In general:

Facilitation, accessibility and availability are the most
essential definitions that enable people to comfortably expand their
activities through all scales of appropriation. Making the
availability of the activity accessible.

In other words if you can’t ‘get there’ the service- or product
initiation might be available but will not be accessible and therefore
siege to exist in general. In the end ‘the way to go’ has to be
obviously readable, and comfortably accessible for a visitor or
client.

Meaning that a visitor or client has control over their
choices of interaction with a service or product and is able to decide
on what scale they want to interact with the product or service. This
grounds the legitimacy for visitor or client to initiate an
interaction as it levels his agenda with the entrepreneur who inhabits
the product or service .

All entrepreneurs who can’t deliver these will siege to exist or not
emerge at all.

Without the physical facilitation of the build surrounding this
accessibility will not be readable.
T

hese definitions are always defined according to the context but in
case of spatial planning one has to understand these terms in the
context of the public domain and privacy control in our build fabric,
or the physical world we move through every day to get to our where
about!

It seems from the perspective of a designer that initiating a design concept sometimes seems identical as undergoing a personal or business initiative. In both cases the goal is uncertain and not always achievable, but one always demands a high-quality end result.

Considering methods that could provide the initiative or design of a certain level of quality is often seen as a logical step. This step seems to reduce the uncertainty of the person in question, because of the feeling of control over the final quality. The speculation about methods, plans and roadmaps in this case, give some guidance and certainty on unknown roads.

But does it really? Or does this so-called ‘certainty guidant’ in fact work counterproductive? See, my experience is that the speculation about the ‘how to’ or philosophize about the concept of quality in times of uncertainty actually leads to a mental block.

We can endlessly discuss the possible methods, worry about quality or critical remarks on production and design methods or what could be the correct way. As long as it is not put on paper, these talks end in discussions without actually producing or achieving anything at all.

I therefore advocate trusting the intrinsic qualities that you have as a designer, entrepreneur, or initiative taker and to talk less and more to produce more. The first sketches carry the potential for quality and innovation in itself and never serve as a direct response to a particular end. Some sketches seem more relevant or brighter than others.

So stop talking about it and just do it! Go ahead! Draw and write walls full of possibilities and then select which idea you want to achieve quality and innovation with, trust in yourself and put the next step! In this respect, production is far more relevant than the guarantee of quality in an efficient production - or design.

In architecture this is called ‘rapid prototyping’. It is a way to create freely and fast without considering all the matters that work as obstacles in the process. This way things are actually put on paper in which in a later phase one can reflect on it and critically analyze it.

It is a kind of brainstorming, but in a more physical and visual form. Personally, for me, this is really interesting as well as all unused prototypes can be archived or categorized. Just going after what now looks like all unused ideas from a brainstorming session, could be ideas that are very useful later.

In this way, the unused ideas contribute to the development of a fixed value for a company. Experiences and ideas are stored for later to be deployed. This makes your business more efficient and intelligent. It allows it to create a database of knowledge. In this way one can also reverse the process. Namely, one doesn’t achieve practical results because one has a good idea, but one realizes concrete ideas because one strives a good end result and because one is free to create.

My personal conclusion of this? Well, besides archiving a catalog or portfolio of projects already achieved I will also archive ‘to be realized’ projects e.g. ‘potential ideas and concepts’: a donut archive!

This will be presentable and thus suitable for a series of lectures and moments when these ideas can be realized or reach a certain level of urgency. Like a box of donuts of different flavors that you can correctly enjoy at the right time! One with sugar icing, one with cinnamon, one with chocolate etc. Bon appétit!

Lets start archiving our perspectives and use them to predict our future!

Virgin Atlantic, which was founded by British entrepreneur Sir Richard Branson in 1984, survived and came out stronger after the airline crisis of the early 1990s when many established airlines went bankrupt.

In a recent interview with INSEAD, Branson said a lot of opportunities will emerge as a result of the current global economic slowdown but companies need to be nimble to move quickly and decisively to realise these opportunities.

“There are enormous opportunities when there is a crisis. In a situation like this, it’s absolutely essential to conserve cash. I think companies that do have cash owe it to their country and the people in the company to actually invest that cash in order to grow out of the crisis,” Branson says.

With oil prices and stock prices of airlines collapsing, Branson said it could be the time to look at whether it is good for Virgin to start an airline in South Korea, Russia or Brazil. “We should consider expanding if (there is) cash to do so.”

The best companies with the best products and services survive in a crisis. “You will see other companies all around you going bust and you’ll benefit from that,” Branson says.

Government needs to allow companies to go bust, so that new and more efficient companies can emerge, Branson says. The US government, for instance, should allow ailing airlines to go bankrupt so that new and more efficient airlines are set up in their place. In this crisis, we have to accept the consequences.

To encourage entrepreneurship, governments should do their part to stir competition, Branson says. For instance a merger between British Airways and American Airlines would be bad news for the consumer and governments should prevent this from happening, he argues.

It was Branson’s desire to improve airline services that inspired him to launch Virgin Atlantic, providing travellers value for money service that brought fun to flying. “Virgin Atlantic’s acceptance of British and Far Eastern travellers spurred all of us to start breaking the rules in other areas.”

