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Competitive landscape: Make your business survive

In today’s time, the business landscape has become highly competitive. It has become extremely difficult to stand out in the business arena. Moreover, there are a plethora of businesses selling or offering the same products or services, but what makes them notice is their unique brand identity and how they market themselves. However, it is more challenging for small businesses to survive in a fierce business market. For this, businesses need to make deliberate effort and build effective strategies to achieve their business goals. Though, inclusion of certain elements in your business plan can help your business stay ahead of the competitors. 

How can you survive the competitive landscape?

Here are few things that can help businesses survive in the competitive landscape:

  • Make your brand unique: The first rule is to make your brand products and services unique. This will help drive customers’ attention and increase your sales. Build a strong brand identity to differentiate from your competitors. Ultimately, it will leave a lasting impression on your customers and your brand will increase.
  • Improve your business operation: Scrutinizing your business operations is important from time to time. It will help you highlight inefficiencies that are becoming a hurdle in your business growth. By removing errors and improving your business operations, you can work efficiently on a competitive business landscape and accelerate your business growth. 
  • Active social media presence: To compete on a digital platform, it is crucial for businesses to maintain an active social media presence and spread their brand messages to their niche. If you don’t have an updated website on social media accounts, your potential customers will most likely not trust your brand and may revert to other competitors of your brand. Therefore, it is essential to present relevant and promising information on your digital platforms.
  • Step up your marketing: For any size of business, making continuous marketing efforts is important. Make sustainable marketing campaigns to give out brand messages to your target audience. This will help your target audience understand what you’re offering and how you are better than your competition. Also, a good marketing campaign is remembered by the audience to make a purchase at a correct time when they are ready.

Bottom Line:

Surviving this cruel business environment can be hard where your brand can be easily replaced by any other competitor. However, by building plans ahead of the time means you have won half of the battle. From making your business plan to listing your short-term and long-term goals to ruling the digital platforms, these elements will define your success in the competitive landscape. Do your best about learning about your target audience and you’ll be on a rise despite the growing competition.  

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Corporate Tax implementation in the UAE

UAE authorities have announced the implementation of corporate tax in the country from next year. The decision came out as a surprise to the business community as it was surprising news to them. Many businesses in the UAE have enjoyed zero income tax on their profits which will now change from June 2023. Previously, UAE has already introduced VAT, Economic Substance Regulation (ESR), Excise tax and Country by Country reporting. However, Corporate Tax (CT) will also play a significant role in the evolution of the UAE tax regime. 

The decision came into the consideration of UAE authorities to meet the international standards, by implementing similar decisions to their neighbouring Gulf countries. Also, the UAE wanted to modernise their business environment and boost their economy. Moreover, UAE aims at minimising the compliance burden for startups and small businesses in the country. 

Let’s look at some important points regarding implementation and process of corporate tax in the country;

  • – The corporate tax regime will be effective for fiscal years starting from or after June 1, 2023.
  • – UAE has implemented 9% CT on taxable income above AED 375,000. As for larger multinationals, different CT rates will be applied (will be announced by MoF) that generate consolidated global revenues above  EUR 750m in line with the Pillar Two of the OECD Base Erosion and Profit Shifting (BEPS) project.
  • – Ministry of Finance may announce any further relaxations related to Small, Medium and Micro Enterprises

Exemptions of CT:

  • – Natural resources are exempted from the corporate tax and will be taxed under Emirate level as before. 
  • – Foreign individuals and entities who don’t operate business in the UAE regularly will not be charged with CT.
  • – Income of foreign investors generated from dividends, capital gains, interest, royalties and other investment returns.
  • – There will be no withholding tax on domestic and international level

Businesses should in advance prepare for CT by conducting a review of their entity structure, accounting system and processes, financial model, and conduct audits. Certainly, the introduction of CT will have an impact on the tax compliance and costs of most UAE businesses.  Therefore, it is imperative for businesses to understand the tax implications and make any necessary changes in corporate structure, financial model , reporting system to ensure compliance with the new UAE CT regime.

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Business intelligence can help a company grow

Majority business owners working in the industry take important business decisions based on their gut or intuitions. Business analyst suggest that making crucial business decisions without any analytical data can be doubtful. Business owners are doing things as per their liking which sometimes work right for them but once the table turns, the million dollar deals can all go in vain if just one decision gets wrong. Here comes business intelligence that is used by dynamic companies to make their important decision based on data.

