There are many towns which have been on decline from eighties and nineties with the steady movement of jobs from textiles, steel, automobile and other manufacturing sectors overseas. The current great recession has expedited the slide with some of them runing huge unemployment figures that are 2 to 3 times more than the national average and leaving the citizens of these towns desperate and clueless about the future. Here we are exploring few ideas by taking the example of Wilmington, Ohio but the thoughts echoed here are relevant for Elkhart, Indiana or any other town in similar plight.

“The Town Runs on Hope”

These were the words spoken by Mayor David Raizsk of Wilmington, Ohio when he was interviewed by CBS last December. The painful truth is that even with retraining, government aid, and incentive programs like cash for clunkers, the town of Wilmington can’t see how it can ever recover from the serious slump that began in 2007.

Despite this grim reality, the town does run on hope, and human beings who continually hope have already won half the struggle.

One reader posted a helpful resource after he listened to the CBS feature. He said that for people in need of resources like a library and free Internet access and a job bank, they can go to Ohio State University’s Starting Place at http://clintoncountyresources.osu.edu/. For Wilmington residents willing to relocate, there will be a Cincinnati Job Fair that’s taking place on January 26 at the Holiday Inn Hotel from 11 am to 2 pm (room I-275).

Listed below are few unconventional ideas:

1. While the buyout of Airborne Express by DHL was a huge letdown for workers, the skills they acquired could be put into good use. They should band together and brainstorm about using their collective skills like starting a courier service. Once formed, they can choose to work independently or take excess deliveries that DHL would prefer to farm out. Some residents can contribute to a cash fund to buy vans or trucks that can be converted into delivery vehicles. Or they might act as customer service agents for other courier agencies, their industry knowledge could be a big advantage.

2. In fact, now that Wilmington has caught the attention of the entire nation and aid has started to pour in, residents may want to create opportunities for themselves by cashing in on that goodwill, especially while the momentum is still there. Men, women and children can pool resources and establish a unique Wilmington market place to showcase the area’s handicraft industry. Or better, the town could create a brand around ‘Wilmington-Ohio’ and sell insignia or other everyday use products on the internet. Americans who shower their benevolence all over the world, would be more than willing to pay premium to help their fellow citizens, and this could be the ideal platform. One could conduct a town wide contest to come up with slogans (like, ‘I love Wilmington, OH’ or ‘I support Wilmington, OH,’ etc,) for insignia and market t-shirts, mugs, banners, business cards, stationery, etc,.

3. Other opportunities might include daycare services (to relieve parents who are job hunting), meal and grocery deliveries, a monitoring service for homebound seniors, snow removal and maintenance of municipal infrastructure. The women can get together and form “guilds” – sewing, baking, cleaning service, tutorials, secretarial services for hotels and inns, and parish activities.

4. A city’s talent pool is enormous, the key is to mobilize that talent. We can visualize the area of Wilmington as an outdoor fair where people meet and exchange ideas, barter unwanted items for needed items, and showcase the best products that Wilmington has to offer. It’s like going back to the good old days where the townspeople meet and do business or simply make social connections. Someone could promote her neighbor’s apple pie, a barber could do some word-of-mouth referrals for plumbers, painters and carpenters. Talent can be harnessed to produce these goods to sell to locals and out-of-towners.

5. Why not turn the present crisis into a clearinghouse of news, goods and people? Another suggestion is that a resident or group of residents can put up a web site that would highlight what’s available in Wilmington. Setting up web sites these days costs virtually nothing. Google, Hub Pages, Wordpress will offer blogging platforms for free so why not use this medium for each and every resident whose got talent in any of these areas:

• Gardening
• Knitting
• Baking and cooking recipes, advice and tips
• Baby-sitting
• Car service
• Parcel delivery
• Pet sitting, house sitting
• Beer brewing
• trades

For those in Wilmington who were fortunate to have found jobs outside city limits, perhaps they need a car pool so they don’t have to spend extra for gas and car insurance.

Back in the days when life was simpler and there was a strong sense of community, America became a strong nation. Maybe that’s what we need.

