hour weekly scheduled support (regional grouping): training and advisory support

·         E-collaterals: presentation kit and brochures

·         Official letter / certificate of appointment

·         E-bulletin (Asia Business Corridor bulletin)

·         Fortnight work plan updates and business strategies

·         Documentation support for commercialisation purposes

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Upon confirmation of interest from your clients, you may then proceed to buy the relevant packages to meet your clients’ needs (refer to the SMILE Licensing – Lite and Premium information here). In the meantime, you need not pay for any fees or costs associated as part of the SMILE Affiliate Programme.

If you are keen, please request for an application form from us and we are happy to furnish you with a brief form. You will be notified of the result in 7 days’ time.

Benefits of being a VSAPAC – SMILE Affiliate Programme:

·         Brand name: Trusted name internationally

·         Industry acceptance: Adopted by leading agencies, organisations worlwide
·         Outcome-oriented: Tailored to maximise performance and minimise gaps

·         Impact: Assisted more than 3,000 organisations

·         Synergies: Part of an international network of agencies in more than 10 countries

·         Support: Technical and business support to maximise the use of our Scorecards

To request for application form, please write in to carmen@vsapac.com

 

Financial Benchmarking as Easy as 1-2-3



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In these uncertain economic times, it has become imperative for organizations in public and private sectors to be accountable for their dollars and cents.

Benchmarking is one tool to help keep the ledger in the black.

In the recent economic crisis, these are times when the management of an organization is severely tested over the financial health of the company. Even large scale enterprises are susceptible to bad investor sentiment and tepid market during a downturn and their financial health too can plummet. Also an economic downturn can prove to be a handy excuse for some employees to justify the poor financial performance of a division or even the whole company.

In such a situation, financial benchmarking can come to the rescue of the management by giving a broad pointer on to how the overall industry is performing in the given scenario.

Financial benchmarking involves performing a financial analysis and comparing the results in an effort to assess your overall competitiveness and productivity. In order to measure effectiveness, a business will use benchmarking to review smaller processes or a large division. By starting with the small processes, businesses will discover deficiencies quickly and determine how to correct them; in turn, this will make the entire division more competitive.

In business, benchmarking your performance against that of your competitors can propel you to greatness too. It can help you establish internal goals, pinpoint market opportunities, exploit competitor weaknesses, and create the kind of esprit de corps to unify and motivate your team.

Some of the more useful financial benchmarks involve:

·         gross, operating, and net profit margins

·         sales and profitability trends

·         inventory, accounts receivable, and accounts payable turnover

·         salary and compensation data

·         revenue per employee

·         cost per employee

·         marketing expense as a percent of revenue

·         revenue to fixed assets ratio

In public sectors, grants and/or investments made on private businesses as part of the national agenda can be benchmarked against a set of companies that do not receive government funding – thereby measuring the effectiveness of the scheme based on various financial and non-financial variables.

The concept of benchmarking -- setting up statistical guidelines to identify best management practices -- can be a tremendous benefit to law firms. Financial benchmarking helps law firms measure their business effectiveness by analyzing profitability, cash flow and collections.

Appropriate statistical benchmarks can help you explore operating strengths and deficiencies, and help you understand where you are currently, relative to your goals. Benchmarks provide fact-based information to help firm colleagues establish consensus about future goals. On an individual level, lawyers who understand financial benchmarking can better assess the value they provide to clients, and better reflect that value in their bills.

While financial benchmarking in itself can to an extent offer a plausible understanding of the financial standing of your company in its own vertical, it is limited by lack of perceptive insights on specific trends. However when benchmarking is combined with KPIs, it offers a chance to stress upon specific aspects towards improving the financial standing of the organization.

Using a financial benchmarking scorecard further allows the management to isolate problem areas by checking them up with industry peers in a holistic manner and rationalise the corrective measure that need to be initiated.

