How to do Asset Management Yourself

It’s not enough that you work every day. If you want to become rich, you also need to invest your money so that it will earn for itself. This is the same concept of putting your money in the bank but the low interest rate that banks give is not enough to combat the rising inflation rates. In fact, if you really want to double or triple your money, experts suggest that you put up a business. However, this is not an option for most people, especially those that are afraid of taking risks. Thatís when asset management comes in.

Asset management is the professional management of your money and other assets like stocks, bonds and even real estate for better profit. This is often done by financial advisors and portfolio managers for a fee or most often a percentage of the earnings in a period of time. This fee is what makes most people, especially retirees, shy away from hiring asset management people.

If you know the economic environment and understand investment terms, you can actually take care of your own assets. Here are some tips on how to manage your money and properties yourself.

1. Ask people

Do not be ashamed to ask people for advice or recommendations. Start with the people that you know. Ask friends or colleagues. If you know people who are good in business, approach them. They will be wells of information. This is because they are probably doing their investing themselves and will know business investments that are really good. Plus, these people in the industry are the first to know about stock news and gossips; so you will have first knowledge of the goings on.

Ask them whatís the latest stock that they bought or what investment opportunities do they know that can yield a lot of money. Even if they are not doing asset management themselves, they can probably mention a couple of companies or investment funds that their managers recommended. This way, you are benefitting from asset managersí wisdom and expertise without having to pay for the fee.

2. Do your research

One reason why a lot of people hire mangers and not do the investing themselves is the fact that the world is filled with people who want to rob you of your money. There are a lot of con artists with schemes that seem picture perfect at first glance. Earn money in 6 months with minimum investment, everything will seem too good. One advice, check it out. If something seems to good to be true, it probably is.

Before you invest in something, make sure that you have done some background checks on the company running it. Looking at their websites or visiting their offices are not enough. You need to look thoroughly at every aspect of the company. Check the transactions that it has made over the years. The number of years that the company has been operating is a pretty good clue too. Stay away from new companies as much as you can. They may be operated by con artists.

3. Diversify

This is actually what most people in asset management do. Do you know the old saying “Don’t put all your eggs in one basket.” Heed that. Put your money in different business investments. That way, when something happens with one, you still have the other one.

4. Keep track of your assets

In the broad view, computer progams are in 3 main categories: (1) word Processing (2) Database and (3) Spreadsheet. Of these, Database and Spreadsheets work well for asset management. Database to keep track of what you have. Spreadsheet (recommended) to list what you have and be able to recalculate values, costs, etc.

5. World view

As of the late 1970’s or early 1980’s the world started to break down into two classes of people: (1) those who are computer literate and (2) those who are unemployed.

Think about that and where you stand in “The Big Picture.”

6. Avoid buying “on margin” and leveraging:

A big factor in the stock market crash of 1929 was buying “on margin.” This is a term meaning that a stock is bought on credit, where the buyer might put up 10% of the price and was actually taking out a loan for the other 90%. After the crash, the US Government passed new laws to limit this practice but it still happens.

Today there is another term, “Leveraging” which means that people use the equity in stocks they own (but may have bought on margin) as collateral for acquiring more stocks.

This is an extremely dangeous practice, especially for the small investor. If they do this, they are no longer risking “money they don’t need” but everything they have.

A true story: In Florida there was a “small” investor whose portfolio had reached a value of one million dollars. He was an active trader and the brokerage firm he was working through gave him his own office and computer setup. But he was leveraged to the hilt and didn’t really own much of anything. When “Black Monday” hit, the brokerage firm gave him a “margin call” of about $20,000. This meant he had to comeup with $20k to cover the full prices of stocks he had bought on margin. They must have known almost to the dollar how much cash he could get. Once he tapped himself out to pay the margin call, they glommed onto the cash and immediately hit him with another margin call which he couldn’t even begin to pay. So he realized that he was going to lose his entire protfolio and there was nothing he could do about it. He brought a gun into the Brokerage firm’s offices and shot as many of them as he could before he shot and killed himself.

It was discovered later that he had been a criminal and was part of the witness protection program. This illustrates the dangers of buying “on margin” and “leveraging.”