The difference between a pipe dream and a strong idea is simply persistence. Here are a few tips to get you started on your own Work From Home Business right away, and get on the path to your ultimate goal beating procrastination and hours of indecision. (1) Get the advantage on yourself - tell enough people what your dream is. (2) Understand your standard excuses and do not listen to them anymore. (3) Break the dream into bite size chunks and reward yourself on the adventure. (4) Take a fork in the road and simply get started. This is according to leading Business Coach Brad Tonini who has just released his latest book “Make It Happen Now!” Brad explains that procrastination is paralyzing to top performance, and it comes from these main reasons: (1) The task is just way to overwhelming (2) You may have a fear of failure or fear of success (3) You look for perfection and never get started (4) You fear a lack of control (5) You have not associated sufficient pleasure or pain to the task to get you moving. It is really odd how we can talk ourselves right out of things, we create self-doubt in our head and then we translate this to contrary self talk. The more we make critical decisions and get started on a new path or one that we’ve desired, we begin to feel empowered, amazed or delighted about making the goal come to fulfillment. The undeniable truth of the matter is that there’s a lot of money to be made with your own work from home business!

But the opposite of procrastination is commitment. According to the esteemed James Womack, commitment unlocks the doors to imagination, allows for vision, and gives us the “right stuff” to turn our dreams into reality. Mack R. Douglas was quoted as saying “The achievement of your dream is guaranteed the moment you commit yourself to it”. Powerful stuff indeed. In that same vein, Pearl Buck said, ” do not wait for moods. You accomplish nothing if you do that. Your mind must know it has to get down to work”. And Albert Einstein said, “Three rules of work (1) out of clutter, find simplicity, (2) from discord, find harmony and (3) in the middle of difficulty, lies opportunity”. Remember to always be persistent, that is truly a key. Just do the work everyday and refuse to ever give up. And when you need help, get it. Then Keep the momentum going! Do not give up or take anything personally. And speaking of commitment, to be rewarded in a Work From Home Business, you’ve got to be nothing less than a fanatic who’s completely committed to making your Home Business not only a successful venture, but a profound commitment for your entire life. You will only fail if you give up. Keep in mind that this is all about freedom from the  daily grind of working for someone else your entire life. Work for yourself and please go forth with your Work From Home Business. Your well being may depend on it!

My inspiration, my guru, Nipun Mehta connected me with Philip to understand his project, the failure club.

I loved the concept. Groups of people take up tasks they find challenging, something they want to accomplish in a specific time frame. Then each person sets milestones for these ambitious projects and meet with the group once a month to track the progress.

For example my friend wants to enjoy a 4 day week after sooo many years of hard work and she deserves it. This could be her project for next year. I want to run a marathon. I have already done a 10K and will be running my second 10K this month. So my project could be a running a marathon.

For Revivalcircle members, it could be pursuing a hobby and exceling at it, finding your dream job, starting your own business….the sky is the limit..

The point is to challenge yourself and even if we fail, it is fine because you will fail at something worth failing at and learn a lot in the process….

Right now it is pilot stage at Stanford and MIT.

So check it out at www.thefailureclub.com

I would love to form a group of people who want to try this out so give me a shout…..

Encouraging and motivating people to get up and “run with the ball” is like half-baked advice. It doesn’t take much effort to tell people to think positive, be proactive and turn difficulty into opportunity. How many times have you heard these gems of wisdom? People need more than advice. They need tools.

A recent article in the local paper struck a chord. It said that if we encourage people to think that they can do anything and that everything is possible, it could actually produce a negative effect. If we remember correctly, the writer cautioned about an over-generous sprinkling of feel-good advice because it could make people feel more inadequate, especially when their situation is compared to the situations of successful people. Sometimes, positive thinking can put an enormous pressure on people who are trying to come to terms with a job loss, a setback, or a rejection.

So we want to be sensitive to the sentiments of the unemployed. We don’t wish to underestimate them by telling them ad nauseam that they can do it. As we said earlier, what’s the point of motivating people advice is not supported by tools and resources they can use right away?

The whole idea behind Revival Circle was two-pronged: encourage entrepreneurship as a viable solution to unemployment, and provide resources that our members can tap. After some research, we think that these web sites can serve as “go-to” portals for some mental stimulation, but more importantly, action. No doubt you have many ideas you want to develop; the key, however, is to have a starting point from which ideas can sprout and hopefully push you into action.

A) www.entrepreneur.com/technology/pcworld/ This web site is addressed to all kinds of entrepreneurs from different backgrounds. There is a section exlusively for franchise opportunities, for women entrepreneurs, for start-ups, and for social networking. If you navigate to the home page, it summarizes the types of information that would be of interest to anyone looking to step out of a rut. There are articles on coping with layoffs, how to stretch your dollars, how to find seed money for a venture and even a section where you can establish a social network.

B) http://www.sba.gov/smallbusinessplanner/index.html. This is the US government’s web site for the small business owner and for people who want to be future business owners. It covers the entire cycle of planning your business, defining it via a business plan, finding a mentor and mobilizing start-up logistics (equipment, location, funding), and managing the business (managing employees, marketing, legal and accounting implications). The final cycle is for business owners who are looking to sell their business. The “services” and “tools” tabs are helpful because the topics cover sources of funding. There are free online courses and there are forms you can download to start the application process for loans.