Vector Scorecard (Asia-Pacific) developed such a tool called “FICRA: Financial Credit Rating and Assessment” Scorecard in 2006 and has been successfully applied to thousands of companies. Large Japanese and American corporations, financial institutions, trade associations, credit bureaus and government agencies have used FICRA for some of the following objectives:

·         are the earning levels adequate and sustainable?

·         are the subject companies achieving higher productivity / output versus industry?

·         Are the companies taking on higher risk levels and compensated by higher earnings?

·         Are the cashflows adequate to meet obligations, and what are they doing about it?

FICRA takes broad segments of a company's operations and breaks them down into small, complete processes that can be measured for overall effectiveness. While benchmarking takes time and detail to implement, FICRA rapidly utilises the artificial intelligence (AI) architecture as a key driver to address multiple parts of company's strategic management process to ensure industry competitiveness.

FICRA provides quantitative results for business processes. Measuring the financial strengths and weaknesses of a divisional process gives management a clear picture of whether goals have been achieved. Another advantage of FICRA is that it begins with smaller processes; once problems are identified, they may be easier to change than an entire division process.

For more details on FICRA, please contact advisory@vsapac.com .

From the Editor's Desk: The Corridor Awakens!

Welcome to the second edition of the Asia Business Corridor (ABC) Bulletin!

I'm pleased to state for the record that we have successfully (and officially) launched the Asia Business Corridor on 1 December 2010 @ the Grand Hyatt, Singapore. 

A big special word of thanks to the busy bees of Vectorians who were tireless and ever-enthusiastic about overcoming the first hurdle of launching this in the presence of 80+ distinguished guestlist, that included,

1) The Guest of Honor, Mr. Zainul Abidin Rasheed, Senior Minister of State for Foreign Affairs

2) Dato Paduka Dr. Haji Amin Liew Abdullah, Permanent Secretary, Ministry of Industry and Primary Resources, Brunei

3) A large delegate of senior ranking officials from the Tieling Provincial Government, China.

4) and several others from Western and Asian nations!

When we first mooted the idea of a global platform that could connect businesses of all sizes, we envisioned one that would be unique, holistic in purpose and highly-integrated.  It must also be very interactive, vibrant and organic. A life on its own. Alive and abuzz with activities!

Amidst all these considerations, the idea of Asia Business Corridor or ABC in short, was conceived– about 18 months ago. We carried it forward, nurtured and cultivated the idea, refined and tested, till today.  

Thank you for all the support and as we not only witness the launch of ABC today, but also the coming to the year-end, here’s wishing all of you here a very meaningful and successful 2011.

Assessing Business, Setting Directions

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One of the basic rules of consulting or business advisory is to have the ability to listen and organise information in the quickest way possible.

Business clients tend to provide “big picture” strategies in all directions, and we have to ensure that the information rendered is organised and segmented into different categories such as a) business conditions b) strategic priorities c) company structure issues d) business model positioning.

Failure to understand and compartmentalise information would mean failed or incomplete diagnosis – which then gives rise to flawed prescriptions or solutions. If implemented, these would lead the business to head the wrong direction through wrong implementation.

Whether you are an entrepreneur or advising entrepreneurs, it is important that you don’t provide superficial advice. We have observed that most consultants or business advisors have the following weaknesses, no matter how matured or experienced they are:

• Concluding too early
• Imposing self-experience to other businesses in a bid to impress, which may be fundamentally different to the entrepreneur’s settings
• Not focusing on the right critical issues i.e. not what the client wants or needs
• Giving generic, theoretical advice without customising to their setting
• Expect clients “to pay first, then get advice” – without showing value
• Weak technical fundamentals – not being able to link strategies and financial outcome; and spending time about what’s the right thing to do, what needs to be done, but wouldn’t be able to explain how it’s to be done and what’s the targeted financial outcome
• Failure to take notes or synthesise information into a single implementation framework
• Not able to communicate clearly through use of diagrams and flowcharts that brings all the points together: both business information and advice rendered
At Vector Scorecard (Asia-Pacific), we have successfully developed a business diagnostic methodology that comes with a diagnostic toolkit and a comprehensive trainer’s manual on how to do a good preliminary analysis of a business situation. Using decision tree and mind-maps that can be customised in numerous business scenarios and industries, BASNEVA ensures that you have what it takes to handle business situations and act upon them.

