News

Wikifloods, an online community registry to support the donations of goods and services for people affected by the Queensland floods has been launched by Fitzroy Oxfam Group.

Australia’s unemployment rate has dropped 0.2 percentage points to 5.0 percent in December, putting pressure on businesses to pay higher wages to retain or recruit employees, as announced by the Australian Bureau of Statistics today.

The Financial Planning Association of Australia (FPA) is showing its support for victims of the Queensland floods with the offer of free financial advice to affected residents.

Not only have the Queensland floods devastated whole communities with water damage and loss of life, but predictions are that affected communities will be hit by an increase in unemployment followed by skills shortage as people rebuild forcing hundreds of small businesses to close.

Australia Post in a statement through their website has advised both business and personal customers to hold off posting any non essential mail to regions affected by the Queensland floods.

Given the growing severity of the floods across the south-east in particular, employers must be quick to consider plans for employee safety and their business recovery, according to Paula Maidens, Managing Director of Recruitment Coach, a people management coaching and consulting firm for small-medium businesses.

GST is a hot topic of late, with Gerry Harvey and the Fair Imports Alliance arguing for it to be applied to all online imports under $1,000 as well as the National Retailers Alliance’s small business members joining the campaign.

If you’re thinking about a new franchise opportunity in 2011, the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission suggests prospective franchisees make the most of opportunities to learn about the business model.

Primus Telecom today implemented a dedicated hotline to help customers affected by the ongoing floods in Queensland, providing a single point of contact where people can divert phone lines to an alternative number, receive speedy restoration of phone and internet services and apply to have their bills waived for the flood affected times.

Spend a lot of time working on your own and you can start to feel cut off from the rest of the world and alone. It’s no secret that the quiet can get to you.

For this reason, the risk of isolation for small business owners is very real.

MyCareer has launched a LinedIn app that allows MyCareer users to scrape their existing LinkedIn profile data and match it to potential job opportunities on MyCareer.

Australian small businesses are being blindsided by important changes to workplaces laws that took effect on January 1, according to an industry expert.

University graduates are lying on their resumes when applying for graduate jobs, with a survey of 2,500 Australian university graduates showing that 38 percent openly admit to lying on their resumes.

Small retailers have joined Gerry Harvey’s call for a GST on online imports, with the National Retailers Association, which represents 3,700 businesses joining the Fair Imports Alliance according to The Age.

Power Balance wristbands and pendants have ‘no credible scientific basis’ and have been removed for sale by Power Balance Australia after Australian Competition and Consumer Commission intervention.

Brisbane based small business and digital agency Cru Digital is giving staff 10 hours a week ‘creative time’ to encourage creativity in the workplace.

With the end of the year approaching and many businesses finalising employee remuneration and bonus payouts, employers are urged to use this opportunity to update their employment contracts, particularly provisions applied to confidential information and restraints of trade, which may be either unsatisfactorily drafted, or out of date, according to Harmers Workplace Lawyers.

Australian-born Cafe2U, the world’s largest mobile coffee franchise, is preparing to expand its operations internationally in the US marketplace, after successfully launching the concept run in California’s San Diego region in June 2010.

Australia prides itself on being a ‘fast-follower’ in technology trends and Cloud Computing is no different. Here is a snapshot of what is happening in Australia for SMBs.

Employment figures are biting back in the lead up to the new year with employment rising to pre GFC levels, with part time employees set to save employers’ bacon in 2011.