C) http://www.irs.gov/businesses/small/article/0,,id=98810,00.html. In addition to legal and accounting advice, this web site is a “must” for those who want to avoid any trouble with the taxman. It is the Internal Revenue Service site’s checklist for starting a business. It provides the tax calendars for small businesses and the self-employed.

D) http://usgovinfo.about.com/od/smallbusiness/a/stategrants.htm. If you think your business could benefit from a grant, this web site provides the links of state development agencies in each state where you can make a grant application. For example, if you live in Kansas, you simply click on Kansas, and the link takes you to the Kansas Business Center, the Kansas Grants Clearing House and the Kansas Department of Revenue – Business. If there is no grant center in the state you live in, you can still approach your local SBA (small business administration) where they can direct you to resources.

E) http://www.zeromillion.com/young/business-ideas.html. Want to know what teenagers are thinking about when it comes to business? This web site features 105 business ideas proposed by teens and might give you an idea of what business might “click” with this particular demographic. If you scroll to the bottom of the page, there are articles on social entrepreneurship and how to get out of the credit crunch.

F) http://articles.latimes.com/2008/sep/21/business/fi-coverbox21. This is the Los Angeles Times’ version of resources for the unemployed. If you need assistance with debt management, bill payments, low-cost health clinics, or employment, this web page provides the names, telephone numbers and e-mail addresses of organizations you can turn to.

G) http://www.forbes.com/2009/06/24/unemployment-retirement-savings-intelligent-investing-planning.html. Does it make sense to invest when one’s unemployed? Apparently it does. Forbes suggests looking into ETFs, corporate bonds and your education. This article is one of numerous well-researched and eloquent articles presented by Forbes Magazine on its web site, www.forbes.com. It tackles subjects like entrepreneurship, leadership, personal finance, philanthropy and other relevant topics.

Reforming Emergency Care!

Is there scope for reforming emergency care! In a country where people with health insurance also think twice before visiting a Doctor, the cost of emergence care is frightening. The emergency care costs several times more than a regular visit, there are countless horror stories of people where a half-day visit to emergency care set them back by a months wages. Lot of people with helath insurnace dread the emergency care costs and tend to avoid the visits with worst ramifications. Can emergency care be reformed and be part of this health care reform?

Emergency Burger / Coffee ?

Can emergency care be priced like regular care? Can Health care operators learn from other businesses that offer 24 hour services at normal prices, on containing the costs /resisting the penchant for big bucks for after hour services. The 24 hour iHop or McDonalds or Startbucks doesnot charge the customers differently for late night or weekend service. There are countless services that provide after hour services at normal rates ranging from airlines, food, customer support etc, who have managed to work out the after hour services with the primary goal of better customer service. What is preventing the health care industry in adopting the best practises from other industries in extending after hour health services at regular rates? Or is it that those other industries have to learn a business lesson or two from health care industry on maximizing profits? What do you feel?

As discussed earlier, we will start focusing on one business idea at a time and lend all feasible support / advice to anyone pursuing that business. Our focus is on no capital / low capital intensives business ideas as those are more amenble for unemployed. Its natural to have suspicion that whether the small business will yield enough to meet both ends or ever reach the desired scale. Frankly, you do not know till you try, so would have been the case for the following people when they started.

• The Railway clerk - Amancio Ortega, who started making gowns in his living room with an investment of $25 with his wifes help and now owns the largest international fashion stores Zara with a net worth of $20 billion.
• Or was Ingvar Kamprad who started by selling matches to neighbors on a bicycle and now owns the largest furniture chanin in the world – IKEA and whose net worth is in excess of $30 billion.
• Or even the two starving students, who could not find any parttime jobs to pay for college and used an old army truck as billboard to offer moving services, today their moving services company Starving Students operates a fleet of 300 trucks.

But they all backed them selves up, dared to chase their passion and came out winners. So, can you if you are willing to take that first step.

Home Delivery Services Business

Here is the first Business idea of the series– Home Delivery Services. The Home Delivery services has a large context, to start with let us confine the scope to enablement of home delivery services of daily use products in a locality for vendors with out their own delivery services.

There is a very small percentage of products that are home delivered. The most widely home delivered product is pizza but there are host of other products with vast potential for home delivery be it food from resturants, delis, groceries, medicines, etc,.

