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Amber Wright Articles

Written by: Amber Wright

Now is the Time - Click To Read Article
I love the hopeful feeling of having a new calendar and fresh plans laid out in front of me. But of course the New Year doesn’t wait long before euphoria subsides and it begins testing your resolve, persistence and plans. Whether your goals for 2012 were written in indelible ink or simply mumbled to yourself during your commute, the universe somehow seems to know about them and begins delivering the challenges. At some primal level, we know that our plans will only take wing if we get both hands on the steering wheel and are not shy about turning it in a direction we want to go. So, if starting a business is on your list of resolutions, I have some thoughts to share with you.

Martin Luther King Day is For Work - Click To Read Article
I’m writing this as we approach Martin Luther King Day on which many businesses and institutions are closed but my office will be open for business on his day. Like many national holidays, ML King Day is anticipated by many as a day to sleep in a bit, putter around the house, perhaps attending a parade or just hanging out. Obviously, I feel differently about it. To me, Dr. King and his legacy are about opportunity and dreams. My dream was to own a business.

Off the Books and Underground - Click To Read Article
Some years ago while taking a walking tour in downtown Los Angeles, the tour guide waved his hand at a commercial strip on Broadway and said something that stayed in my mind. “More cash changes hands every Saturday on this street than in Beverly Hills” was his observation. Notice he said cash and not higher gross sales. There is an unmeasured segment of the small business community that seems to be growing, especially in urban areas. It is a world where cash is not just King, but the entire royal court! Politicians and regulators need to absorb the lessons coming from the off-the-books economy.

Grateful Thoughts on Business - Click To Read Article
We are nearing the end of a year that has been obviously challenging for most of us, including even the most ambitious small business owners and entrepreneurs. Eleven months ago I was brimming with hope that my business would sprout new wings and land on higher plateaus. The year turned out to be less than sparkling in many ways as some of the dream balloons turned out to be heavier than air! But the holiday season beginning with Thanksgiving is my favorite time to absorb the past year’s lessons and top up the hope reservoir for the year ahead. We should all devote significant time to listing the things we are grateful for, from the most basic to the most fanciful.

Small Business Essentials - Click To Read Article
In response to a recent e-mail question regarding how to succeed in a small business venture, I began to distill what I’ve learned from over one-thousand business owners of all sizes, categories and ethnicities. They are people whose television stories I’ve presided over as executive producer of the Making It! weekly TV show. Though the end goals are consistently familiar, the pathways to a thriving enterprise are many. Here are several important things they’ve taught me and our viewers.

More Jobs-Steve and Small Business - Click To Read Article
Many thousands of words have been written about Steve Jobs as a visionary and titan during the past week. They are well deserved. Today however, I’m looking in on his life as an inspiring story for the small business owners of today and tomorrow.

Helped by “The Help” - Click To Read Article
A motion picture titled “The Help” is proving to be a surprise late summer box office hit and after watching it recently, I wanted to know more about the author of the book on which the film was based. Among the things I found in the book, the film and the author’s personal story was a set of the most important lessons any business owner can ever learn.

Business Ownership - The Ultimate Benefit Program - Click To Read Article
The horrific wrangling, finger pointing and just plain denial that has been going on in Washington DC during recent weeks isn’t really about raising the debt ceiling. Beyond the ever present politics, it’s about spending future generations’ financial heritage on today’s entitlement benefits programs.

Trump This - Small Business Lessons - Click To Read Article
Just when you think that you’ve heard everything about Donald Trump, there’s another chapter being written in the semi fictional book of his life. Last week, I was in New York, the place where he has marked out his most prized territory with tall, expensive buildings. Though his recent dust-up with President Obama is forcing people into “love him” or “can’t tolerate him” positions, I think that small business owners can get some wonderful lessons from a closer look at the Donald’s adventures.

America vs. Canada | Small Business Blog - Click To Read Article
I had never heard of something called The Index of Economic Freedom until recently. The 2010 edition of this index published by the Heritage Foundation and the Wall Street Journal tells me that Canada, our frozen neighbor to the north is now economically freer than the United States.

A Boy's First Business - Click To Read Article
If there is or was a favorite “first business” in America for the past one hundred years, it is probably delivering daily newspapers as a newsboy. Now, that business has shifted from eager youngsters on bicycles to less enthused adults in pickup trucks. I think that’s too bad. Every young person should have the benefit of learning what is involved in the business basics of buying, selling and working with customers. Even people whose work area is a cubicle in corporate America would be better off having these skills at their disposal. In reality, each of us is a chief marketing officer and a self-sales manager.

Messy Brand Management | Charlie Sheen and Muammar Muhammad Gaddafi - Click To Read Article
It’s as old as the very first brand building transactions in the first marketplace on this third rock from the sun. So, as you meditate on what you should be doing in your business right now remember, not only do brands have lives, sometimes they are lives.

Brotherhood of Entrepreneuers - Click To Read Article
There have always been small business enterprises to hold families and communities together. Timeless, enduring and even biblical, our brotherhood will prevail and sustain our forward progress.

