Interlochen Corners,LLC

Glass Pockets: Foundation Transparency

2010-04-01T08:10:00.000-07:00

Transparency: Is the money being used as it was intended? Who is using the money? How were the decisions made about who was going to get to use the money? Who made the decisions? How much was paid for the service? Who provided the service? Was the amount spent on the service appropriate for what was purchased? Who benefited from the service? How did they benefit?

Answering the question: What are the consequences of managing the money this way, purchasing the services from the sources used, and using the funds and services this way?

Glass Pockets

Volunteers

2010-01-24T16:50:00.000-08:00

Today, in the United States, citizens have many volunteer opportunities available. Events like the earthquake in Haiti focus our attention on the need for volunteers. But the demand for volunteers exists even in periods between such disasters.

For example, the United Way typically helps communities find volunteers for a variety of activities. Here in Northern Michigan, the United Way has a group of volunteers who knit afghans for the elderly in the winter.

The U.S. Government also needs volunteers for the Park System. For instance, Estes Park in Colorado is looking for office help. They'll help pay for uniforms and supply a free camp site for anyone willing to work in the office 32 hours a week. Now think about that for a minute. You could take your RV to Colorado, go up into the mountains and stay at one of the most beautiful National Parks in the country in exchange for volunteering in the office four days a week. That leaves three days to see the country side.

The group of volunteers who knit afghans also receive a few perks. Coffee, fellowship, and a few sweets from time to time. If you don't know how to knit, you get free training.

Here's the point. Volunteers receive rewards for their service and the rewards come in surprising forms. This is true whether you're volunteering for a couple hours a week for a few weeks, or your volunteering for an extended period of time.

Consider volunteering. It might be the best use of your time.

Calling For The Real Santa

2009-12-19T06:45:00.001-08:00

Check out this SlideShare Presentation:

Calling For The Real Santa

View more documents from Abhishek Shah.

Stages of Team Development

2009-11-29T19:00:00.000-08:00

Organizational psychologists, executives, managers, and team leaders use strategies to

train,
guide, and
coach

their teams through stages of team development. They want their teams to be effective in the way they accomplish their work. They also want the members of their teams to value the team approach. In order for the organization to succeed the teams need to succeed. This means they need to achieve a state of cohesion.
In other words, the members of their teams need to value being part of the team. It is especially true if

the benefits of membership are intangible,
a significant amount of work is required, or
a lengthy period of time will pass before the rewards of participation are obvious.

Belonging is an intrinsic reward. But belonging to a team is not an accident. Belonging is participating in relationships.
For this reason, it is benificial to know what to expect when working in online communities. If you have a knowledge of teams and what to expect when joining an online community, you'll find the experience more enjoyable. If you use online communities to promote your business, you'll find the team approach a way to engage and encourage the participation of community members.
There are five stages of team development. Those are:

Forming,
Storming,
Norming,
Performing, and
Adjourning.

How we interact with others changes from stage to stage. These changes are more about how the group functions than about our individual personalities. They are also about the work the team needs to accomplish.
   When a team is managed well, team leaders understand how the wants and needs of each member will change as the teams progresses through the stages. Team leaders, facilitators, managers, or moderators plan their interactions with others on the team and vary their own behaviors as a way of ushering the team through anticipated changes.
   Effective team leaders recognize how each team member approaches teams differently. Team practices include spoken and unspoken rules. The team leaders know how to speak to the unspoken rules and guide team members through the learning that leads to belonging and satisfaction.
   Future postings will be about how team leaders facilitate the growth in their communities and what you can learn from their examples that will be helpful for you to use in your community participation.
   Sign up for our News Feed to learn more about stages of team development and how you can succeed in online communities and business.

Making the Connections: Building Teams

2009-11-22T19:00:00.001-08:00

   Teams, the solution to many business problems, are a mixed blessing for businesses. But they are vital to online business strategies.
   The home based business owner and the work at home mom use a time tested technique, networking to build their business and achieve success. In fact, the networking may be their business.
   You may think of networking as a team activity. Members of a network trade information, offer their skills to one another, and create ways of building relationships benefiting everyone involved. Those benefits can include:

learning,
inspiring,
motivating,
supporting,
planning,
designing,
creating, and
problem-solving.

