Succeeding at Business in Southeast Asia

CHAPTER 11An Asian Strategy for Small Businesses

Small business is the backbone of society, yet many opportunities elude small businesses because they do not have the experience or wherewithal to evaluate all of their opportunities. Sometimes businesses miss out on their best chances in business because they stick to what they know best.

Small businesses offer a unique perspective on business growth, especially international business growth. Innovation often happens in the international market because the options afforded to larger companies aren’t available to small businesses. A small business can’t afford to place extra employees on a project, despite its potential, because they don’t have the available manpower so they find different ways to get similar results, thus you have International PEOs or other outsourced services that didn’t exist previously. Instead they find innovative ways to do things at less expense and/or in a less time-intensive manner. Sometimes this works gangbusters, and sometimes it’s not the right decision and the result is slow or no growth. Another result of the lack of available employees to support growth is that success comes much more slowly to a small business. The inability to move quickly—unless you have a new technology or innovation—is an obvious downside because it’s nearly impossible to time markets, and therefore getting to market first, which may make the difference between success and failure, is elusive. Some options for small businesses ...