Prioritizing Yourself

Personal Success can only be measured against preset and pre-stated targets; I am going to be physically and mentally healthy for as long as possible, I will earn higher qualifications within the next four years and generate more revenue in my chosen field directly after, I will build trusting and loyal relationships with family and friends over my lifetime, but which carries the most importance - Health, Wealth or Relationships.

Asset Valuation

The key issue, at the centre of the crisis of confidence that has driven the world’s financial slowdown, is clearly the present value of assets. Many of these assets are a mix of tangible and intangible component. For example, the value of a thirty year old business is its current and fixed assets plus its inventory less its liabilities, plus the intangible goodwill from customers that has accumulated over many years. Because of the goodwill and many other elusive values, which form significant parts of a balance sheet, an association of accounting and auditing professionals with worldwide recognition, set standards for valuating such assets.

Standard Accounting Practices are a set of rules which were developed and are constantly reviewed to ensure that comparisons can be made and understood. Regulators, such as tax collectors and securities and exchange commissions, are guided by these rules. Noting that the same highly trained and experienced accounting professional that is charged to set and enforce the rules also serve clients, whose objectives are to make profits even if it means breaking the rules, hence, the complexity to hide an asset’s true value.

One Technology Card

Eliminating the stigma associated with Government handouts by applying public relations strategies to gain universal acceptance firstly for the programs themselves and then for the delivery (qualifying, administering and auditing) systems. Computer Programmers along with hardware manufacturers design solutions targeted to build and improve societies. Working in collaboration with various experts, trained in a multitude of disciplines, to eliminate waste and employing efficiency techniques and measures to the delivery of numerous public services.

Recession Business

During this global recession some business sectors will continue to be profitable. Agriculture, Processing and Packaging, Transportation and Maintenance are all reliant on Energy and Security.

Agriculture, both animal (including fish) raring and plant cultivation of any basic food items at any scale or size of farm, can offer the much sort after food security. From massive farms to home gardens, utilizing all available space, state-of-the-art technologies and practices, to grow food, is an opportunity for everyone to benefit. Mixed farming and multi-storey green houses are the latest techniques for all year round profit generation. Green house construction and farming support services, such as agricultural consultancy and education, animal feed supply and plant nutritional supply, are further profit generation opportunities.

Funding Opportunities

Whether expanding an existing business or establishing a new project, financing can be an enormous challenge. The funding requirements forces decisions to be taken on the ownership structure, succession plans, debt funding, management incentives, employee share ownership participation and most importantly, an exit strategy, to guide success.

The ownership structure can be a mix of common (by class) or preference shares, with different powers (voting rights) and rewards (returns options) and requires a skilled financial negotiator to get the best mix. The best arrangement to the ownership structure of any business or project is determined by the entity (individual or group) that intent to provide the most valued capital (the key component that the business or project needs the most). Hence the golden rule, the one with the gold makes the rules. So the ownership structure is decided by the one with the most to lose.

Understanding Financial Institutions

Money is an economic tool created to measure ownership and development activities, giving rise to many opportunities for countries, groups and individuals to measure net worth (the difference between the value of what is owned against what is owed) with the same tool, money. Tracking the exchange of property, goods and services is therefore the function of the financial system compiling many complex entities.

Financial Institution, in a free market system and in most of the developed world, is a legal status given to an organization holding a license from the relevant and recognized regulatory body to operate depository accounts on behalf of a public. Ideally, this license grants the right to the issuer and regulator to examine and step in and take any necessary action to protect depositors’ accounts, most of which are protected to a specified limit by depositor’s insurance backed by taxpayers and the regulator’s statutory deposits from the pertinent financial institution as a percentage of all deposits held.

Support Services

As some previously employed professionals seek to offer their services, they must come to grips and understand and respect their own limitations and the need for strong support services. These support services normally include; the development of a creative and detailed business plan to address all foreseen aspects towards operating a successful practice, the setting up or establishment of a legally registered entity to offer personal protection to all stakeholders, the design of a marketing plan to communicate and promote the business and the periodic reporting on and filing of financial statements.

Creating Work

By now, even small communities, whose local banks were not directly involved in sub-prime lending or whose major industries were not directly affected by the global financial crisis, have been experiencing wide spread job losses as recession takes hold of the world. The unemployment offices and recruitment agencies are very busy advising job seekers to be patient, to update résumés and to sign up for career enhancement training. Use this time productively to take a break, sharpen skills, build networks or generate ideas.

For those who can afford to, having set aside some savings, take a vacation. The rest or change in routine will bring enormous benefits to one’s physical and mental health, restoring relationships with loved ones and generating new life altering ideas and strategies.

Informed Thoughts

Decisions about the future, whether physical infrastructure or social development, are made based on information reaching a decision-maker. The physical requirements are simply numbers, how many houses, apartments, commercial centers, schools and parks, what type and measurement of water treatment and distribution, electricity supply, road and bridge networks, all guiding future plans. The social requirements are much more difficult to identify, how many police officers to protect and serve, teachers to educate, service personnel to maintain the infrastructure, what type and level of skilled professionals to operate health centers and hospitals, courts and prisons, all making change or implementation problematical.

Annual Investment Statements

As the world comes to grips with the financial crisis and most pension plans and mutual funds report their yearend performance, more bad news is expected as the reality of the situation appears in print to hundreds of millions of individual inactive investors. It is the awakening of these investors that will drive the stock and bond markets over the next quarter.

Many persons have money being invested directly out of their pay packet into pension plans, annuities or mutual (stock-based, bond-based, real estate-based and balance) funds, most of these investment instruments are legally required to publish or file quarterly performance reports with the security and exchange commission, but as a general rule, they only print individual statements once a year to be used for personal income tax filings. The 2008 financial crisis has been widely and intensely covered and discussed across every media house and academic forum in the world and many people have already been affected by it, through defaulting or missing mortgage payments, being denied new loans or directly or indirectly through job losses, but when investment statements are received by the more passive investors, a further reaction is expected.