   These are social activities. They are relationship activities. In a world where your personality is your brand, the way you manage those relationships is a powerful influence on the results you get.
   The art of online relationships is navigating the negotiation of relationship. What do I mean, "navigating the negotiation of relationship?" I mean forming relationships which are mutually beneficial.
   For most people who want to form relationships online, the online environment forces them to think through their interaction with others in new ways. After all, their interaction is more obvious and transparent to others which may be intimidating at first.
   Fortunately, it is possible to learn how to use online tools in ways that form productive, fun, and profitable teams. There are some good examples of those teams and relationships on those teams in online communities. One such online community is Squidoo-Club. The members of that community help each other learn to promote their Squidoo Lenses. If you're a Squidoo Lensmaster, the Squidoo Club can be quite helpful for you as a place to form relationships with others who have similiar interests as you. I highly recommend it.
   Future postings will be about the stages of team development and community life cycles.
   Sign up for our News Letter and learn how you can use your knowledge of team development and community life cycles to succeed in business.

Strategic Plan: Identifying the Needs, Barriers, and Gaps

2009-11-15T19:00:00.001-08:00

   Understanding your customers is essential to your success. Knowing how they think about their needs and what they believe about their capacity to meet those needs tells you a lot about how to present what you have to offer.
   It is also helpful to learn about the challenges, or barriers, that your customers face when they fill those needs and wants. For example, if the challenge is knowing how to use the tools at hand, then training for their staff or tools that are easier for their staff to use are potential solutions.
   But if the challenge is forming partnerships with other organizations or leadership within their own businesses, then the focus of the learning changes from how to use a tool to how to use a different type of resource, people.
   Knowing how to assess the needs of your customers is vital to your ability to help them meet their needs. If you can help them meet their needs, they are more likely to be satisfied with your service.
   When using social media as a solution as a business solution, it is safe to assume a gap exists between what your customer or partner knows about what can be done with the available tools, how to use them to achieve optimum results, and how using them will impact their existing business model.
   These challenges are magnified when your customer is the solo entrepreneur. A work at home mom, or another type of home based business with a small staff often face the same challenges that larger businesses face.
   Future postings will be about how to assess the needs of the business owner and how to match the tools to those needs.
   Sign up for the News Reader and learn what you can do to use social media to form those relationships and as business solutions for your customers.

Opportunities to Serve

2009-09-01T19:00:00.000-07:00

People are driven to serve. Once they find their purpose, they organize their lives around it. Psychologists (and entrepreneurs) understand how frustrating it is when someone knows their purpose and encounters barriers to fufilling it.

Micro-enterprises are designed so the entrepreneur is able to fulfill that purpose.

The Foundation Center maintains an online database of information about

private foundations,
grants, and
community projects supported by those grants.

Ashoka is an example of a community based business and non-profit collaboration. It

Researching Markets, Developing Marketing Plans, Building Business Models

2009-08-15T19:00:00.000-07:00

One resource in short supply to the work at home entrepreneur is market research. In order for any entrepreneur to succeed, she needs to

understand the people who will buy her product or service,
how they will access it, and
what they want it to do.

The entrepreneur also needs to know how to

define the market,
locate the information about the market, and
use the information to meet the needs of the market.

The work at home entrepreneur who already has a shortage of resources such as

time,
money,
information, and
know how

needs direction, short-cuts (if there are any), and support as she learns how to find the information she needs. One way work at home moms gather their research is by talking with other work at home moms. This type of peer support is often used in business, education, and non-profit organizations. It is a form of role modeling which works extraordinarily well.

Case examples help. When people have the opportunity to learn by observing, they are able to benefit from the experience of others. That benefit is magnified by a feedback system. It also helps to have someone who knows the ropes, or how to locate the information, organize it, and present it in a way that's useful.

Future postings will provide examples of how informal social networks leverage resources, describe the merits of one strategy compared with another, and provide suggestions about where to locate more examples and resources for the work at home entrepreneur.

Sign-up for our News Feed and receive updates about our research and forthcoming tutorials for the micro-enterprise using social media.

Work At Home Entrepreneurs: Micro-Enterprise

2009-08-01T19:00:00.000-07:00

   Starting on a shoestring is an understatement for work at home entrepreneurs. A brief search on the internet will reveal stay at home moms who earn pocket money by selling their handicrafts online. One example of a Work at Home Mom (WAHM) who writes about how to succeed in a home based business is Clouda9, a Squidoo Lensmaster who has created over 100 successful Squidoo Lenses is a good example.
   Her Squidoo Lens Yola Websites: Work At Home Moms Sites demonstrates what creative individuals can do at the kitchen table. Cloud9 has learned to create sophisticated pages that earn her an income by targeting the needs of WAHMs. She's a role model for them both as an entrepreur, and a mom.
   When you visit her Squidoo Lens, you'll see how she's building a network of followers by providing them what they need. You'll also see the modest but remarkable achievements she's made in her work as a writer.
   You're invited to ask questions about Squidoo, about micro-enterprises, and social networking in the comments section following this posting. Future postings will define micro-enterprises in greater detail, explain non-profit suppot of micro-enterprises, and describe the benefits of for profit and non-profit partnerships for micro-enterprises.

