Consultants Network
Chapter Officers
Chair: Mr. Joseph Levy
Vice Chair: Position Not Filled
Please check the IEEE home page for the meeting notices.
Past Meetings:
April 2, 2021 – Our joint chapter chair of AP / VTS / EMC spoke at the Seattle Electrical Conference as a Power and Energy Consultant
November 4, 2013 – Richard Kay from Health Insurance Authority spoke to us about the latest changes in the Insurance requirements for small businesses and consultants.
October 7, 2013 – We had vibrant meeting with four different consultants/small business workers present about their business or ideas for business.
Friday, December 7, 2012 – Joint meeting with the IEEE Employment Network
Friday, March 30: Employment Network
IEEE
Princeton Central Jersey section
Employment Network
All – Engineers & Professionals – are invited to participate in the
Employment Network of Princeton Central Jersey Section of the IEEE (Institute of Electrical & Electronic Engineers)
The objective is to provide a forum for engineers, technical professionals, and employers as well.
The meeting will provide you with an opportunity
* to discuss the kinds of support that local unemployed members anticipate from IEEE
* to exchange job leads
* to meet agents/HR in local companies
February 20, 2012 at 6:00pm – Relationships in Business and Personal Life
IChen Mei, IEEE PACE PCJS Communications Workshop Chair will speak to the group on – presented: Lookinginto relationships in everyday life, including one with self
Topics included the following:
– Do you wonder if there is a better way to communicate? …..
– Building relationships in everyday life
– How do you deal with conflict?
November 21, 2011 – IEEE Princeton Central Jersey Employment Network
We had the kick-off meeting of Princeton Central Jersey section’s Employment Network of IEEE. We had a greatturnout. There were four companies in attendance who were looking for potential hires.
The network’s main objective is to build a network of engineering professionals and to provide aplatform for both – employers and job seekers – in Central Jersey.
The kick-off meeting dealt with:
- kinds of support that local unemployed members anticipate
- exchanged job leads to help each other
- met with at least 4 job agents in local market
Tuesday, October 11, 2011 – Don Borcherding of NexSummit LLC came back to speak to us on “Achieving On-Time Qualityâ€. Don has developed new Project Management techniques to achieve On Time Quality and gave a very interesting talk.
Monday, May 23, 2011 – Alberto Molina of Suretech.com spoke to our group about Cloud Computing and how we can use it in our business
Tuesday, April 26, 2010 – Yu Oen of Optimal Solutions spoke to our group about the Federal Reserves affect on our personal welfare as well as our business.
Monday, June 7, 2010 – Ken Sickles, Solution Strategy Director at Dow Jones, spoke to our group about Using Social Networking Tools in our Business. Ken showed us how we can make use of Linked In, Facebook, etc. to help market our companies.
Monday, March 1, 2010 – Richard Kay spoke about Health Insurance for Small Businesses.
Richard Kay, owner of Health Insurance Authority, located in Plainsboro. Richard spoke about “The ABC’s of Health Insurance forthe Small Business Owner”. Among the questions he addressed were:
How do I qualify for aGroup Health Plan in NJ? What do I qualify for if I am a Sole Proprietor? What’s the new buzz about “consumer-driven” healthcare?
Why is NJ one of themost expensive states for health insurance? Yes, it was some bleak information for sole-proprietors. However, the new Heath Care SavingsAccount sounds promising for healthy employees.
Tuesday, January 19, 2010 – Matthew Ma of Scientific Works spoke to our group about intellectual property issues. Dr. Ma spoke about practical intellectual property issues from unique perspective ofengineers. Matthew is an IEEE senior member, also the author of the book “Fundamentals of Patenting and Licensing for Scientists andEngineers”, World Scientific, 2009. He is the founder of Scientific Works (http://www.scientificworks.com) that provides IP training for engineers/scientists and patent filing forentrepreneurs and individual inventors.
December 2 2009 – Bob Carullo – of SMART and Drew Marshall – PJCF presented what their organizations aredoing to bring jobs to New Jersey (Bob) and to Princeton area specifically (Drew). They handed out vu-graphs on their organizations. ContactFran if you would like copies.
November 4, 2009 – Dan Crevina of BBB in Trenton, NJ
Mr Crevina speaks to various groups on behalf of the Better Business Bureau to pass alonghis ideas for best practices as well as warning small business owners about the various hazards in running a business. Recently, Mr Crevina has heard from various companies that were victims of Identity Theft. Mr Crevina will speak to us about those difficulties and how to avoid being targeted.