7. A saying:

There is a saying, “You make your money when you buy. Not when you sell.” This means that if you buy something cheap enought, you can’t fail to make money later when it appreciates and you decide to sell it.

Another idea is this: “It’s not money until you sell it. Until then, it is only marks on paper.” This is particularly true of stocks.

8. Stock market, if and when to get out

If the market starts to drop, you have 2 basic choices, get out or ride it out. Remember that if you decide to get out, sell orders are not executed until the end of the trading day. So, say, you see a trend you don’t like at 8:05 AM EST and give the “sell” order. During the day your stocks drop, say, 550 points. You will eat that entire loss because your sell order will be executed at the end of the day at the price of the stock at that time. Not at 8:05 AM EST at the price it was when you first gave the sell order.

A lot depends upon world news and how you think the market will do over a period of weeks or months rather than on a single day’s performance. If you are pretty sure there is going to be a long down trend, it is probably best to get out to stop the bleeding and then get back in when it bottoms out.

9. Watch out for signs of Market Wrecking:

Intentional Market Wrecking is done by rich and super-rich stock owners. It starts with the sale of some huge block of stock or portfolio. Such a sale will automatically start the entire market on a downward spiral. The original seller can stop selling after a 5 or 10 point drop, once momentum has been established. If a long term wrecking is decided upon, as in the 1929 crash, each time the market starts to rally, the rich and super-rich wreckers will sell short on other blocks of stock. Their resources are so great that they can keep doing this for years.

After a while, the frequency of attempted rallies will slow down as the market reaches a point of exhaustion. Margin buyers and those leveraged will be wiped out quite early in this process. Add bank failures, foreclosures on mortgages, massive unemployment and other related financial reverses and you can see how a long term depression can be created.

Why would someone do this? (1) because they can (2) this is a way the rich and super-rich can remind everyone of the power they wield (3) The people who start this will stop selling early and “ride out” the crash they have created. Once the market bottoms out they can start buying assets at bargain basement prices and the big losers in the crash are all the small investors. Think of this as “A harvesting of the turkeys.”

Remember the words of John D. Rockefeller: “There’s no such thing as an accident. If something happens, you can bet that somebody made it happen.”

 

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Fixed Asset Management

Fixed Asset Management

Fixed asset management is an accounting process that seeks to track fixed assets for the purposes of financial accounting, preventive maintenance, and theft deterrence. This applies to all industries because doing so makes the workplace more productive.

Without fixed asset management, the equipment and resources of the company are not used both effectively and efficiently. Think of it like a car. If you do not have the oil changed, it will break down. The net effect is being able to save money instead of spending it on repairs which could have been avoided in the first place.

This is why companies take various steps to manage these closely. For instance, machines that are used undergo regular maintenance. If anything needs to be replaced or replenished, this is ordered well in advance so there will not be any disruptions at the workplace.

If the machines are already obsolete and there are newer models that can do a better job, management must consider the costs of buying new or maintaining the old one. In recent times, new equipment is purchased to avoid being left behind the competitors.

Management also has to coordinate with the various departments in the company to see how each one is doing. This is done on a monthly basis to determine whether the company is achieving growth. If it is not, find out why and then do something about it.

For large companies that need to ship goods nationwide, management has to check on their logistical support. Will it be cheaper to maintain their own set of trucks or should they outsource this to someone else?

If the company is experiencing some hard times because of a few subsidiary companies that are not pulling their weight, management has to decide whether to sell subsidiaries or find a way to improve them. Should there be an opportunity to gain something, then they also have to consider if this will be beneficial to their portfolio. Will such a sale put them at a competitive disadvantage? What capability will they lose through such a sale?

Companies also let their auditing teams conduct an inventory to take into account their fixed assets. Sometimes, they may need outside help to do it and there are a number of established companies that have the manpower to do exactly that. They can even suggest to management improvements that need to be done and may well be worth the expense of hiring seasoned professionals.

In order for management to see how well the company is doing, the asset management data has to be put on paper. These days, this means computerizing everything so everyone in management will be able to give their input and agree to a suitable plan.