Sign-up for our News Feed and receive updates about our research and forthcoming tutorials for the micro-enterprise using social media.

Heart of Home Business Success: Social Networking

2009-07-15T19:00:00.000-07:00

   Home based business owners benefit from social networks. Their customers find them because of these social networks. This is the value of word of mouth advertising.
   Successful entrepreneurs know this. They listen to what their customers say and what other business owners say. In fact, they attend trade shows and join associations just so they have the opportunity to do so.
   In the non-profit world, the directors of the agencies follow the good example of entrepreneurs. They participate in networks and associations for their specialties.
   What do these types of businesses have in common besides social networks and word of mouth advertising? They need to leverage their resources. In other words, they need to find ways of sharing resources with other businesses in order to reach their goals profitably, or at least without a loss.

Future postings will be about how small business and non-profits can partner to promote the success of home based businesses including work at home moms and dads.while achieving their own goals. Other postings will be about social networking, social media, non-profit networks and business networks.

Sign-up for our News Feed and receive updates about our research and forthcoming tutorials for the micro-enterprise using social media.

The Business of Caring

2009-07-01T19:00:00.000-07:00

Increasing numbers of families are developing work-at-home strategies to compliment other sources of income. Today, home based businesses are an effective means for families to

make use of existing resources,
develop new skills,
provide a necessary service, and
bring their products to market.

As the demand for the products and services of work-at-home or stay-at-home entrepreneurs increases, a growing number of small businesses have recognized the needs of the home based entrepreneur.

However, it is a challenge for the home based entrepreneur to learn how to use the available resources these small businesses provide, develop their business plan, their marketing plan, and the financing necessary to make their home based businesses profitable. Yet this is exactly what is required of them while they also perform the work necessary to manufacture their product or provide their service.

While business development centers, schools, and social service agencies recognize these trends and their related challenges, the aspiring entrepreneur struggles to gain a foot hold and build a successful business with more hope than money and more ambition than time. Fortunately, entrepreneurs are risk-takers.

Many of the challenges the home based entrepreneur needs to overcome are gaps in

knowledge,
experience,
connections, and
resources.

Future posts will describe the business of caring, or how the methods of for profit business and non-profit organizations can be combined to fill these gaps.

Sign-up for our News Feed and receive updates about our research and forthcoming tutorials for the micro-enterprise using social media.

What is a Social Entrepreneur?

2009-06-15T19:00:00.000-07:00

A social entrepreneur applies business principles and practices to promote the social well-being of a community, a group of people, or a particular social cause. Our work is purposeful and driven by three principles.

First, those who work at home or in a home-based business need information that empowers them to earn an income while operating a small scale business, supplementing a household income, and capitalizes on their own creativity and talents.

Second, social media is a vehicle for micro-enterprise commerce, but requires specialized knowledge, skill, and tools that are vehicles of commerce and not the end product or service for most work at home entrepreneurs or home-based business owners.

Third, the traditional government to business and business to business practices recognize the importance of small scale businesses operated by individuals out of their homes, but focus their resources on larger scale endeavors.

It is our mission to provide the micro-enterprise entrepreneur

information,
resources, and
services

that save the entrepreneur the time and expense associated with researching social media as a way of delivering product or bringing a service to market.

Interlochen Corners, LLC links the work at home or home based business entrepreneur with tools and services the home-based business operator requires in order to use social media while conducting business in cost effective ways.

We research and publish market trends, business opportunities, and social media applications for the small business owner. We also research, review, and publish funding and venture capital opportunities for business and non-profit partnerships which share principles and practices in common with us.

Sign-up for our News Feed and receive updates about our research and forthcoming tutorials for the micro-enterprise using social media.

Interlochen Corners, LLC

2009-06-01T19:00:00.000-07:00

Formed in 2008, Interlochen Corners, LLC is a for profit enterprise dedicated to the business of working at home and those who enjoy visiting the towns and villages in rural America. It recognizes how poverty impacts the lives of those who live and work where others vacation.
Not only do we strive to connect those in need with those who have the necessary resources to meet those needs. But we also support the integration of business and non-profit strategies as a way to empower those who live in rural communities.

Sign-up for our News Feed and receive updates about our research and forthcoming tutorials for the micro-enterprise using social media.