June 9, 2009 – Dolcey Chaplin Esq. DoD Procurement
Dolcey navigated us thru some of the government procurement process. She demonstrated an upgraded website at
Please check it out for information on how to do business with the Federal Government
February 25, 2009 -Katherine Kish and Louis Wagman – Strengthening Central Jersey’s R&D Advantage – Recent Activity of Einstein’s Alley
The goal of Einstein’s Alley is to create jobs and growth, encourage creativity and entrepreneurship,and to make Central NJ the best place to live and to uild new businesses using science and innovation to create value. KatherineKish and Louis Wagman will brought us up to date on recent activities and discussed how their non-profit organization isencouraging the growth of R&D in our neighborhood.
January 27, 2009: Topic “ A tax break for your business today – tax-advantaged retirement plans for consultants and small businessâ€.
Speakers: Yuriah Bailey and Annie Wang.
Mr. Bailey of Pioneer Investments and Annie Wang of Merrill Lynch lead us through an interestingdiscussion of the Uni-K Retirement plan and how it has benefits when compared to Traditional IRAs, SEPs and Roth IRA plans forbusiness owners. Yuriah and Annie had presented some good ideas on retirement planning.
December 1, 2008: Topic: Banking for Consultants and Small Businesses during this financial crisis
Speaker: Mr. Thomas Lanigan
Mr. Lanigan is Vice President of the Bank of Princeton and Hamilton Branch Manger. Mr Lanigan has 30 years of banking experience. Mr Lanigan has worked in small business banking, managed the branches at regional and community banks, after starting his career as anauditor. He has served with the United Way of Mercer County, his local planning board and Notre Dame High School’s Development Council. Mr. Lanigan is a graduate of The College of New Jersey and holds various insurance andsecurities licenses.
November 12, 2008 – Topic: “WHAT’S WHAT? — Patents? Copyrights?, Trademarks? Trade Secrets?â€
Speaker: Mr. Clement A. Berard Jr.
Mr. Berard is an attorney with Dann, Dorfman, Herrell and Skillman. DDHS specializes in the practice of Patent, Trademark,Copyright, and related Trade Secret and Unfair Competition Law, as well as domain name matters, representing clients in the U.S., Japan, and Europe.Technological strengths include mechanics, electronics, computers, chemistry, and biotechnology.
Mr Berard gave a lively talk about the present patent system as well as Copyrights,Trademarks and Trade Secrets. Our attendees had many questions answered.
April 30, 2008- Barry Meyers of The People Source Group presented “Consulting 101, How to
Build a Successful Consulting Practice”. This highly interactivepresentation
addressed marketing realities for s and the nine P’s: Planning,
Product, Professionalism, Place, People, Price, Packaging, Promotion, and
Positioning. At the end, we all completed a 2-page Self-Assessment. Barry gavenumerous examples of each one of the 9 categories.
More info on Barry Meyers and his company can be found at http://www.tpsgco.com
April 2, 2008 – Don Borcherding of NexSummit, LLC
Don Borcherding of NexSummit, LLC will lead a discussion on how to develop more products without moreresources using a profiling method he developed called RISQ. With RISQ you capture how Responsive, Innovative, Strategic and Quality focused you are. He explained how companies lacking in one attributecan improve to become more rounded.
More info on Don and his company can be found at: www.nexsummit.com
February 12, 2008: Snowed out from meeting with Don Borcherding, however, four of us showed up for the business card exchange. Thank you Joe Levy and Gerhard Franz for some good ideas for our group, going forward.
December 10, 2007: With Business coach George Sierchio of Action Business Partners Inc.
We had an informative meeting on December 10. George Sierchio of Action Business Partners led us in a discussion on running a small business from getting more projects, cutting down salescycles, hiring/firing, to time management.
Mr. Sierchio is a successful engineer/IT business owner that has spent the past 4 years specializing incoaching and advising technical people that have jumped into business for themselves.
More info on George Sierchio and his company at: http://www.actionbusinesspartners.com
June 12, 2007: We had a successful Consultant’s Network meeting on June 12 at 5:30 pm. During this meeting about 10 consultants prepared andgave a 5 minute marketing presentation of their service or product.
See link at <http://www.fxoinc.com/IEEE.htm> for our upcoming
consultants network meeting schedule and past meeting notes.
Consultants who presented at this meeting:
- JimFaunceP.E. with Faunce Engineering
- PeteDimitrov-Kuhl with Optimized Photonic Systems, Inc.