Fixed asset management is what every company needs to survive in the 21st century. This will serve as a guide whenever money has to be used to buy things or whether the funds of a certain project have to be diverted elsewhere.

Before any decision is made, they have to ask themselves a series of questions. For instance, will this be good for the business long term? How much can we make? How much do we stand to lose? Is this the latest technology around? Is this the best thing in the market today?

These are just some of the questions that companies have to ask themselves in order to practice effective fixed asset management.

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Asset Management and Human Resource Management

What is asset management? It is a business process and a decision making structure that covers various things in order to come up with cost effective investment decisions. For this to work, you need to practice good human resource management by hiring the right people with the right qualifications to get the job done.

This job falls to the human resources department as they are, after all, the ones in charge of hiring. In the past, the people who worked in this department simply gave the employees their paychecks. But that is not the only thing they should do. They are supposed to train and develop the employees so they feel that they are part of something bigger.

Psychology is important in choosing people for this department. You can’t afford opionated, judgmental people. You can’t afford bullies. You can’t afford sexual predators. And the list can be much longer, including alcoholics and drug abusers, etc. At this point someone might ask, “So who’s left?”

The professionals who are supposed to do this should see themselves as two things. First as a strategic partner and second, a agent for change. Strategic partner because without them, a company will not prosper. A changing agent because it is through them that the employees can become better individuals.

With that, you can say that human resource management is the bridge between the administration and the employee. For a company to practice true human asset management, their human resource department has to do the following:

First, they must have an active role in organizational planning. To make this happen, they must be given the power to dictate what is needed in the planning phase including the necessary resources.

The human resource department should be able to recruit employees that are best suited for the organization by being given a free hand as to how this will be achieved. This includes the selection process which involves the testing and the administering component.

Human asset management can only be effective if the human resource department is able to produce change. This is done by seeing what needs to be improved on in an employee and then coming up with programs that will help him or her to make the desired changes. This includes, of course, facilitating and overseeing the training. If this was never done before, it should be evaluated to see if there are any flaws to be avoided in the future.

Letís not forget the basics such as traditional personnel administration including administering wages and benefits, time management, employee cost management as well as employee performance review and appraisals.

Human asset management is serious business because how well the company does depends on the people they hire to fill various positions. If they hire someone and he or she is not qualified, problems will occur. Niether can you afford to reject a qualified person because of some minor personality quirk or Government efforts to blackball them. If the company has a high turnover, money is also wasted because of the time, training and money that were invested in that person.

To keep employees happy and motivated, they also have to come up with programs that will enhance their skills even if they should be tempted by offers from competitors.

Asset management is a combination of different things. These include cash, bonds, stocks, property and people. If you want your business to prosper, you must have an effective human resource management team in place that will take care of it. Otherwise, there will be problems within the organization. People will quit and when your competitors see that, this can be used to their advantage to the point that they may even take over your business.

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Asset Management Software: the Secret of Efficient Businesses

Naturally, all businesses need to manage their physical and non-physical assets regardless of their size. Call centers, manufacturing firms, sales companies and other corporate offices need asset management. Everything needs to be watched from the point of choosing the assets, initiating and maintaining them, up to the point of finding no use for them and disposing of the assets.

All these processes are important in determining the efficiency and organization that goes into running a company. Without making the right choices for asset management software, many disadvantages may be posed to the optimization of profits and to the business in general.

Using Software in Businesses

First of all, the assets we’re talking about here are virtually anything the company owns from office supplies, company vehicles and machines to copyrights and patents. What this software does is keep a record of all assets for the company. After all, mechanical assets depreciate over time and need to be disposed of when of no further use. Decisions must be made to replace them or not, depending on need. Software will have updates, sometimes fequently. Office supplies are consumed and need replenishment.

The company doesn’t need to hire people to keep track of maintenance and replacement schedules, resulting in too many people on the payroll and more expenses to waste money upon. With asset management software, you can be sure of the actual condition of your assets and that they are replaced efficiently when they need to be.

Once you have the software, the only manual thing you have to be doing is to run the asset management program and make sure that all assets are accounted for and all changes in their condition are reported to the respective people in charge. More importantly, in the event of emergencies that cause certain losses in assets, the company will have a detailed report of what they own and what they lost, all organized by the protocols of the software.