Virgin group Today, some 40 years since Branson and his partners established Virgin Entertainment, their recording business, the Virgin Group has over 250 companies in its stable. Besides airlines and entertainment, Virgin is into hotels, leisure, finance, renewable energy, telecommunications and even space travel. Virgin Galactic will start its space flights next year, using environment-friendly space launch technology.

Apart from promoting entrepreneurship and competition, governments need to regulate when there is not enough regulation, particularly in the banking sector.

He says the banking mortgage community should never be allowed “to bring the world almost to its knees ever again. There obviously has to be a better regulation in that area.”

Beyond making money, Branson says entrepreneurs must also realise that they have the responsibility to promote greater good. “They have the responsibility to look closely on how they can possibly redistribute wealth for the collective good.”

Business people, for instance, should not leave money sitting unproductively in banks. “They should use that wealth creatively to change society and to start new companies. They should expand their businesses in new regions of the world, thereby employing more people and bringing opportunities to areas which are previously being exploited by companies that are monopolistic.”

“I’ve always believed that there is no point in going to business unless you’re going to make an enormous and positive difference,” Branson says.

Source: knowledge.insead.edu

Fashion Entrepeneur about his “Joie de Vivre” as an entrepeneur.

Meet Jason: a versatile entrepreneur. As founder of The Birthday Song Company - Jason offers a alternative for the boring Hallmark cards by making personalized birthday songs on demand. Check his myspace for more or to order one online. Keep an eye out for Jason, as you might soon see him perfoming with his ‘Teddy Drums’. Klatergoud.com met with Jason in Ghent, Belgium for an exclusive interview.

Nobody would have predicted the success of Starbucks, IKEA or Zara. They are creatively designed and intelligently executed ordinary businesses that became - because of their owners’ entrepreneurially intense mindset - extraordinary exemplars of well-expressed imagination in a field of mediocre competitors.

The biggest opportunity lies in creating a company that does something that traditional commodity businesses don’t do nearly as well, for a market that has grown tired of the status quo. An entrepreneur must spot the weakness and improve upon it in such a significant way that a brand is born. This new brand will become preferentially unique because it delivers results better, faster, cheaper and most important nowadays -more ‘socially- and globally minded’ than anyone else.

The story of the Socially- and Globally-Minded Entrepreneurs.

The concept isn’t new. What is new, is that today’s entrepreneurs have adopted a fresh view of the world that empowers them to take on problems traditionally outside the business milieu. Because entrepreneurs possess the imagination, innovation, passion and skill to produce results, they are often more efficient than governments, charities, religious institutions and other not-for-profit organizations that have historically been responsible for proposing solutions.

Muhammad Yunis’ Grameen Bank

A 2006 Nobel Prize winner, Muhammad Yunus, a 67-year-old Ph.D in Economics.
Yunus set up The Grameen Bank, worlds’ first microcredit bank in 1976 with just $27 from his own pocket. More than 30 years later, the bank has 6.6 million borrowers, of which 97% are women. “Just enough capital” was a catchphrase that preceded today’s usage of the term now coined “micro-lending.” This notion inspired a transformational movement that now translated this vision into practical action for millions of workers in more than 100 countries.

Yunus tackled the problem of poverty the way any entrepreneur would, by laying bare the root of the problem and innovating solutions to overcome these core obstacles. Financial, political, religious and familial restrictions prevented these Bangladeshi women from running self-sufficient businesses that would produce the income they and their children needed. These deterrents appeared crippling at first, but they could be alleviated by the injection of small amounts of cash loaned on terms acceptable to them. Remarkably, 96% of these loans are repaid.

Yunus is a perfect exemplar of the New Entrepreneur, an individual who doesn’t look for traditional opportunities that suggest only personal gain, but rather who applies business sense to global problems for collective gain. And good news: his successful business model is nowadays being supported by existing multinationals like DANONE (dairy products) and Evian (mineral water). As they are setting up businesses in developing countries according to the Yunus dogma. “What a wonderful world”…

Alfredo Silva is a freelance marketing & communication consultant. Contact Alfredo: alfredo@klatergoud.com

Yunus on new opportunities:

There’s some truth to that overused maxim: What’s expensive to me may be mere pocket change to you. Yet we all want value for our money. Luxury goods are supposed to be far more than expensive: They should offer the best materials, workmanship and style that money can buy. That’s value, for those who can afford it.

Yet many luxury goods have devolved into branding exercises. Nylon or canvas handbags with big logos have replaced many finely worked luxury leather bags, for instance, though these logo bags still sell for luxury prices – much of the price paying for the marketing to establish the logo. And we’ve all gnashed our teeth after buying an expensive item of clothing that quickly fell apart, went out of style, or simply looked worse in the true light of day.

Spending money is no guarantee. If only it were easier to consistently find and identify artfully-designed, well-made clothes and accessories. I recently experienced this with a well-made but not-trendy suit, about which I wrote in my On Style column this week. That suit cost a lot, but turned out to be priceless.

Do you own clothes, bags, shoes or other accessories that have turned out to be truly priceless? What is it about certain suits, shoes, bags and other products that make them real luxury, as opposed to just very darned expensive? Please weigh in!
– Christina Binkley

Even in the biggest economy of Europe, Germany, luxury brands getting though hits by the current crisis.