Quit Being a Scraggly Entrepreneur and Other Must-Read Business Tips

A roundup of the best tips of the week from Entrepreneur.com.
As on the dating scene, looking good is an easy way to stand out from the crowd. That could mean sporting a well-fitted suit or the right pair of shoes, but at a minimum it means being well-groomed and presentable. "Just because you may not be pitching an angel investor or VC every day doesn't mean it's acceptable to look like a mess," says Thomas Edwards, the founder of Confidence Unchained, an executive coaching firm. "You never know who you'll meet at any given moment and it's pivotal for your confidence to know you're looking good."
Similarly, your smile is one of your most effective tools for making people see you in a positive light. A great introduction to that key investor or potential client can hinge on a smile. Smiling makes you a better leader, too. "Even in the most strenuous of circumstances, smiling can put everyone around you -- including yourself -- at ease," Edwards says. "Then, you're in a position of influence to make decisions people will trust."
5 Simple Steps to Be a Super-Confident LeaderTake advantage of the FOMO phenomenon.
As a business owner, your first few partnerships will be the hardest to get. But once you have those, you can use them to get interest from other potential partners, says David Chait, the co-founder and chief executive of group travel tool Travefy. This works because companies, like people, often suffer from FOMO, or the fear of missing out on a good thing. But partnering with a startup also comes with risks, and it's easier for a large company to feel confident if other partners are already onboard. "Take advantage of the FOMO phenomenon and shamelessly leverage your existing partnerships to build additional ones," Chait says. 5 Secrets to Landing the Perfect PartnershipA product company needs more than one product to survive.
Nowadays, Kickstarter and other crowdfunding sites are full of cool ideas for gadgets. The first task of an inventor entrepreneur is to develop a product and bring it successfully to market. But once that is done, "you will need to immediately start developing follow-up products in order for your company to survive," says Christopher Hawker, the president of Trident Design, LLC, a product development and commercialization firm. "You have to keep adding new items every year in order to stay relevant and ahead of the innovation curve." And if you don't have any additional ideas yourself, you had better start thinking about where you are going to source them. 3 Things You Need to Know About Launching a Product BusinessFind inspiration by getting out of your office.
It's easy to get lost in the technological tumult of 21st-century life, but when you need inspiration for your next big idea or project, it helps to get away from it all, says Steve Tobak, a managing partner of Invisor Consulting, a Silicon Valley-based management and strategy consulting firm. Either take a walk, put yourself through an intense workout or just bask in nature. A beautiful landscape" has a magical way of drawing you in and making you feel part of something alive and wonderful," Tobak says. Exercise will clear your head and a little time in the natural world will put things into perspective. Need Inspiration 
Here Are 9 Ways to Find ItMotivate your employees by showing gratitude.
Companies who can't inspire loyalty in their employees are bound to lose them -- or at least the most talented ones. You can forestall the brain drain by showing appreciation for the efforts of your staff. One way to do this is to foster wellness by paying for nearby yoga classes or subsidizing (partially or wholly) your employees' gym memberships. You could also upgrade the office lighting (no hideous fluorescents!) or eliminate a time-sucking errand by offering dry cleaning drop-off and pick up at the office. "Even in this climate with higher unemployment, people can change jobs," says Victoria Krotzer, an independent human resources consultant at Maximum Business Consulting in York, Pa. "You want to encourage loyalty, and appreciation from the manager and the company can do that."

Signs You Might Be a Terrible Leader (Yes, You)