With the advancements of digital industry, new business tools are available that helps gather insightful and comprehensive business data. Business intelligence tools enables business owners to leverage the available tools and make informed decisions based on the data. Moreover, these are powerful tools that can be used by medium sized and large businesses to analyse their company’s data and implement new trends and solutions.

Understanding Business Intelligence 

Business intelligence tools is define as an umbrella term that includes tools, applications, technologies and practices that enables business to analyze, collect and interpret data into insightful and actionable format. BI process includes the following

  • – Data mining
  • – Analytical processing
  • – Querying and reporting

Business intelligence tools are important for businesses because it will help business executives, analysts and operational team to make decisions based on rational data. Successful business executives are already using these tools which has given major benefits to their business. Also, it improves the overall operations of the business and makes it more efficient and profitable.

Why do you need Business Intelligence?

Let’s discuss how BI can help your business grow.

  • – With an effective use of BI, you can gather business information and convert that into actionable insights that will ultimately improve competitive intelligence. This allows business leaders to make business decisions strategically based on logical data and numbers.

  • – BI software can help your business identify new trends, new business opportunities, identify buying patterns, understanding customer behavior and predicting future market trends.

  • – With BI tools you can eliminate the complexities of storing data at different locations. BI allows you to integrate all business data in your workplace in different formats. This saves you from the hassle of maintaining data on different softwares.

  • – Using BI, you can make your business strategies more composed and effective. Based on your performance data you can make effective plans and strategies that are personalized and more specific in order to elevate your business.

  • – With interactive dashboards, you can make all the complex business understandable. Dashboards include both customer related data as well as your business insights. Also, dashboards will give a single consolidated view of your business and customers.

Conclusion

As we all live in a highly digitalized and competitive business environment, it is important to understand the power of data. Furthermore, leverage the available business tools, prepare personalized strategies based on the data and make your business data driven.

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Data-Driven Organization: What is the importance?

In the current business landscape, most companies are aspiring towards becoming data-driven organizations. But is it that easy to become one? Well to become a data-driven organization you have to cross many barriers and challenges. It is not an overnight process, it requires hard work, consistency, persistence, and resilience. 

What is a Data-driven organisation?

Organizations that make their business strategies and decisions based on the data instead of relying on intuitions or opinions are data-driven. The process is automated using software that prepares reports, conducts analysis reviews. Business leaders make decisions that require minimal or in some cases no human intervention.

Whether you like it or not to making better-informed decisions requires the support of accurate data. That is one thing that will separate you from the organizations that are struggling to amplify their business performance. Though it’s not easy for organizations to come out of their traditional work culture and adapt to the change. They have a years-long setup which will take a much longer time to adjust to this new change of work. But many dynamic organizations are open to new challenges and are making continuous efforts to evolve their practices to current business dynamics. 

The last two years were quite critical for business due to the pandemic and the new challenges it gave. During this time, the importance of data was even valued more by business leaders and was a blessing in disguise for others to understand the importance of data, reports, and facts. However, now things are back to normal. Companies need to work hard and make their data culture strong. There will be no shortcuts to this, it will take time, effort, and dedication. With a flexible approach and willingness to learn new things, organizations will eventually learn how to embrace data. This is a perfect time if you haven’t started already, data, science, and facts are increasingly becoming more important than ever. 

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How to use XLOOKUP function in Excel?

A new function is introduced in Office 365 which is “XLOOKUP” a modern replacement of previous functions “VLOOKUP”, “HLOOKUP” and “LOOKUP”. This modern function allows locating specific entries in a large array of data. Whereas, the previous similar function VLOOKUP only allows searching for single cells in a spreadsheet.

XLOOKUP allows you to search for data in a horizontal or vertical array and finds a matching value in some other row/column. This will give you an exact matching of the data you have searched for. 

Here is the XLOOKUP function:

=XLOOKUP(Lookup_value, lookup_array, return_array, [if_not_found], [match,mode], [search_mode])

The first 3 inputs are compulsory, while the other three are optional.

XLOOKUP fEATURES

XLOOKUP VS VLOOKUP 1

If you are not using XLOOKUP already, I strongly recommend replacing use of VLOOKUP with it, you are going to like the experience.

If you have anything more to add or any questions do mention in the comments.

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New UAE Labor Laws Highlights

On November 16, 2021, the UAE government announced significant changes in employment laws. Federal Decree-Law No 33 of 2021 on the Regulation of Labour Relations (New Law), will come into effect from February 1, 2022, replacing the Federal Law No. (8) of 1980 (as amended).