BASNEVA methodology adopts a lateral thinking approach with speed in mind – and trains you to be focused, disciplined and unbiased in your assessment of business settings. As a result, you can prescribe higher quality solutions with identified markers for implementation in various phases.

BASNEVA has been successfully applied to more than 3,000 SMEs in ASEAN and has significantly aided policy makers and SME champions to do the right thing - LISTEN.

For more enquiries, please write in to advisory@vsapac.com

Widening Market Share through International Business Opportunities

Rise in demand in worldwide procurements, combined with the immense growth of commercialization all around has been instrumental in development of numerous business websites dealing with international tenders.

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http://o-tenders.blogspot.com/



The basic premise of such tenders are that the company inviting the tenders will give all the information about the work concerned, and their overall requirements. Similarly, the service provider should give their background history and assessment of experiences on the issue. Competitive nature of the tenders makes it imperative that the bidder is able to create a strong impression on the inviting company for winning the tender.

Inviting company should make it a point to specify the points that will count in awarding the tender to any bidder. Usual features of such requirements are stipulated time period, structure of the proposal, and making a good impact on the minds of the clients. In addition, it is also required to have total pricing relating to project completions. Mentioning the prices will enable the bidder company to decide how best they can go for the tasks to be accomplished in case of winning the international tenders.

International tenders come in different types, values, and features. Such tenders could be on any item one can conceive of. These tenders cater to almost all types of requirements of the organizations, government or even private enterprises. Apart from the products, these tenders could relate to multiple types of services that include life insurance, survey services, hotel services, logistics, and many such others.

Because of the vast opportunities in international tenders, we created O-tenders. O-tenders is an integrated platform developed by leading economic development agency, Vector Scorecard (Asia-Pac) to help you secure worldwide tenders based on your companies’ competencies and product offerings. Within this platform, o-tenders enables clients to be kept abreast of the most updated developments on various business activities all over the world - and latest information and tenders for clients.

O-tenders provides you with more than USD1bn of opportunities each month and diversify your business internationally.

Being an O-tenders member allow you to have access to:

• Database for tenders, bids, RFPs and upcoming projects
• Fast and accurate information to bid and win contracts overseas
• More than 1000 live opportunities monthly
• Projects in 13 countries listed in Vector's Asia Business Corridor (ABC) in various segments such as Infrastructure and Construction, Services, Information Technology, Supplies, Consultancy, Energy, Power and Electrical, Healthcare and Medical, Transportation and Education
• Weekly live updates, with 250 new opportunities added weekly
• Have access to an international analyst helpdesk who can help prepare quality submissions for you and monitor via a pipeline valuation tracking sheet

Internationalisation is an important strategic theme to widen market access for businesses

• Diversification of client base can lead to higher profit margins by at least 30%
• O-tenders.com offers a unique, one-stop-shop service for businesses to have a dedicated, end-to-end service to be exposed to millions of pipelines worth each month!—
• We have 2 simple packages for you that can make a difference to your business ie. the Deluxe (basic listings and you pay for what you need only) and the Platinum (shortlisted and customised listings each month and includes preparation/submission/coordination/monthly updates).

Write in to advisory@vsapac.com for more details on what packages we have and more importantly, how we can assist you to grow your business each month.

Ready to Step Onto the World Stage? Think ROI first

When planning to venture overseas, we have to consider many factors - from the usual market research to commercial due diligence as well as regulatory/compliance issues that we need to grasp before considering to operate locally.

What most industry practitioners tend to miss out is assessing what's the required Return on Investment (ROI) of venturing into a single or multiple markets within a period of time - usually 1-3 years.

What do we mean by the "required ROI"?

Imagine a situation where you have gathered a certain level of cash, plan to penetrate 3 foreign markets at different risk levels with 5 core products (that were successfully sold in your home country). For each market, you have different levels of market knowledge, several channel partners with varying levels of competencies - which would probably lead you to different customer base/types.