As a business owner, leadership is more than just telling others what to do. Leadership is about the investment we make into others and the responsibilities we accept for being the voice and direction that others count on. Every great leader knows that his or her role comes with responsibility for those who follow him or her, and in ensuring they provide value in return for their loyalty.
Sometimes entrepreneurs -- either by nature or habit -- are bad leaders. Perhaps you lack the understanding of the social responsibilities that come with leading others. Or perhaps you've fallen into a routine and your leadership abilities have suffered for it.
Recognizing poor leadership is a vital skill to help you achieve greatness. Here are signs that you are a bad leader, exhibiting traits that you don't want to be following:
You make empty promises.
Poor leaders motivate those following them with false promises of promotions, success and a great tomorrow, but rarely deliver on those promises. Leaders who do this can be manipulative and often hold the goals and aspirations of their follower's hostage in order to get them to comply.
As a business owner you need to be aware of what effect this has on your staff. If you commit to something but don't follow through it can send the wrong message to your employees, who you are pushing to deliver the best results.
You fail to follow up.
Poor leaders tend to lack the understanding that their followers are counting on them to handle issues that they are not able to fix on their own. Leaders can forget to follow up on these issues as they might be of little importance to them. Months can go by with little or no change.
Following up is an important part of leadership as it is our ability to hold ourselves accountable. When you make a promise, not only is your word on the line, but so is your integrity, so follow up with a "yes it's completed" or "no, but here is when I commit to it being completed."
You're fearful of confrontation. 
Poor leaders often try to avoid confrontation, especially when involving performance. This is typically due to either a lack of knowledge on the topic at hand or an urge to be intentionally blind to the truth -- deciding to act unaware about a situation rather than dealing with it.
While business leaders want to drive results, they can be at a loss when they don't attain them through those who work for them. They often go around those tough conversations by trying to empower others to have them so that they don't have to.
As opposed to avoiding confrontation, focus on outlining exactly what is expected in every partnership or transaction you engage in. That way, when there is a discrepancy, it's easy to recognize.
You don't hold yourself accountable.
Nobody likes to be held accountable when things fail, especially poor leaders. They will often justify their need to hold others accountable rather than themselves. They don't self-reflect and improve.
Because confrontation scares them, poor leaders can also be hesitant to hold others accountable outside of talking about doing so. As a result, they end up talking in circles and shifting blame from person to person out of fear.
A simple way to keep yourself accountable is to eliminate the word "sorry" from your vocabulary. When acknowledging your broken agreement, acknowledge in a way that suggests that you realize you broke your word and will commit to a change in action as you move forward.
When you acknowledge that your word is your most important asset, "sorry" becomes an easy way out. Great leaders take ownership of what they say and do.

Keep Your Promises and Other Must-Read Business Tips

A roundup of the best tips of the week from Entrepreneur.com.
Entrepreneurs are known for making grand statements and inspiring other people with their visions of what is possible. But it's one thing to be a visionary and another to be someone who makes empty promises. "Poor leaders motivate those following them with false promises of promotions, success and a great tomorrow, but rarely deliver on those promises," says marketing and business-development expert Lewis Howes.
If you catch yourself doing this, and especially if it's a habit, you need to reassess your leadership tactics. A manipulative leader will dangle the goals and aspirations of his employees like a carrot to get them to do what he wants. But eventually employees will get fed up and most likely find somewhere else to work. Even if you don't intend to be manipulative, says Howes, "if you commit to something but don't follow through, it can send the wrong message to your employees, who you are pushing to deliver the best results." More: Signs You Might Be a Terrible Leader (Yes, You)
Make your message as simple and efficient as possible.
Getting a potential customer or client to take action isn't easy, but it's easier if you communicate as efficiently as possible. "Don't presume the audience has any interest in what your message is," says Tom Haley, a creative director at Chicago-based Jellyvision Lab, a company that provides personalized multimedia content for its clients. While you may eat, sleep and breathe your business, your customers don't. Give them what they need to make their decision -- nothing less, nothing more. More: 5 Simple Ways to Get Your Customers to Listen to You
Think about the space your employees are in.
One element of keeping employees is providing an environment in which they will enjoy working. Peace, Love & Little Donuts, located in Pittsburgh, sets itself apart from other doughnut shops partly with its unusual flavors, such as maple-and-bacon, and partly by providing such an environment for its staff. The psychedelic décor and 1970s music fit with the shop's "Feed Your Inner Hippie" slogan and provide a fun atmosphere that its workers, many of whom are young college students, won't mind spending a shift in. More: Why Happy Employees Are Your Key to Successful Branding
Debrief yourself every Thursday.
It's all too easy to let your time dribble away in emails, small talk and other distractions rather than being productive. To stay on track, sit down and give yourself a debrief every week, preferably on Thursday. That means assessing how you have spent your time and how you have improved (or slackened) your focus and productivity over the past week. "Doing this kind of debrief on Thursday, instead of Friday gives you a sense of achievement from reviewing that week’s work, which provides extra energy to carry on before the weekend," says Jason Womack, the founder of The Womack Company, an Ojai, Calif.-based productivity-training firm. "This also gives you time to organize anything that needs to be done before you leave the office for the weekend." More: What You Can Do Today to Make Tomorrow More Productive
Make disciplinary conversations objective, not subjective.
When one of your employees is behaving unprofessionally -- perhaps making inappropriate jokes or dressing in a way that isn't suitable for the workplace -- it's obvious that you need to sit the employee down for a serious talk. But it's important not to rely on vague words, like "professionalism," that can be interpreted subjectively. Refer instead to your company guidelines. That will make the substance of the conversation objective rather than subjective, says Susan Strayer LaMotte, founder of exaqueo, a workplace consulting firm. If you don't already have clear company guidelines for workplace attire and behavior, now is the time to create some, so that your employees will know what is expected.