The New UAE Labor Laws applies to all employers and employees of the private sector. This includes companies established in the UAE mainland and free zones, regulated by the Ministry of Human Resources and Emiratisation (MoHRE). However, some free zone companies that have exceptions are the ones based in Abu Dhabi Global Market (ADGM) and Dubai International Financial Centre (DIFC), as they have their separate employment legislation. 

Some of the significant UAE labor law changes include:

Fixed Employment Terms

Under the new labor law, unlimited contracts are abolished and will be replaced with fixed terms contracts for a maximum period of 3 years not more than that. However, the contract can be renewed for either the same or lesser duration. 

Equality, Non-Discrimination and Harassments

New labor law clearly prohibits any kind of discrimination such as religion, caste, race, color, sex, national origin, ethnic origin, or any disability. Moreover, employees shall enjoy their rights of equal workplace opportunities and will also be protected by law in case of any form of sexual harassment or violence.

New work modules recognized

Other than the traditional work models, new work modules are recognized and separated them into 4 different categories: 

  1. Full-time work
  2. Part-time work
  3. Temporary work
  4. Flexible work

Probation

The probation period has been specified under the new law which is for 6 months. However, during the probation period, the employer must provide 14 days’ notice to terminate an employee. On the contrary, if an employee wants to change jobs during the probation period he must provide a 14 days notice or one month’s notice if they wish to leave the country.

Maternity Leave

Under the new law, a woman with one year’s continuous services with her employer is entitled to 60 days paid maternity leave (Previously 45 days). Maternity leave  benefits are enhanced and will be paid as follows:

  • First 45 days full pay will be paid
  • Remaining 15 days half pay will be paid 

Additionally, an employee will be given extra 30 days leave if the employee’s delivered child requires a full time escort.

End of Service Gratuity

According to the new law, employees who have completed at least one year of continuous service with their employer are entitled to full end-of-service gratuity payment. Another significant change that, end of service gratuity is to be calculated based on working days

Compassionate leave

New labor has introduced compassionate leave for employees. This grants 5 paid leaves in case of any unfortunate event of a death in the family.

The new labor laws adapt modernized employment systems across the UAE. The authorities are required to ensure that all employers and employees are compliant with the latest regulations. 

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Business Intelligence Reporting Importance

Business Intelligence (BI) Reporting is driven by technology that helps business leaders analyze information and make data-driven decisions. Business Intelligence incorporates a combination of analytics, data management, and reporting. Analyzing critical data points of business has become easier with BI reporting process.

Should decisions be driven by instinct or by data?

BI is an advanced form of operational and financial reporting that is more detailed, better presented visually and use multiple sources of data in a single dashboard.

Let’s look at the BI reporting benefits:

  • Increased workflow speed
  • Accurate reporting, analysis and planning
  • Accurate business decisions
  • Improved data quality
  • Operational optimization and forecasting
  • Cost Optimization
  • Increased revenues
  • Increased competitive advantage

Why Business Intelligence reporting?

Let’s say you have all the findings and data analysis with you, but if you can’t translate that information then it’s meaningless for your business. This is where BI reporting comes. It presents data in digestible formats. The most significant aspect of BI reporting is the interactivity factor. Individuals can explore data on their own without any complexities involved.

With dashboards and data visualizations, businesses can evaluate their business performance and build their new strategy. BI reporting not only focuses on tracking but also includes forecasting based on predictive analysis and AI which can save valuable time for business leaders to make critical decisions. Additionally, BI reporting highlights multiple angles of business that are important to consider in business growth.

However, it’s high time that organizations eliminate guesswork from their business planning and go for a comprehensive and data-driven decisions approach. Also, utilizing the available BI tools will make your operating system more efficient and give you an edge over your competitors. Lastly, empower your organization, make it stronger, efficient and amplify your business success.

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Workplace culture: How to build positive environment?

Building a positive workplace culture for employees is extremely important. Amid the pandemic, organizations have understood the importance of employees’ well-being and have made their workplace culture flexible. Also, organizations are now prioritizing and focusing more on building a workplace environment in which employees feel safe, inspired, and more productive. Focusing on creating a positive and strong work environment will ensure business growth.

In many organizations, employees have excessive work pressures due to multiple deadlines. This affects their mental capacity and often results in burnout. Therefore, organizations must have proper communication with their employees, motivate them, and define the company’s goals and strategies clearly.

Importance of positive workplace culture

Every company is unique and has a different workplace culture. There is no such thing as a one-size-fits-all template that all organizations need to follow. Workplace culture defines a proper way in which the organization works and how people will behave. This must include your organization’s core values, beliefs formed by the management and leaders. Internal communicators of an organization must communicate these beliefs to all employees to align them with your organization’s vision.