Pop quiz: what would be the estimated returns that you should expect minimally ie. the hurdle rate - for each market?

Developed by leading scorecard solutions group, Vector Scorecard (Asia-Pacific), X Border is the region's first unique, smart scorecard that is able to answer the above questions - taking into account several economic factors PLUS your company's credit strength as well as the country's operational risk indicators as gathered by World Bank.

The X Border Score will then provide an estimated yield - a percentage that is reflective of the risks that you are taking, the opportunity costs and thus signify what you must aim to get for venturing into that particular country.

Having a X Border Score enables you to quantify the risks, estimate the costs involved and plan your resources wisely - thereafter, set a minimum target that you should set.

All factors constant, the lower the risks, the lower is the expected ROI and vice versa.

Now when you start planning your foreign market entry, you don't just get swamped with market data information only - you assess internally, evaluate externally and estimate specifically what your profits should be based on your circumstances.

That is X Border.

For more information about X Border, please enquire within: advisory@vsapac.com

8 Things You Need to Know abt Business Loans

by: http://www.vsapac.com/

Finding the money needed to start a new business is almost always one of the most difficult obstacles new owners face. The most likely (and easiest) sources of capital are your families, friends and own savings.

However, you should not overlook institutional sources as well. Without a previous track record in business, securing a bank loan may be difficult.

Banks cite risk factors and increasing costs of servicing small accounts as the primary reasons for minimizing their exposure to small businesses. Still, it can be done.

At VSAPAC, we developed a Scorecard called FlexCheck that is able to identify the probability of your business getting a business loan by evaluating your bankability strength and identify any working capital gaps so that you can address them before meeting the bankers.

This system is built upon consultation with more than 6 local and international banks in Singapore – unlocking their best practices and risk appetite since 2009. Using the FlexCheck tool, you are able to determine areas of concerns that the banks would focus on (qualitative and quantitative), for example:

a)     your average bank balances versus the existing and future loan obligations

b)    patterns of repayments

c)     profitability and capital adequacy

d)    business model

e)     and many more...

Here are some general steps that you should take to improve your chances of getting that much-needed bank loan:

1. Choose a business-friendly bank.  To increase your chances of getting a loan, look for a bank that is familiar with your industry and who has done business with companies like yours. Seek out banks that are active in small business financing. Some banks lend on a conventional basis (lending money without government support), while some banks participate in government programs (in the form of government participations involving direct government funds or loan guarantees). However, be aware that banks often demand stiff collateral requirements for start-ups. Most banks do not lend to start-ups unfortunately.

2. Financial condition must be reasonably healthy – show that you can service the intended loan obligations. You need to show your bankers that a loan to you is a low-risk proposition. Have on hand a completed loan application, copies of cash flow and financial statement projections covering at least three years, and your cover letter. 

3. Have a proper plan on what you intended to do with the loan. A confident and thoroughly prepared borrower is four times more likely to have his or her loan approved than a borrower who does not know the answer to some of the basic questions a banker asks. To show the extent of your preparedness, prepare a basic business plan. Your business plan should also include answers to your banker's questions. These questions normally are: 

• How much money do you need? Be as exact as possible; although adding a little extra for contingencies will not hurt. 
• How long do you need it for? Be prepared to go into detail about what the money will do for you and why your business is a good risk. 
• What are you going to do for it? Businesses use loans for three things: to buy new assets, pay off old debts, or pay for operating expenses. 
• When and how you will repay for it? Your cash flow projections should provide a repayment time frame. Convince the banker of the long-term profitability of your business and your ability to repay the loan by using your financial projections and business plan. 
• What will you do if you do not get the loan? 

4. Be sure all your documents are neat, legible and organized in a cohesive and attractive manner. Type all your loan documents. Handwritten documents look unprofessional. Don't forget to include a cover letter. 

5. Do not push the loan officer for a decision. Doing so might result in a rejection as it appears that you are desperate more than anything else. Your banker cannot make a decision until all your documentation is complete. To ensure a speedy decision, make sure that your application is complete. 

