A
Technology Board of Advisors for Your Small Business
by: Ramon Ray 
As your small business grows, you will delegate more and
more. You’ll begin to manage your business by relying on staff and
experts to help grow your business in areas where you need expertise.
(Of course, as a true small-business entrepreneur, you'll never
stay too far away from working one-on-one with clients, or doing
what you love doing.)
You must do the same thing with your business' technology. Even
though you may want or wish to do everything yourself, in order
to grow you'll have to rely on the advice and expertise of others.
Parts of the Board
Most businesses have a board of directors or advisors; my suggestion
for small businesses is to set up a technology advisory
board (TAB) comprising the following experts:
- Mobile computing
- Broadband
- Networking
- E-business
- Desktop computing
- Financial technology
- Marketing technology
These seven categories should provide the technology foundation
of every small business.
You don't necessarily need seven different individuals in your
TAB. If you have one or two consultants whom you've relied on
in the past and who have helped your business use technology,
explain to them that you'd like to be kept abreast of these seven
technology categories – specifically as applicable to your business.
Meetings
Your TAB members can be structured in any way you choose: conducted
with formal rules and bylaws (just like a board of directors)
or with informal meetings and procedures; either way, get a TAB
in place to ensure you're maximizing your use of technology in
your small business.
TAB members don't even have to know they’re TAB members, but
your goal is to seek out those who are very knowledgeable about
these seven categories and to develop a personal relationship
with them. Ask them to advise you of technology solutions
that can help your small business.
Compensation
Understandably, some people will only want to help if there's
a financial benefit for them. However, many others will be glad
to help you with no strings attached. On the flip side, you don't
want to abuse their kindness or time, so you should definitely
come to them when you're ready to spend money on suggestions they've
made. It goes without saying that technology vendors would love
to provide you with information on their product offerings; but
unless you can get them to serve you information that is pertinent
to your business, the information may not be very useful.
For Your Own Information
If you don't already, I’d recommend that you subscribe to PC
World, PC Computing, Inc. Magazine (they have a quarterly
technology issue), Small Business Computing and Communications
and Home Office Computing. These magazines will give your
small business general information on how to use technology.
I also strongly suggest subscribing to e-zines that provide
information related to small-business technology. Subscribe to
all you can find, then unsubscribe to the ones you don't find
useful. I suggest starting with FindYourDream.com
and iBizMagazine.com.
Other great resources are:
- Mobile Computing Magazine
- Quicken.com
- About.com's guides on various issues
- The small-business web sites of IBM, Microsoft and Hewlett-Packard
- The Small Business Technology Library at SmallBizTechnology.com
If you want to keep abreast of technology news, check out Individual.com;
also, you can go to Yahoo!
and create a MyYahoo! of things you want to know about.
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