Nur Ahmad Furlong

Category: VeloCITI

  • VeloCITI session #3 – An introduction to Finance

    Instalment 3 of the VeloCITI business incubation program dealt with Finance, an area many entrepreneurs need lots of help with. Knowing that we might all be intimidated with this session looming ahead of us, Tony Mallam of cape Venture Partners assured us he’d ease us into the subject.

    The Finance module is an optional one, though most of the companies involved in VeloCITI saw the need to attend and with good reason. Getting the numbers right in business can be a matter of life or death, for the business that is.

    We started out with an introduction of what the Finance module will cover in the next few months and I was completely overwhelmed by the amount of business concepts I have either never heard of or never been directly exposed to. It’s all well and good to be a master of your own art, but when you’re an entrepreneur and running your own show you need to be a jack of all trades and a master of a few as well.

    So we started out with a few definitions of what Accounting is all about. I found this one interesting, using the word "Art"

    “the art of recording, classifying and summarizing in a considerable manner and in terms of money, business transactions, activities and events, which are part of a financial character and later on interpreting the results of the reports”

    Keeping Financial Records – Some of the benefits

    Keeping financial records is most definitely an art. Having a clear, logical system, one which can be easily analysed later, and from which certain insights can be gained is a skill which must be developed as a necessity. This is a serious weak point for me having always been an employee and not needing to worry about overheads and that type of thing.

    Budgeting & Tax Records

    Keeping good records helps you budget correctly, helps you easily spot areas you can streamline and keeps things in order for when the taxman inevitably comes knocking at least once a year. Keeping clear financial records is most importantly done for SARS(the South African Taxman) without which you could land yourself and your business in some trouble with the Law. This is an activity which has to be done on a monthly basis. You’ll know when you’re spending too much on entertainment and when and how you might have saved on your telephone budget as well.

    Tracking your businesses health

    Knowing when money comes in and when it goes out gives you a clear idea of how you’re doing, whether you’re making profit or operating at a loss at any given time. Having the figures on a timeline can also allow you to track if any activities engaged in have resulted in significant gains or losses.

    This timeline can be inspected will help should you need to review any inconsistencies in your cash flow as well.

    Investors want to see the money

    Should you be looking to bring partners on board or to apply for investment, loans etc, having a clear financial history in black & white helps make a case for your business.

    How I currently do it

    Currently my accounting procedure involves keeping any and every slip, including coffee at Vida which happens quite regularly for meetings. That’s a business expense by the way. My lovely wife then helps me with a beautifully structured excel document she has created which keeps a nice record of our financial activities broken down into personal and business and allows us to create calculations for each type of expense. This has helped in a few instances for me to determine when an invoice was paid or when I topped up my last data bundle for example, so it serves many other functions as well.

    Petty Cash

    One of the simplest systems you can use to manage your daily expenses is the petty cash float. basically you start out with a box, hopefully one which has a lock. based on your budget for these types of expenses you put some cash in and each time anyone needs to use the petty cash they need to give you a slip of paper with their name, signature, purpose of the cash and amount taken. When they return they hand over the slip and any change. Once all the cash is gone the total amounts from all the IOU’s and the slips should equal the original cash amount.

    Accounting Software

    My process for keeping records is not sophisticated at all and leaves much to be desired, though it’s a starting point and with the help of VeloCITI I hope to take a step up into the world of Quickbooks or Pastel accounting packages pretty soon. I’ve also been investigating a few open source accounting packages though with the little knowledge I have right now it’s a tough decision to make.

    If you’re interested in open source accounting Cubit(made in SA) & Compiere seem like pretty powerful packages for more than just accounting. For now excel is my friend, it will make the transition into an accounting package a little easier than written notes I would imagine. Be sure to back up though.

    I’ve got a long way to go in the area of finance and appreciate every little bit of advice I receive along the way. veloCITI 2008 rocks!!!

  • VeloCITI session 2 – the value of Value Propositions

    After investigating our values in VeloCITI session 1, we’ve moved on to crafting our Unique Selling Proposition or Value Proposition so we have a clear and impactful way of conveying the essence of what our businesses are all about.

    It’s sometimes referred to as the elevator pitch, you only have a few seconds to convey to someone what you do in a way which uncovers it’s unique characteristics while still being clear enough for them to perfectly understand what you’re saying.

    David Murray of Cape Venture Partners hosted an excellent half day session with us taking us through the nuts & bolts of value propositions. We also focused on company names and how these impact the way the market perceives the company.

    Describing your company in 10 words:

    If you had just ten words with which to describe why people should buy your company‘s product or service, what would you say?

    10 words are very few, especially when there’s so much we want to say to those who ask us that all important question: “So, what is it that YOU do?”. Many times we are faced with this question, not only from business people, but sometimes from our family members and friends. If we are stuck for simple words to describe what we do,chances are we haven’t Mastered the art of selling our businesses yet.

    So What exactly is a Value Proposition?

    Otherwise known as USP or Unique Selling Point/Proposition,it’s a condensed, yet simple and easy to understand expression of what your business is all about.

    • It has to be Unique, Different and that uniqueness has to be attractive enough to matter.
    • It has to be clear and easy to comprehend with as little jargon if any at all.
    • It has to matter to the customer or potential customer
    • It has to be a solution to an existing problem. In other words there must be real(or perceived) value in what you are offering or no-one will be willing to pay for it.
    • It has to be different in some way to what your competitors are saying in order to make you stand out and be more attractive to the potential customer.

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  • VeloCITI Session #1: Getting our Values in order

    For the 15 start-up businesses chosen to be on the VeloCITI 2008 program, today, March 18, was a truly inspirational and profoundly introspective day.

    See more about What VeloCITI is?

    We started off at 9 waking up to cups of coffee and a round of congratulating each other for making it onto the program. It was great seeing the familiar faces from the bridging course 2 weeks ago and re-connecting. I feel this year will unlock some really special relationships and it seems it already has.

    We were introduced to Judit from PeerPower, our facilitator and mentor for the day who was later joined by Mignon(PeerPower). I think I can speak for all when I say we were rearing to go and eager to find out what the topic of focus for the day would be.

    Introducing ourselves

    First off we completed a quick introductions/interview exercise in which we each interviewed one of our VeloCITI peers and had to introduce them to the team. We then focused on setting some guidelines going forward in terms of rules of engagement and how we as a group think we would need to work together to produce the best results within the team over the next 7 – 8 months.

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  • VeloCITI 2008 – I’m officially on the programme. Yeah!!!

    velociti-hereicomeMy head is spinning completely after attending the bridging course of the VeloCITI program. Out of all the companies applying (20 odd) who were short listed to attend the bridging course, I’ve made the cut with 14 other exciting new companies who will be given the chance to build their businesses from the ground up with professional help.

    If you don’t know what VeloCITI is all about, it’s the business incubation program sponsored by local government and run by CITI (Cape Information Technology Initiative). It aims to take start-up technology based companies and grow them with the hope of increasing employment and growing the local economy.

    A well known graduate of the programme, Rafiq Phillips was recently seen on Carte Blanche discussing web 2.0. Rafiq made a name for himself with his start-up venture, i-drive and is still out there creating buzz and achieving great things. Other companies like Red Button, one of the winning companies from the 2007 program are making it big with their wireless hotspots.

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