6. Be confident. An attitude of confidence enhances your chance of getting the loan. Show that you can make a success out of the money that the bank will lend to you. Visualize in your mind the positive results of your bank application.

7. Keep trying one lender after another until you get your loan. To improve your position as you change bankers and banks, the best way is to ask for a referral from a successful entrepreneur. Before you decide to approach a bank directly, find an associate, friend or acquaintance that is in good standing with the bank to give you a good referral. Bankers tend to deal more favorably those who were referred to them by their best customers. 

8. Track record in borrowing. Bankers prefer to lend money to borrowers who have borrowed at least once and have paid back at least one loan on time. They are not venture capitalists that make high-risk loans regardless of the profit prospects of your business. Bankers prefer to lend to low-risk, low profit ventures than to high risk businesses or those with no record of accomplishment.

 For more details about FlexCheck, please contact advisory@vsapac.com

Managing Employer-Employee Gaps

We estimate that the cost of replacing an average manager in a large organisation is 1.5 times the annual salary of the worker. To minimize turnover costs and maintain a productive workplace, employers need to look beyond the salary and benefits. Work can be a positive experience for your employees when their work expectations are being met. Salary and benefits are the obvious compensations that an employee expects from his or her employer, but there are a host of immaterial things that can provide job satisfaction.

The VSAPAC Group has successfully developed a tool  that can effectively measure the proximity of expectations of employer-employee across more than 1,600 combinations at real-time. This toolkit can assist employers in ways to improve relations, enhance the workplace environment, address perception gaps - customised to each employee settings (internal/external), and yet matched to employer expectations.

c8: TALENT ASSESSMENT AND COMPATIBILITY SYSTEM



Our observation is that most employers expect key things from their staff such as:

A Team Player: An employee who is able to relate and work well with a diverse group of people. Someone who leaves his or er problems at the front door, and shows up to work with a “winning” attitude.

A Go-Getter: An employee who can be focused and determined. Someone who doesn’t have to be micro-managed or asked twice to do something. A person who can generate new ideas, follow these through and actually benefit the company.

Multifaceted: An employee whose skills aren’t limited to those needed just for his or her specific position. Someone with great initiatives and who can perform a variety of duties with ease and enthusiasm, and is willing to learn new skills.

Flexible: An employee who can “go with the flow,” and handle assignments as needed. Someone who won’t say things like “there’s no way I can work those hours,” “I didn’t plan on and don’t want to work on this assignment,” or “I can’t believe I have to share an office with three people.”

A Good Communicator: An employee with poise, tact, and something worthwhile to say; someone with a good command of the English language that can converse with ease; an employee who can also write as compellingly as they speak.

On the other hand, employees do have a basic expectation that would make them part of a happy workforce. We list some of these as follows:

Environment : Many employees expect a pleasant work environment. No one wants to wake up each morning having to face politics at work or deal with a hostile, unsecure environment. There could be varying stress levels and social atmosphere that would not be suited for the employees.  Some employees do expect being assigned projects that require teamwork and personal interaction. That said, different personalities expect different types of work environments. Some people work better under pressure and welcome the opportunity to be challenged. Giving workers the opportunity to express their ideas in a workplace that emphasizes results over personal relationships may give them satisfaction.



Structure vs. Independence Structure is an integral part of the workplace for some employees, including having adequate resources whilst some would be able to handle work just fine with very limited resources. Some employees within the workforce prefer being given specific timelines, procedures, or guidelines that may be beneficial to them when completing a project or problem-solving. Some people, however, expect to work independently. They may want to set their own priorities or use their methods of problem-solving. Granting freedom to take on new responsibilities or to streamline current procedures might be a way to keep your employees happy.

Work vs. Personal Life: Most employees expect a certain balance between work and personal life. They have commitments outside of work and feel that work should not distract them from fulfilling those commitments. In a dynamic, high growth-high target setting, employees may need to sacrifice their commitment to their families and other activities in favour of higher rewards/goals. There is a need to balance between work and personal life, but also that employers do expect high standard of job performance at a particular stage of the organisational life cycle.