What Small Business Owners Really Want - Click To Read Article
We wonder where the time went, what the New Year will hold and how we can take our enterprise to what we euphemistically call the next level. This year there is an extra bit of haze in the picture because the mid-term elections have sent a lot of rookies to various legislatures and embracing small business may not be their #1 priority. I think that the biggest thing small business owners want from all levels of government is simply respect. With over 60% of all jobs created in the country coming from the small business community, won’t politicians and others simply say “nice job” to the men and women who hustle and risk ev

An Unwitting Entrepreneur - My Mom - Click To Read Article
But I do believe that the very same spirit of self reliance, resourcefulness and entrepreneurial thinking is more important than ever. The country is hungry for it. You’ve probably read the biblical references to teaching people to fish rather than simply giving them a fish

Keeping Fear Alive - Click To Read Article
As an example of how pervasive the word fear has become in our daily lives, on the front page of this morning’s (10/11) Los Angeles times, two story headings caught my attention. One said “Cost Fears Cited in Fire Delay” and the other screamed “Fear and mistrust rule in high-stakes Iraqi politics.”

Business, Politics and an Election - Click To Read Article
There is a revolution underway in our country and I hope that we find people who’ve managed in chaos before and gotten good results. I’ll borrow a couple of lines from the biblical book of Ecclesiastes. “To everything there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven; a time to get, and a time to lose, a time to keep, and a time to cast away.”

Relationships and the N-Word - Click To Read Article
I’m feeling a bit sorry for Dr. Laura Schlessinger right now as I gaze at the wreckage left behind after an indulgent and misguided five minutes of spraying the N-Word across the airwaves.

A Capitol Trip - Click To Read Article
I do hope you take your entrepreneurial self to Washington and when you do you’ll notice that the literal distance between the congressional offices and the congressional library is only a few hundred yards.

Feeding the Hungry - Click To Read Article
Food for the soul and human spirit is perhaps the hardest meal to find, consume and fully digest. I believe that entrepreneurial thinking is the plate on which that meal is well served. Everyone has dreams and yearnings that can be turned into goals to be passionately pursued. When we as a nation learn how to care for and feed that hunger, we become truly unstoppable.

Graduating to What - Click To Read Article
If you are a graduate, especially at the college and university level you may be filled with a mixture of pride and anxiety.

True Confessions: What It's Really Like to Be a Franchisee? - Click To Read Article
But this year you're really serious-whether it's because your boss is getting on your nerves or because you're just feeling the urge to be your own boss.

ARE THEY CONSEQUENCES OR RESULTS? - Click To Read Article
Perhaps it’s just my perspective, but it seems that these days, every newsmagazine and newspaper is featuring articles on subjects that point to an inadvertent but vital lesson for us in life and business.

THE ENTREPRENEURIAL ADVENTURE - Click To Read Article
In a week when the big media stories have been about disasters involving an oil spill off Louisiana, immigrant legislation in Arizona and bomb plots in Times Square, my “story of the week” was quite different. It was written in a San Francisco newspaper on April 29th, 1852.

The Call To Action - Click To Read Article
“No matter how carefully you plan your goals they will never be more than pipe dreams unless you pursue them with gusto.” That is your call to action.

Going GaGa For Business - Click To Read Article
As small business owners we can probably learn some great marketing lessons from her story and those of other pop music performers.

Starting a Non-Profit - Click To Read Article
Starting a non-profit is rarely as simple as donating money to a worthwhile cause. Non-profits are run like businesses, and to start one, you have to prepare and take the necessary steps to create a legitimate enterprise. Here are some tips to get you started

Can We Handle the Truth? - Click To Read Article
Whether we can handle it or not, it is time for a major dose of truth.

Kentucky Fried Wisdom - Click To Read Article
His friends often ask when he plans to retire, and his response is “retire to what?” These older business owners are proving that age and accomplishment does have its privileges, challenges and rewards!

How to Obtain Business Success Over the Long Haul - By Executive Producer, Nelson Davis - Click To Read Article
If prospering over the long haul is your goal there are several business lessons I see here.

Twitter and the Pet Rock - Click To Read Article
very accurate and offbeat comparison of twitter vs the pet rock.

I'm a Customer, Damn It - Click To Read Article
With each passing day, businesses who covet my dollars seem to want me, the supposed customer to do more of their work and to give them money for that privilege!

The Importance of Thinking Big in Business - Click To Read Article
There is reward and satisfaction in big thinking but it is so easy to forget when you hit the inevitable rough spots in building your dream.....The start up phase of a business is such an obsessive undertaking that we can usually only focus on what is in front of us and the next few weeks ahead. But if the business survives, the day comes when we lift our gaze from the near term goals and are forced to think in terms of bigger dreams and how ambitious we might dare to be.....

Freelancing as a Career Option - Neha Kashyup - Click To Read Article
A good freelancer must be a forward-thinking, self-motivated leader who is comfortable taking initiative in unfamiliar environments. Freelancers should be able to make new relationships easily and spot potential clients wherever they go. For those of you who want to take the plunge, here are some tips for starting and growing your business:





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