By Brendan Rees
When it comes growing a small business, Judy O’Connell has a wealth of knowledge.
“I am passionate about helping small business because I’ve lived and breathed it most of my life,” she says.
The Victorian Small Business Commissioner was the guest speaker at the Greater Dandenong Chamber of Commerce Business Awards breakfast at Puntill Apartment Hotel in Dandenong on Friday 12 October.
Ms O’Connell has extensive public sector experience working with small businesses, with a public service career of over 30 years. She comes from a family of small business owners – both her father and two sisters operate their own businesses.
She currently advocates to make sure Victorian small businesses have a fair and competitive environment whilst running their business. Judy also manages the quick, low cost dispute resolution service for small business.
During the breakfast, Ms O’Connell’s talk centred on the theme of ‘Creating a level playing field for small businesses.’
“The biggest challenges we have heard for small businesses is around managing overheads, their cash flows, work/life balance, managing their internet, and also managing your employees,” she said.
She said small business were also faced with the “huge” problem of cybercrime which was “costing a billion dollars every year.”
“It’s a sad indictment about where we’ve come but you cannot trust anyone online,” she said. “This is becoming more and more prevalent.”
“If you receive any sort of email asking for private information or asking for bank details you’ve got to actually verify it.
Ms O’Connell spoke about a recent case in which a business had their computer system hacked whereby $100,000 was lost.
On another issue, the VSBC recently launched its infrastructure guidelines to support small business owners disrupted during infrastructure projects, Ms O’Connell explained.
“VicRoads has signed up and agreed every time they do any road closures or upgrades they actually contact all the businesses now and let them know what’s going on,” she said.
Businesses also changing over to the NBN had proven challenging, Ms O’Connell said.
“A lot of small businesses aren’t understanding what they have to do; it’s all too confusing.”
She said people “get shunted from post to post” when making phone enquiries with the NBN: “We’re working with the NBN co about how we can actually make it simpler.”
Ms O’Connell also stressed the importance of business owners to look after their mental health.
“If you’re not on your game then the business is going to suffer,” she said.
“You can go to a doctor and get a certificate and take some time off work and try and recuperate.”
The breakfast also featured outstanding business nominees which was presented to Advanced Robotics, Afghan Rahimi Restaurant, Le Pine White Lady Funerals and Southern Migrant and Refugee Centre.
The Youth Enterprise Nominee went to Rita Karki, a Bachelor of Engineering Technology student at Chisholm Institute.
The Chamber Business Awards presentation night will be held on Wednesday 21 November at the Atura Hotel, Dandenong from 6.30-9.30pm.