Career Growth: Having a career is important to many people in today's business climate. If your employees enjoy their job, invest a lot of time and effort, and succeed at it, they probably expect to get rewarded. The reward doesn't always have to be monetary; sometimes a new job title, increased responsibility, or other incentives will provide the positive reinforcement they desire - but different people have different expectations. Career-minded employees probably want to gain new experiences and increase their set of job skills, making themselves more marketable to other employers. Making sure your employees know there are opportunities for advancement may keep them satisfied and keep them with your company. 


c8 is an employer-employee matching tool that can help identify the things that can make work a positive experience for your employees and identify areas where employees may not be satisfied in their current positions if their work expectations are not met.

As an employer, you understand the high cost of employee turnover. If you want to retain your employees, you can use c8 to learn what their work expectations are and do what you can to increase their job satisfaction, making work a positive experience - at the same time, you can use c8 to educate the employees about your expectations and address any gaps in perception.

For more details about how c8 can successfully analyse and recommend talent selection and retention, please enquire within: advisory@vsapac.com .



The Importance of Business Roadmapping

5i-Pro is a Business Roadmapping Toolkit developed by VSAPAC to ensure that 5 core pillars of an organisation or a business, are identified, strengthened and implemented via a business roadmap.

These 5 core pillars relate to

a)     Internalisation: determination of core competencies and strengthening business models

b)    Innovation: in terms of organisation, product, process and platform

c)     Integration: how connected it is to the business ecosystem online and offline

d)    Investment: the extent of funding diversification across equity, debt, grants.

e)     Internationalisation: readiness to venture abroad and access to foreign markets

But what is a business roadmap used for?

The roadmap makes sure that gaps in the plan are identified and can be closed as needed in the future. It also serves as a guide for the team during the implementation process, allowing them to recognize and act on events that require a change of direction. Roadmaps are also being used to communicate the firm’s plan to various stakeholders.

Our 5i Business Roadmapping toolkit (Professional version) comprises of 4 parts:

1)     Needs Analysis in more than 30 business dimensions

2)     Business Resource Planning and Budgeting

3)     Business Strategic Planning

4)     Business Implementation Roadmap

There are 10 reasons how our 5i Competency Building Toolkit could assist your organisation improve its performance:

1. Roadmapping is just good planning, for all the areas that contribute to a successful business prioritisation strategy. The roadmapping process leads a cross-functional planning team to fully examine potential competitive strategies and ways to implement those strategies.
2. Roadmapping helps the team make sure that they will have the right resources and capabilities at the time they will be needed to carry out their strategy.
3. Roadmaps link business strategy and market data with product and technology decisions. Roadmapping prompts a team to be specific with respect to planned features or performance in terms of value for customers.




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4. Roadmaps reveal gaps in company, product and technology plans. Areas where plans are needed to achieve objectives become immediately apparent, and can be filled before they become problems.
5. Roadmaps prioritize investments based on drivers. We need to focus on customer needs, product drivers or technology investments.
6. Roadmapping helps set more competitive and realistic targets. This would allow the team to set objectives to lead, maintain parity, or lag competitors in specific areas.
7. Roadmaps provide a guide to the team, allowing the team to recognize and act on events that require a change in direction. Part of the process of developing a roadmap is to create a risk roadmap, identifying those events or changes in conditions that signal a need to reevaluate and revisit the plan during the development journey.
8. Sharing roadmaps allows strategic use of information and technology across product lines.
9. Roadmapping communicates business, technology and product plans to team members, management, customers, and suppliers. The roadmap also tells the larger development team, corporate management, and other development teams where the company is headed.
10. Finally, roadmapping helps to build the development team. The roadmapping process builds a common understanding and shared ownership of the plan, incorporating ideas and insights from team members and gear them into action.

For more information about the 5i Business Roadmapping Toolkit, please contact advisory@vsapac.com  or call (65) 6534-8047/49.