White Papers

Client: Capital Partners

Confident Future: Creating a sound financial future for women after divorce - Published June 2010

Excerpt:

Introduction

No one enters into a marriage contemplating divorce. Separating a shared life presents a challenging situation combined with emotional upheaval. Few things undermine financial security like the breakdown of a relationship. When any degree of wealth is part of the equation, the difficulties of ending a marriage increase.

Management of shared financial resources is often delegated to one partner, commonly the husband. Women experiencing the break-up of a marriage face new financial obligations. Without the benefit of trusted advisers to guide them through complicated and sometimes overwhelming circumstances, the divorce exacts a heavier toll than necessary.

How does a woman retain her lifestyle and ensure a sound financial future when her marriage ends?

Achieving Financial Independence: Personal Advice for Freehills Partners - Published February 2010

Excerpt:

The Challenges Faced by Freehills Partners

A partner business at Freehills is essentially a cash-flow business. When the partner quits working, the business ceases. Typically, the only asset of a partner business at Freehills is the value of future earnings. Those earnings decrease with both current and future spending.

Becoming a partner removes pressure from personal finances. Managed well, the years spent at Freehills adequately support a generous lifestyle throughout retirement.

If monetary concerns are not present, what is preventing a partner from obtaining financial independence?

Client: Ryan Briggs

What is Brand? - Published December 2009

Excerpt:

Executive Summay

We live and work in a brand culture. Whether we recognise it or not, our customers and prospects make decisions based on their opinions of your brand. Even if we wanted to, we can’t avoid it. According to Dr. Stephen Downes, postgraduate lecturer in brand management and advertising at RMIT, a brand is a “set of associations in the mind of the customer. Brand lives in the mind.”

Practical Advice for Making Social Media Work for Your Company - Published September 2009

Request a free copy of this report - a $75 value - by filling out my contact form and state the Social Media Whitepaper in the "comments" section.

Excerpt:

Introduction

Social media is quickly becoming a vital tool for business. Also known as social marketing, social networking and Web 2.0, the buzz around social media is impossible to avoid. The problem is the maze of products and surrounding hype make it hard to know how to engage with your clients and prospects. With a blurred line between personal and business usage, many people are nervous to enter the fray for fear of doing more harm than good.

This paper is developed for business owners or people that have marketing responsibilities in their job. It’s also suitable for anyone that wants to learn more about social media and successfully use it in their professional lives.

Client: info-tech research group

Application Software Testing: An IT Managers Guide - Published 2001

Excerpt:

Why "testing for success" doesn't work

Testing is a destructive process. It requires that the person doing the testing have a mindset that finds fault with a program or a system. Systems Analysts and Application Programmers (otherwise known as Developers for the purposes of this discussion) historically have been relied upon for testing the applications that they develop. Analysis and programming are creative pursuits and the person that is attracted to these professions will view themselves as creative people. The first problem with testing is that the Developer wants his system to work. Developers are very good at proving this. They're lousy at proving that they don't function as needed.

This is where the problem comes in.

Developing Application Test Plans - Published 2002

Excerpt: 

Defining a Test Plan

Taking a practical approach to test planning means doing away with standard definitions and focusing on the desired result. Importantly, the planning should be done early in the development cycle when the IT manager can get consensus and commitment from the entire team including Development, Testing, Product Support, Customer, and Management. Ron Patton says it best in his book called Software Testing:

The test plan is simply a by-product of the detailed planning process that's undertaken to create it. It's the planning process that matters, not the resulting document.

View the test plan as a development aid and you'll begin to realize a valuable asset in your delivery cycle. Take the ad hoc planning out of the hands of each of the project participants and allow your test team to create a strong document that will guide the entire project to success. The test plan should define the project, not document it for posterity.