Specialized Software Available

There are three common kinds of asset management software being used in the business world today. Automated data collection software is used as a time log of all processes involving the assets. Inquisitive software is responsible for checking out IT systems, codes, hardware systems, software and other digital assets. Repository software has the more clerical type of job in that it archives and organizes data files for easy access, uploading and retrieval.

Making Choices through your Options on Asset Management Software

Before you begin browsing through the different kinds of software available for your company, the first thing you need to ask yourself is if the company needs it. Are certain processes being held up because of delays in maintenance and repairs? Do you find that there are discrepancies in the way certain assets of the company are being managed? If so, then you can try your hand at investing in this type of software.

There are some aspects that you may need to be looking into when you decide on it. How much does the software cost, and is it worth it or will you end up spending more than if you have people manually managing assets? What kinds of services do you need the software to be doing for your company?

How many people in the company will be running the asset management program? Is it available for international use or is it limited to local usage? With the answers to these questions, you will be able to find the asset management software that is perfect for optimizing the business processes in your company.

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Asset Management in the 21st Century

These days, asset management has taken a turn for the better. And this is to the advantage of most people who are involved in asset management. There are many advantages to asset management, and they continue to multiply in the 21st century. In fact, they are even taking a turn for growing exponentially. Here are some of the advantages that are uniquely available to asset managers in the 21st century.

More upgraded techniques of managing:

Managing is made easier now, when you come to evaluate the available technology. But the natures of operations and output demands have become just as complex. So the changes are hardly felt. The upgraded techniques are still advantageous in the sense that they are able to keep up with the demands that are imposed in this technological age.

It takes a team, not an individual:

Since the demands are much higher for asset management these days, it takes a team to be able to build it up. So, having an individual do the asset management may not be exactly the best option. A person will still need assistants especially if it is a big company. Now the good thing about having a team work with the management of assets is that there can be constant monitoring and less excuse for lapses in the updates or inventories. If properly synergized, the different assets of the team members can all work together for the good of asset management.

Technology tools:

Tools of technology make the work much faster and more convenient. What one could have done in the past by physically transporting one’s self from one department to another may be done by group messages and computer networks. Plus, monitoring is also much greater at lower increments and friendly to the different people tasked to manage the assets of the organization.

Evaluation at smaller increments:

The evaluation at smaller increments helps detect subtle changes in the liquidation of different company assets. The more frequent the monitoring, the better the quality of outputs. The good thing is that smaller increments can always be adjusted in case there are other things needed to be accomplished within the company. Also, smaller increments ensure that problems that arise will be quickly identified and managed.

Accuracy is enhanced:

Given the metrics from the asset management tools, the accuracy is enhanced and it gives more room for other tasks. Better accuracy is now within reach since it is measured by high technology gadgets. There will be less room for estimations and other inaccurate means of obtaining actual statistics. This will render more integrity to the asset management plan.

Sometimes pen and paperless:

As the case is currently operating in different countries, the environments are already pen and paperless in general. There are more people who find the convenience of storing data in less bulky packages. There will also be no need for hassles in the form of archived documents which are hard to classify.

Asset management is definitely better these days than in the past. While people may have to adjust to a new or updated technology, it is still the best option when it comes to effectively managing assets. Old techniques may still work, but when there is a better option presented for the new users of asset management, why not take the opportunity?

 

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Asset Management in a Volatile Economy

Volatile as the economy may be, asset management may still stand and survive to keep your company in top shape. Organizations and companies with proper asset management tend to go farther in terms of productivity and results. The good thing is that asset management is a holistic effort of the components, and is something that is really meant to be shared within the bounds of the company. You donít need to outsource asset managers to do it for you if you know how to go about it. Here are some strategies that will ensure that your asset management will withstand any economic storms.

Asset Management Strategy 1: Go for the solid assets

By solid assets, we mean assets that are not easily threatened by changes. If you have some stocks, which are highly volatile in nature, have some investments on established entities as well. This may oppose the “Nothing ventured, nothing gained” adage but a certain measure of security is still vital for success.