- TitiTrandafir with Juvent Medical
- RajTumuluriwith Openstream Inc
- Mitchell M KurinziJrwith Applied Technical And Administrative Services.
- Tony Moore
- Gerhard Franz of A.G. Franz Associates LLC.
- Ross Dennis ofClearsight Research
- WarrenUmholtz
- Francis O’Connell with FXO Inc.
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May 2, 2007 – Dolcey Chaplin from NJIT Defense Procurement Center
Ms. Chaplin outlined for the group the exciting opportunities available for getting federal contracts. Ms.Chaplin took us through the registration process with the CCR (Central Contractor Registration) and how to be ready to receive federalcontracts. There is some paperwork to do on our part. Dolcey’s office is setup to help us do this registration and find out about what contracts are out there.
A key hint we learned is to search the websites of your potential military or federal government clients for varioustopics that other contractors are working. Usually when you see a request for proposal, the buyer already has a vendor in mind. The key is to makerelationships with the buyers and tell them what your company can do. Ask to speak with a chief engineer and assess what problems theyneed to solve. Suggest your solutions. You will see that a few months later, a request for information or proposal will come out almost tailored towhat your company can do.
Dolcey also spoke about the SBIR, Small Business Innovation Research projects. She suggested going forthem. Phase I awards are between $70K to $100K. If your ideas are good and you perform on Phase I, you may be awarded a PhaseII contract that could be $500K to $750K.
Dolcey handed out the current information of key buyers in NJ and with the Federal Government. These are the people tocontact.
Here is some further information about the Defense Procurement Center and Dolcey’s contact information:
D.P.T.A.C.
| The Defense Procurement Technical Assistance Center (DPTAC)
was established at New Jersey Institute of Technology to improve the business climate and stimulate economic development. The Center’s main goal is to provide marketing services and technical assistance to small, disadvantaged and woman-owned businesses. In addition DPTAC attempts to increase its client companies’ business base beyond local opportunities to all federal and state agencies by instructing them as to how these entities purchase their goods and services, and what kinds of certification and registration are available to distinguish their firm from their competitors. DPTAC also disseminates marketing contacts within large businesses, so as to provide these large firms with viable vendors in order to expand their government mandated diversity goals. The Center currently generates over $30 million per year in new contracts for New Jersey small business. Contact: Dolcey Chaplin |
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October 30, 2006 – Darren Baldo, Esq. Attorney at Law from Lawrenceville, NJ
Mr. Baldo conducted a lively meeting by going over the pitfalls that are waiting if you do any of the 10 biggest mistakes inrunning a business.
Including
- No contract review
- Not using a qualified attorney
- Not having enough insurance
- Using verbal contracts
- Failing to “stop the bleedingâ€
We spent as much time on individual questions. Mr Baldo was conversant in all small business details.
See also http://www.ewh.ieee.org/r1/princeton-centraljersey/ for the latest in IEEE events.
August 17, 2006, Florence Lau
From: Ballezzi and Associates (http://www.taxbeacon.com/ballezzi)
Topic: Coping with Taxes in your successful business.
We had a successful seminar led by Florence Lau of Ballezzi and Associates. Florence led us through some of the new accounting changes as well as some “heads up†things that every business owner should be doing.
For example, every business should put into their minutes every year memo to record that the corporate officers had met and that there were the following changes,or no changes, etc. Maybe put a comment in to say that the corporate plans didn’t change and that there are no pending lawsuits. Make sure this is done every year. You may want to send a copy to your accountant.
Florence spoke about how to compute a Basis, your money in the company.
She then spoke about Section 179 and how business assets up to $108,000 this year for a C-corp may be deductible.
Florence cautioned that the chief executives must take reasonable compensation. That is, you must take a payroll salary. Not all distributions.
The rules are very generous for business owners to put up to 40% of their salary into 401K and SEP programs. She suggested that we take advantage of this.
Save all your receipts…Corporations are exposed for 7 years. Longer if there is anyfraud or payroll related issues.
Don’t deduct Life Insurance or Disability Insurance from the business. If you die, then the business will have to pay the full tax on the distribution, and the real recipients will lose out.
A full time employee is one who works a minimum of 25 hrs per week.
Finally, New Jersey is really clamping down on the Use Tax. You must file an NJ Use tax form every year by May 31. This is for items purchased out of state and used in NJ that you didn’t pay tax on. Florence had a client that got clobbered on this tax on some computers he bought from Dell, and Dell didn’t charge sales tax.
For the latest events of IEEE PCJS, please visit http://ewh.ieee.org/r1/princeton-centraljersey/Calendar.htm