The important reason to build a strong workplace culture is what makes it separate from the successful and average organizations. Furthermore, having a positive culture in the workplace is vital to inculcate a sense of pride and motivation among employees for the hard work and dedication they are doing for the organization. As result, employees will manage to work more efficiently and create more business opportunities for organizations and increased profits. Engaging employees, building workplace relations with effective communication can substantially contribute to employees as well as organization growth.

The organization’s internal communication department must step up and ensure that they are communicating with employees either digitally or in person. Employees must be engaged with the internal activities happening, what new strategies are being implemented and where the company is heading in the future. Employees must be given the flexibility to have access to information from any device and at any time. It is essential to resonate with your employees so that they are able to understand your vision and mission. Leaders, managers, and internal communicators are responsible to bring all employees on one page. Moreover, keeping your entire workplace connected will improve teamwork among employees. Therefore, you should have an easy approach to build a strong and positive workplace culture for your employees and ultimately achieve your business goals.

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Annual financial review: Why is it important?

As you manage your monthly business finances and work towards achieving your financial milestones, it is always a good idea to conduct an annual financial review. This will help analyze your performance and then make adjustments to your financial plan.

For this purpose, conducting an annual financial review is recommended. It gives you a comprehensive view of your company’s financial performance, and evaluation of your success, and identifies any loopholes in your financial strategies. More importantly, a financial review is essential to revise your implemented financial plans and readjust your priorities and goals according to current business dynamics.

Aspects covered in review

The annual financial review covers an in-depth analysis of your business, your overall finances including your income, expenses, investments, profit, saving goals, and other key points. Moreover, this process also includes detecting overall risks to your business and identifying areas that are working well or blocking your way towards achieving financial growth.

Getting professional help is recommended rather than conducting this process on your own. The reason is, a professional has comprehensive knowledge and experience of financial management. He can give new business insights and fresh perspectives which you wouldn’t be able to get on your own. Also, outsourcing financial services gives an unbiased, transparent and clear outlook of your business.

Preparing for Annual financial review

Firstly, hire a professional financial advisor, who has adequate knowledge and can help preview detailed reports for you. The next step is to provide all the relevant documents suggested by your advisor. You can review your current financial strategy and discuss your new goals with your advisor to get his recommendations. Discuss what new goals you are planning to implement, ask questions regarding your current strategies. Keep an open approach to make tweaks and changes in your strategies. Take full advantage of the professionals’ knowledge and benefit your business with an accurate financial system.

Lastly, an annual financial check is an opportunity to look at the big pictures of your company’s finances. This detailed review can help specify your short-term and long-term business goals. This process will save you from financial downturns or sudden decline in implementing plans. 

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Remote working: What is the future?

In 2020, the year began with major uncertainties. Due to the pandemic, remote working popularity skyrocketed globally. The shift to remote working happened overnight with some challenges and hurdles for many organizations. But remote working was a blessing in disguise during the pandemic. As now things are finally returning back to normal globally, what is the future of remote working? Is it here to stay or will it completely vanish from the work culture?.

Demand for remote working is still soaring. The economies have rebounded, lockdowns have ended and yet the remote job posts have not decreased. This is because people liked the idea of flexible working and remote working is still prevailing globally. This has become a popular work arrangement and companies are now changing their work culture with this new adaptation. People are also reevaluating their professional career and looking for a job where they get perks and flexibility of work. The priorities of people and companies both have changed during this time. In addition, a hybrid work approach is now adopted by many companies.

Hybrid work approach

Remote work doesn’t mean that companies are permanently closing their offices. Companies have adopted a middle ground: a hybrid work approach. This gives the freedom to employees to choose whether they want to work from the office or home. They can work at both spaces alternately depending on the work requirement. People can also decide a workplace which best suits them. This work approach doesn’t put any pressure on people as it’s not rigid and allows flexible working. Companies still prefer to have on-site meetings for building strategies, brainstorming on projects and for team building exercises. While on other days, employees can work from home on their projects as per their comfort.

What does the future hold?

Pandemic has proven that work can be done remotely and efficiently with the same level of productivity. This shows that remote working is here to stay. However, it does require new policies, improved digital infrastructure, and freeing office space. Most importantly, strict cyber security policies must be implemented to make remote work more secure and eliminate the risks permanently. Companies should consider giving training for remote working and facilitating remote workers with the right tools. Now, we will have to wait and see what new remote work developments will happen in 2022.