Home delivery offers ultimate convenience of fulfilling the spontaneous needs of customers in the comfort of home. How about extending the conveninece to other popular foods like burgers, delis, pastas and what not; afterall the cravings /sudden urges at home are not just limited to Pizza. Such a home delivery service is a win-win for all, brings in additional customers to vendors, conveneince to customers and the revenue to service provider. Once succesful, may be the service can be extended to local stores of national food chains like KFC or Taco Bell or Sub Way or Baskin Robins and so on.

The service is also useful for people with restricted mobility, they need not compromise on a meal or miss out on that essential pill or that fire wood just because they didn’t get it on their weekly shopping visit.

There is enormous scope for extending the service to cover goods from every vendor in the neighborhood. And who knows, if successful one may be able to expand the scope of services to larger boundaries and may even have a national delivery chain with a name like DeliveriesRUs, creating employment for thousands.

How do you start

We have covered some of the common information like capital, skills, fees, etc, in our Home business article on Pizza delivery services, you can refer it here.

One can start the business with literally no capital, the essential requirements are
• the mobility to drive and deliver the goods
• location knowledge so that one is efficient in deliveries
• communication mechanism like Cell phone to take orders
• customer interaction skills and ingenuity in delivering the product fresh offer the cutting edge

You may start the service by catering to friends and relatives and expand the scope as you gain knowledge and confidence.

As professed by Lao-Tzu, the journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step. If you are ready to take that step we are ready provide support thru the RevivalCircle.com in the form of advice at every step of the way ranging from marketing, pricing and other aspects. There is no downside, so get started by registering and posting your questions / needs in the forum here.

That was supposed to be the title of Michael Jackson’s next concert series in London. Many observers called it his comeback, his last stab at reviving a career that had taken a detour because of his personal battles.

Jackson’s death has a lesson for each one of us: death creates life.

“Death creates life” at first glance seems like a contradiction. Maybe it’s a pretentious attempt at philosophising. But when Jackson died, how many people suddenly woke up from their slumber to share the grief? How many emotions - sadness, hope, and joy – were rekindled? How many messages of gratitude were expressed to this towering but frail human being for showing us his talent, his sense of charity, his ability to get people singing and dancing, even for just a few minutes?

Think about this for a second: Jackson’s life, though crowned with success, was a string of major upheavals with the law, his drug dependence, his failed marriages and his dwindling financial resources. From the time he held a microphone in his hands, this man whose childhood was rudely interrupted had been taken advantage of by an unimaginable number of people.

And yet, he rose above them. He showed that no matter how much he’s had to grapple with, how much he’s been ridiculed and mocked, he was ready to take a stab at life one more time. He was willing to go back to that stage and do what he was always meant to do: entertain. Entertain and give people their share of an adrenalin rush.

You Too Can Say, This is It!

You lost your job a few months ago. You’re still looking. The so-called experts keep changing their minds about the concept of economic recovery. Now you see it, now you don’t. Life’s a circus, a maddening one.

You have a choice: you can either chase jobs or create a job.

You can mimic Michael Jackson and take a stab at life. Star quality or not, each one of us can do some kind of a heroic act. We can make the change for the better or…let a corporation do it for us.

The problem with corporations is they have to keep an eye on the bottom line. If you do it yourself, you keep an eye on your potential, your hidden talents, your resources.

Now is the time for Self employment

Right now you’re unemployed. Tomorrow, who knows? Look at this job loss as a wake-up call, a temporary detour. Today’s the best day of your life. You can now harvest that dormant entrepreneurial seed in you.

Instead of racing against time to beat rush hour, you set your brain in motion, giving it the time to think of an opportunity. Instead of defending your project to the boss, you can network with people of similar interests. Instead of mind games with your corporate rivals, you can brainstorm with people who share your vision. Instead of justifying your costs and expenses, you now have an abundance of manpower – friends and family.

It’s all about attitude. Entrepreneurship is a long word – no less than 16 letters. But if your juices are flowing and your passions are slowly stirring, it will probably take only 16 seconds or 16 days to geta headstart on that opportunity, that small business you’ve been thinking about lately.

In their book, Mission Inc. (BK Publishers, 2009), Kevin Lynch and Julius Walls said, “the business you run, the business you’re starting, or the one you’re simply dreaming of can change the world for the much, much better. Make that your aim, and you’ll be running the most successful business on earth.”

Lynch and Walls believe that the survival of a business depends on it filling a social need, whether real or invented. If the mission of “Michael Jackson Inc” was to bring music to the world so that people would be motivated to sing and dance and dream, or to encourage kids in the ghetto that they too can make it big, or to germinate struggling recording studios, then Michael Jackson – the man and his business – were a success. No one can take that away, not even his most acerbic critics.

