Impact Impression Blog

Before we begin, let’s destroy the myth called Entrepreneurship Gene. There is none. Entrepreneurship can be taught. While in the school of trial and errors, or knowing the facts by following proven principles, remember this, Action, not truth, will set you free as an Entrepreneur. As an entrepreneur, you don’t see the world through your eyes, company’s perspective or gut feeling, no matter how exotic they are. You must see the world through your customers’ eyes. There’s no better pair of lenses than the customers’ eyes. It is called, entrepreneurial garment . We all know that customer is king and their kingship reign forever, as far as business is concerned. And to miss or discard the whims and desires of these royalties is like staging an orchestra in your living room without an audience – a total waste of time. Remember again, it is the customer and only the customer that determines how good and viable you products are. It doesn’t matter if you think your products are...

Alibaba is planning to open its first brick-and-mortar mall in April at its headquarters in Hangzhou, China, MarketWatch reports . “More Mall,” as it is reportedly called, will be five stories tall and offer products from brands on Alibaba’s Taobao platform and elsewhere. It will also feature retail technologies like virtual fitting rooms, high-tech makeup testing mirrors, and Alibaba’s tech-based grocery store. More Mall is another step in Alibaba’s plan to go after traditional retail. The company has invested as much as $8 billion in brick-and-mortar retail in the last two years, according to Forbes, with its current footprint including Hema, its grocery store chain, and Tao Cafe, its unstaffed convenience store. Hema stores allow shoppers to get additional product information by scanning a barcode and order items to be shipped from the store, while Tao Cafe offers customers the ability to pick their products and pay automatically upon their exit. These innovations could ...

Technology has come to be part of our everyday lives. The environment has completely been changed, especially in the minds of youngsters. Our gadgets, especially our cellphones have become such essential tool, that it is only needful that we know not just how to use them, but also how to take care of them- for precautionary and longevity reasons.  So according Gadgets360's professional view, here are five(5) ways to take care of your cellphones 1. Don't let your phone overheat Heat is perhaps the worst enemy of lithium-ion batteries, the kind most smartphones use. You should take basic precautions like not keeping your phone on the dash board of the car where it will get a lot of direct sunlight. You should also avoid charging your phone while playing graphically intensive games, because that will also raise the temperature of the phone and harm the battery. The ideal charging temperature is between 20-30 degrees Celsius, according to a OnePlus product manager....

Since this administration got into power, the most recurring word in Nigeria's economic industry is recession. Many did not even know that this word exist until they were plunged into it. However, this ugliness is here among us and is threatening to cohabit with us for much longer than is necessary or required. Hardship is bad - when viewed from an angle. But if viewed from other angles, it can be a tool of greatness. Many successful people in the world today have credited their success to a one time hardship, or deficiency, which prompted them into doing the extraordinary. Of course if everything were rosy, some of the great inventions in the world today wouldn't have been thought of, let alone brought to being. Napoleon Hill, in his address said, "There is one quality that one must possess to win, and that is  definiteness of purpose, the knowledge of what one wants and a burning desire to achieve it." To live above this evil called recession, you must be...

The way we pay is changing dramatically. People are beginning to use their smartphones for every kind of formal and informal transaction — to shop at stores ( www.chip.ng ), buy songs online, and even split their rent... Nearly half of consumers prefer using digital apps to make payments. Roughly 47% of consumers stated that they preferred digital means for performing transactions, while cash came in slightly lower, at 45%. This difference will likely become more profound as consumers increasingly move away from using cash. In fact, half of survey respondents reported that they carry cash less than half of the time, and when they do, they often don't use it — 46% of consumers reported using cash fewer than eight days a month.  And these habits don't vary much by demographic segment. Although millennials are embracing the use of digital payments more than any other age group — 49% of millennials prefer digital payments to cash — they aren't the only ones; 44% of G...

Did you know that communication takes two forms -the verbal and non verbal? And of course when both conflict, the non verbal is (consciously or unconsciously) validated. Do you know how horrifying this can be? Imagine preparing the best presentation – world class type – and then mess it up by being fidgety or frowning or even showcasing fear! Why take the trouble to gather or face an audience (believe me, it’s not easy to do this) and then muddle it up by communicating the opposite of your intention? Have you ever watched a Chinese movie that’s not translated yet you still watch it to the end? Why would you watch a movie that you don’t understand Jack of what they are saying? Because somehow, you can relate with shouts, facial expressions, body language and other tiny bits – this is non verbal communication doing its thing. Some of the action could be misunderstood, because the verbal and non verbal are supposed to go hand in hand (complement each other). But the fact remains...

