A very interesting article to be read by all : The Great Management Consultancy Scam — and How it Could Be Coming for Your Job.
After getting a degree specializing in romantic poetry, he was astonished to be hired by a prestigious management consultancy, given three weeks training, and then dropped into major corporations to tell them how to run their oil rigs, menswear stores, and factories, for tens of thousands of pounds a pop……..It’s like robbing a bank but legal. We could take somebody straight off the street, teach them a few simple tricks in a couple of hours and easily charge them out to our clients for more than £7000 per week.” It consisted, he says, of “lies, lies and even more lies.”
Rebuttals anyone? 
If you are dreaming about growing the next Microsoft or the next Google you need money. Unless you’ve got great credit or lots of credit cards, you look toward the venture capitalists. Unfortunately, they are not in such a giving mood! Venture capital funding plummets 81% in quarter
The saddest thing about the collapse of a young entrepreneur’s empire isn’t hearing that the receivers have arrived or that the Ferrari has been repossessed – it’s hearing that the poor young thing has been forced to move back in with their parents.
Read the entire article at smartcompany.com
It’s an exciting time to be building a startup.
An interesting commentary on all the hats a startup founder needs to have…15 to be exact 
…the Silicon Valley Insider describes how to combine and reduce them: 15 Roles Every Startup Needs Filled
Plenty of other laid-off workers across the country, burned out by a merciless job market, are building business plans instead of sending out résumés. For these people, recession has become the mother of invention.
NY Times article: Weary of Looking for Work, Some Create Their Own
There is only one reason to start a business. ONE.
I came across this blog entry by Andy Swan. So true, so true. Short, but insightful….read it 
Small companies work to prevent layoffs at MSN Money.
When there are only a few dozen employees — or fewer — layoffs can hit harder. So small businesses are using various methods and incentives to try to avoid them.
As the economy retraces, funding for many of those “standard” projects for consultants evaporate. Sales abilities are tantamount for all consulting team members.
Many consulting firms operate on the premise that if an employee can sell one thing, he can sell anything. For example, if he has been successful selling a product, then he will be successful selling consulting services. But research and experience have shown this is not usually the case.
Read this excellent article in the Charlotte Business Journal: Economy exposes consultants’ weakness in sales.
News headlines are bleak, especially for banks….and that creates a ripple effect for small business.
A crisis in the U.S. bank sector has hit small businesses hard, drying up credit and throwing many long-standing banking relationships into doubt.
Read this interesting article from Reuters: Banking crisis threatens small businesses
