Best Practices

3 essential things to check before your lend personal money to SMEs – Part 1

Lending has been a way of life in India. It is routine for us to lend money to businesses run by our relatives, friends or their friends. However, many of us have also been burnt in the process. Whether you …

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An easy to way to understand any credit rating issued to a business

Broadly speaking, credit rating is an assessment of the creditworthiness of a business. A good credit rating means strong financials and a high likeliness of paying off financial obligations timely. There are about 6 credit rating agencies in India …

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How to study your competition in 5 easy ways

Make a list of competitors: Yes, that’s the starting step. Make sure you have chosen competitors of similar size. In case you don’t know your competitors, ask your customers who else they compared you with. Google, IndiaMart, JustDial, and …

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How to evaluate a startup for investment purpose

Background check of the founders: Evaluate the experience and educational background of the founders and the core team. Try to get references if you can. Do they have any experience in the problem they are aiming to solve? How …

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How you can make your business survive longer

I recently came across this term ‘Shinese’ – a word used to refer to long-lasting companies. Interestingly, about 90% of all businesses worldwide that are more than 100 years old are Japanese. They all have fewer than 300 employees. They …

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Profits or Valuation?

I often wonder about the new economy, new kinds of businesses, massive funding rounds for some of them and valuations. Infact, we all do. Are we missing something? How did these young companies become the world’s biggest companies so soon? …

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Why is it important for you to understand your business’ financial statements

For a lot of businesses owners, preparing annual financial statements is a compliance formality to be fulfilled. Typically, this is how it goes – The senior accountant works with the auditors and replies to the queries. The accounts and the …

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3 things you should check before meeting a client

‘Know your customer’. It is one mantra that we hear repeatedly for successful sales closings. No secret about it. But what and how? We have enumerated 3 essential things that should be checked to prepare for a sales meeting. The …

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2 important checks to carry on your customers every year to prevent bad debts

We all are vaguely aware of the concept of vendor assessment. However, customer assessment is a lesser-known concept. Because who cares to know more about a customer? He is business and one never lets go of the business, right? However, …

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How 3 simple vendor checks helped me avoid fraud

Some of us evaluate a vendor before entering into a transaction. Some of us don’t. Many times it is difficult to get any useful information on that vendor. Things work by word of mouth until they go bad. Broadly speaking, …

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5 essential checks of your vendor onboarding process

The vendor onboarding policies and thoroughness of due-diligence depends on several factors like the size of your organisation, criticalness of a vendor to your business, size and nature of transaction, etc. However, these are five essential checks you should always …

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5 data driven tests to assess your job offer from a startup

Working in a startup comes with its own set of rewards as well as risks. If a startup hits it off, employees would enjoy attractive hikes, stock options and other employee benefits. But, in reality, 90% of startups are found …

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Six preliminary checks to ensure that a Company is genuine

Have you got a job offer from a company you haven’t heard of? Or got a great deal on internet but want to know the whereabouts of the company offering it? These concerns are genuine. You might feel the requirement …

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Due Diligence for doing business with small / medium companies

Are you doing business with a Small or Medium sized company? Are you a vendor, customer or a competitor of a Small or Medium Enterprise (SME).  Are you planning to enter into a Joint venture with it? How do you …

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Due Diligence: Does it always have to be detailed?

Generally, the term ‘Due Diligence’ gives an impression of detailed and cumbersome research process. However, that is not completely true. A Due Diligence process may range from a high level review to detailed and comprehensive research. What’s a ‘High Level …

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