The world has become digitally reformed that almost anything is possible. These days, most of the work has been done for you by, of course, technology and many geniuses in the world who keep discovering cool stuff – around the clock. Now, the only prerequisite is a thinking brain. Fortunately, everyone has a brain; but unfortunately, not all brains think. Not that they lack the capacity to think, they are just simply lazy. With the world becoming a global village, the barrier of country borders is now a thing in the past. Your customers can be anywhere and everywhere. All you have to do is use leverages. There are basically 3 ways to leverage on other people’s tools to make money.  They are: 1.        Using Other People’s Platform (OPP) : You may have good products and what you think everyone needs, but if you don’t have the right platforms to advertise and project your goods and services, it will be difficult to make the right turnover. Y...

There is time for everything under the sun. But a lot of people have ignored this principle and this is why they struggle with money. For you to die a wealthy man, you must be willing to live the beginning of your life as many people wouldn't, so that you can live the rest of your life as many people can't. The goal is to be rich and not to look rich. Unfortunately, a lot of people prefer the other way round. They spend the money they don't have to impress the people that don't care about them. This shouldn't be you. Don't allow your expenses to drag your income, rather let your income drag your expenses. What this means is that you first increase your income before your spending. NOTE: At all times, your income must be more than your expenses. There are certain things that you pay for right now that you haven't grown up to. The fact that you can pay for them doesn't mean that you can afford them. This is the difference between payability a...

We've all got weaknesses. Fortunately, those weaknesses usually are not due to lack of ability; more often, they’re the result of bad habits. When you’re sitting in your office with a daunting presentation to prepare, and you keep checking your inbox and returning calls instead, it isn’t necessarily because you’re bad at prioritizing. It might be that you’re playing out a deeply habitual, practiced response to anxiety, inadequacy, or fear. The key to changing these kinds of habits is to identify the nature of the moments that provoke the ineffective response. Pay attention to the time of day, the location, your mood, and your physiological state. If you can pinpoint the circumstances that cause you to act in ways that lead to bad results, you’ve shrunk the size of your problem. Change seems daunting when you think it requires constant vigilance. But it’s usually about handling a few minutes per day better than you have in the past. (Harvard Business Review)

Most people do their best work when they know their manager trusts them. If they worry that you think they’re lazy, incapable of directing their behavior, or lack integrity, they’re unlikely to take feedback or coaching from you. So go out of your way to gain your employees’ trust by demonstrating positive assumptions about them. Give challenging assignments, with the clear and confident belief that your expectations will be met. And don’t hide information, or assume people will mishandle it. Instead, promote transparency. Try adding a “through the grapevine” agenda item to meetings as a fun, informal way for people to share company information they’ve heard, so you can either confirm or debunk the rumor. When managers demonstrate positive assumptions, employees respond in kind. [HBR]

Making other people better at something requires more effort than we need to make ourselves better at the same thing. In other words, it is much easier to tell somebody what they should do if they can see we have done the same thing ourselves. Our lives say much more than our mouths can ever articulate. How we talk to people, how we react to situations, in whom we put our faith, how promptly and genuinely we care about other people, and a host of other life matrices combine to give us away quicker than we are ready to defend ourselves. So, the work starts with us. We are better placed to suggest strategies to other people only if we have applied such strategies--or similar ones--to our lives, and we are currently prospering as a result of that. It is easier for people to believe what has previously worked for someone else. This explains why big organisations spend a lot of money inviting successful people to talk to their members of staff. People with success stories tend to...

The way we do our payment is changing dramatically. For example, people are beginning to use their smartphones for every kind of formal and informal transaction - to shop at stores, buy songs and movies online, and even do their banking. At the heart of these changes in how we do our transactions are lots of companies competing and collaborating to facilitate transactions. Although a great percentage of people use digital forms of payment, very few fully understand that it is an extremely complex industry. Payments is transferring information from one party to another, and nearly every stakeholder in the industry benefits when that process runs on digital rails. This is the era that we are in. Do you see any business opportunity? If everything is moving towards online, there must be something you can do (service or business) to be part of this moving train. Think.

Do you know why many would be successful business owners (entrepreneurs) get stuck while making strategic plans and choices? It is because they considered Where to Play  without reference to How to Win. I’ve heard variants of this over and over. Although I have always emphasized that these five choices have to link together and reinforce each other, hence the arrows flowing back and forth between the boxes, it has become clear to me that I haven’t done a good enough job of making this point, especially as it relates to the choices of Where to Play and How to Win. Many people ask why Capabilities and Management Systems are part of strategy when they are really elements of execution. That is yet another manifestation of the widespread, artificial, and unhelpful attempt to distinguish between choices that are “strategic” and ones that are “executional” or “tactical.” Remember that, regardless of what name you give them, these choices are a critical part of the integrated set ...