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A found a great article, The 5 Challenges of the Intermediate Entrepreneur, which succinctly outlines five of the challenges that most entrepreneurs face. The blog post is written by Wendy Piersall, CEO and founder of Sparkplugging.com who has over 8 years’ of entrepreneurial experience and is a writer for the Entrepreneur Magazine Blog Network.

Go check it out…

If you haven’t heard about Slideshare yet and you have been using hacked together code or a slow loading work around to host your PowerPoint slides on your website than you are in for a nice treat.

Slidehsare is a very cool Powerpoint sharing web service that converts your Powerpoint slides and converts them into Flash slideshows. You can then easily embed them in your blogs or share with your buddies. The slideshow loads right inside your web browser using the Macromedia Flash plugin.

It is really easy to set up and the whole process (slides to embedding) is very intuitive. You will be hosting your slides in minutes with a few simple steps.

1. Upload your Powerpoint (also works with Open Office presentations) using their web-based interface to the Slideshare website.
2. Give the slides a short description
3. Attach tags to the presentation.
4. Slideshare converts your presentation into a Flash format.
5. Copy the auto generated embed code and load up on your site or blog.

Take a peek at Slideshare.net or go to this cool slide presentation titled: 100 Attributes of an Entrepreneur. Please let me know what you think of this new Slideshare application? I would appreciate your thoughts and comments.

A cool and inspirational video on entrepreneurship - only view this video if you are ready to be motivated…

As owners of MikWright Ltd., a Charlotte, North Carolina-based greeting card company, Tim Mikkelsen, 45, and Phyllis Wright-Herman, 44, employ a group of friends and neighbors to glue old family photos to off-size greeting cards.

The duo then writes humorous, snarky captions for the 1950s, ’60s and ’70s-era pictures. Sounds like a simple, old-fashioned kind of operation, right? Well, it is, except for the fact that the company sells its products in more than 10,000 retail locations around the world and generated sales of $1.3 million last year.

Despite the fact that they could easily afford to mass-produce their products, the owners feel it’s important to keep the same production methods they’ve used since launching the company in 1992. “There’s not a machine that can guarantee the quality control that a human can,” says Mikkelsen. “We’re not looking to be this huge conglomerate. It would change who we are and what we do.”

Entrepreneur

Entrepreneur J.A. Tosti created Left Lane Drivers of America as a diverse, very loosely affiliated group of drivers who share the common objective of reducing the Left Lane congestion on our freeways and multi-lane highways by politely encouraging slow drivers to move over.

In order to actually help slower drivers move right, LeftLaneDrivers.org offers windshield decals (USD $29) which boldly and prominently display their unified sentiment in the offending driver’s rear view mirror. The decal, which reads “MOVE OVER” when viewed through a rear view mirror also has a large arrow showing the slower driver where to go.

“Although the sign minces no words, the idea here is not to be rude or pushy, but to offer slow drivers a gentle prod, reminding them of the need to either pick up the pace or make room for those who choose to drive a bit faster,” Tosti explains. The bottom line, he claims, simply is highway courtesy and safety, as well as “doing one’s part to help traffic flow smoothly.”

From speech impediments to deafness, a growing number of people with disabilities are shunning the corporate world and starting their own companies.

After a battle with sinus cancer, Dawn Hampton was wary of re-entering the workforce. The eye patch and dental prosthesis she was forced to wear — the disease claimed an eye, cheekbone, and several teeth — left her self-conscious about her appearance and speech.

“I thought no one would hire me because of what I look like,” Hampton says.

So she decided to become an entrepreneur.

Hampton, who had worked in hairdressing, retail, and construction prior to her diagnosis, used her first-hand knowledge of insurance claims to launch Ph.D. Organizational Services, a Santa Barbara, Calif.-based firm that processes reimbursements for patients and physicians.

Concerned about corporate hiring practices and the potential for career advancement, Americans with speech impediments, hearing impairments, and other disabilities are opting to go into business for themselves. Read the rest of this entry »