You can create a business. If you’re not into wordly matters, you can create a movement. If, as a manager, you spent your entire career life counselling subordinates and pushing them to the max to generate profits for the company, you can continue on that managerial mode. You can put those skills to use by collaborating with people with complimentary skills. Most businesses not only need the feet on the ground but also organizing and planning capabilities behind and people with Managerial experience can play that role.

Maybe you’re not yet an entrepreneur. But you can start as an ideapreneur, servepreneur or an op-preneur. Take that idea, service or opportunity out of your head and put it in your hands and knead, knead, knead.

And…you don’t even have to wear a silver glove.
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We have presented a numberof self employment opportunities for consideration thru the articles in the Business section. Starting next week, we intend to go beyond, focus on one opportunity at a time and muster all our resources to support anyone interested in pursuing the opportunity during that period. We have lined up some expereinced and committed professionals to counsel / guide people in their self employment endeavors. So watch out!

An online article about a certain GM ex-worker named Nancy Kelly stirred something inside me. Kelly used to fix boilers in one plant – a work she did for 30 years. The article goes on to say that after leaving the company she dedicated most of her life to, she’s now trying to fix the hearts and minds of laid off auto workers. She spends her time counselling ex-colleagues who have taken to the bottle or suffer from depression.

If anyone wanted to graphically portray stress, all one needs to do is peek into the home of every auto worker who has lost his job. Study their faces, watch their movements, and observe the family interaction. Listen to the unspoken words. I don’t think you’re going to like what you see.

Someone once said that it’s during times of trouble and desperation that we rekindle our spiritual selves, and turn to that someone who has the power to help us. How many stories have you heard where people, realizing that death is near, unconsciously say “Oh God, please help me”?

The way I see it, turning to an invisible power represents our only recourse because our own power is gone. Our physical and emotional survival depends entirely on a being we know not much about. Still, it signifies hope – even if it’s our last one.

There are times when hope appears to be our only chance. It has a power of its own. We’re witnessing drastic upheavals these days. A virus like the H1N1 pales in significance to displaced families and disturbed psyches. Displaced families and disturbed spirits have far more dire consequences than a virus that will eventially be conquered by the right mix of chemical agents. Lost souls are entirely different. Some may not find a cure.

Our Support is Urgent

We should perhaps follow the example of Nancy Kelly. She was laid off. Her own family may be feeling the pinch, but instead of worrying about her own circumstances, she’s offered a helping hand to fellow workers who are making the slow descent into a dark hole from which they may never get out.

Let’s all be the Nancy Kelly that displaced auto workers need.

How might we help? Answer: by opening up the minds of auto workers who can still wake up in the mornings and look forward to productive days. We open up their minds by offering suggestions. When their minds open up and they are psychologically receptive, they could soon be opening up avenues of their own and head into a specific direction that will untap some of their hidden talents:

Dear auto worker, here’s an idea…

• Your hands have served you well for many years. Have you tried building miniature engines (using popsicle sticks, hardware store wire, nuts and bolts) and perhaps having them shipped off to the children of the third world?
• Have you spoken to your community college and expressed an interest in holding demonstrations on how to disconnect wiring inside a car’s engine? Or any other aspect of mechanics?
• Have you thought of speaking to teenagers and mentoring them on how they can do a better job should they decide to work in a future car assembly line?
• Have you taken down the names of people who you think are turning into alcoholics or who are slipping into a depression and submitted their names to your local pastor?
• Would you be interested in coaching kids who are competing in hockey, soccer, football and baseball games?
• Have you considered perhaps rounding up a few buddies you genuinely like, inviting them to a breakfast meeting, and brainstorming on what you can do for the community? or on pursuing self employment opportunities.
• Would the idea of blogging interest you? In that blog, you could talk about what makes a good car, how to extend its lifespan, and what car owners should be aware of when a mechanic says some part has to be replaced. You could also invite questions from car owners. And when you get enough visitor traffic, you can start thinking of how to monetize your blog.
• How about driving around your city and taking note of services it lacks? You could fill that need. A city has a lot to offer, but the opposite is also true: a city always lacks something.
• Car pools: can you and your buddies offer people in your neighborhood whose cars were repossessed a lift somewhere? Would you offer to take or pick up a kid to and from school because their parents are busy making ends meet?
• How about starting a soup kitchen in your community and asking the government for funding? That way, those food store owners who are thinking of closing down may not have to close down at all. A food co-op is an excellent start.

Dear auto worker, speak to your government about self-employment assistance. You could qualify for a loan that will help you start a business – your own. And who knows, what’s good for your business might be good for the country

great!!!