Over this past month I’ve been researching how small business teams will work in the future.

This research has led me to attend a number of conferences where I’ve listened to highly successful “web-gurus” talk about how they are making $000s through on-line selling and affiliate marketing and using virtual teams.

There seems to be a number of common threads to all the talks:

• Small teams can provide exceptional products that are often better than equivalent and expensive products from larger businesses.
  This is true and I’ve even invested in two CD’s packed with useful information for under $10, including postage.

• Work such as marketing, web design, product production and delivery, customer contact and much more can be outsourced at a fraction of the current cost.
  Again very true and if there is one aspect to the future of business that will impact even large teams in multinational companies.
  

The final message that I heard from all of them is that individuals and small teams can make $000s without much effort. All you have to do is to buy the product package the “Guru” has developed for $000s and your journey to riches begins…100% money back if not satisfied…guaranteed!

I guess I shouldn’t be surprised that people still find the “instant riches” message so attractive. The Lottery, advertisers and TV game shows all contribute to this perception.

Having spoken to and observed some of the “Gurus” telling everyone how easy it is to make money on the web and that it only takes an hour a day it’s interesting that they themselves seem to work very very very hard and very long hours.

Perhaps the learning point is that: Technology makes life easier but the effort that needs to be directed towards producing and maintaining a successful and sustainable outcome for clients changes.
Those that get rich will only do so through hard work, the rest continue to delude themselves.

The first day back from the festive holidays brings a staff meeting between Maria and her team. Now that she has been in her new job for a couple of months Maria intends to implement her plans for cost savings within the HR department.

She has told the team that her intention is to exceed the Managing Director’s request that all departments make a saving on budget of 6% during 2010. To do this Maria intends to restructure the team slightly and reassign workloads so that specific people handle specific departments.

Maria has also told her team that she intends to review “search company and head-hunter contracts” when sourcing new staff and that she will renegotiate fees and payment terms. This means that “some search companies might be dropped” in favour of ones that Maria has worked with in the past and whom she trusts.