Asset Management Strategy 2: Ensure support from the higher ups

The higher officers of your company must support your endeavor to manage the assets of the company if it is to materialize fully. The support will also prompt other members in the company to be mindful of the undertaking.

Asset Management Strategy 3: Set your priorities

You must always have an outline. What are your priorities? If your priorities are to establish oneís security, you might have to be more rigid with your asset management tactics. On the other hand, if you are planning to venture out and expand your company, you may have to manage your assets in a way that it is more open for change and risk. However, you must make risks that are calculated and make sure that you can bounce back should things go badly.

Asset Management Strategy 4: Easy does it

Make changes gradual, if you are to introduce them. Donít shock the system with revolutionary changes. In order for it to last longer, there needs to be at least a period of transition for any undertaking. The same thing goes with asset management.

Asset Management Strategy 5: Determine patterns and learn from them

If there have been instances that occur again, make sure that the current system is able to learn from its past mistakes. This self-learning quality is one of the ways in which you can ensure that the asset management system will be able to endure even the toughest economic shakings. It would be completely useless otherwise.

Asset Management Strategy 6: Get the best tools available to you

If you are talented in managing assets but undermanned when it comes to resources, you may be in for a losing trend. The technology today enables you to manage everything from the desk and without much hassle. So make the best use of the technology when it is made available for you.

Asset Management Strategy 7: Review the facts regularly

Regular review is the lifeline of asset management. If your last inventory was a decade ago, then your assessment may not be at par with the demands in a company over time. Update the inventories, keep stock and review the statistics regularly. Set up systems for this. Any changes in inventory should be promptly entered in your database. In that way, should hard times come, you will find that you have a ready answer because you know your status fully well.

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Asset Management for Business in the Digital World

The traditional definition of asset management is that it is a well-organized process of maximizing the utility of assets for a long period of time with the objective of providing benefits to the community. It involves engineering and business concepts in that it maintains the quality and usability of assets through an engineered framework. Today, it has greatly progressed in the way it gets the job done. In this article, you’ll find an overview of the process of managing assets and how it has evolved to meet the public’s needs in the 21st century — a digital age.

Functions of Basic Management of Assets:

If you work in the field of managing assets, you’ll be expected to work on an asset from full to zero potential. This means that you are responsible for seeking out the necessity for such an asset based on public demand, initiating and maintaining the operation of the asset throughout the time of its usability, as well as the termination of the asset when it has no more use or provides no benefits to the community or to the company.

Digital Management of Assets in a Business:

Manual management of assets may sound like a tedious job considering that it must be looked after from beginning to end. With that in mind, one of the many brainchilds of the digital age is digital asset management. It has become a useful tool especially for big and branched out organizations that have resorted to electronic management of data and files for a more efficient time schedule in the workspace.

This doesn’t mean that only multi-national corporations and worldwide franchises can use the digital process. Even small businesses can utilize this kind of software to cut on labor costs and other expenses that are unnecessary and take up a lot of time. After all, what’s a digital age without adhering to the times?

In the context of a business, for example, DAM or digital asset management essentially includes uploading and storage of files, backing up files for safety, and renaming and organizing files in folders for easy retrieval. They’re easy for computers but tedious and somewhat boring for people to do all day.

There are different kinds of software that businesses and organizations employ for DAM, but are too complicated to explain here without needing computer software jargon. The most important thing to know is that DAM is one of the necessary business strategies to utilize considering the increasing demands of consumers today.

DAM helps a company run more smoothly with automated protocols and quicker responses. They are able to acquire, maintain and dispose of assets at a faster and more efficient pace. Press kits, sales kits, marketing and advertising data, presentations and videos are easier to get with DAM because of its archiving features and multimedia libraries.

Having DAM to sort out all the data files mentioned previously can cut off a big chunk off the company’s time. Now there is more time for businesses to focus on brainstorming for marketing and advertising, optimizing profits and community benefits, among others.

Essentially, DAM helps not only to set the wheels in motion but also to set the pace at full speed, thanks to the continually developing software in cyberspace. More and more businesses, regardless of size or sector, are beginning to see the advantages of investing in digital asset management software for a better and more efficient approach to data management.

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