PROPOSAL FOR SUBMISSION

Research Topic

Our research topic is about the SoHo. SoHo stands for Small office/Home office. The businessman or the workers would select a small place, space or environment at home or somewhere else to set up their office and operate their business. It is a modern concept and it has become a trend as well. Some would call them as virtual office as they can’t live without technologies and internet. SoHo normally only involves few people (1 to 10 workers) as workers, so it always been categorized as small business or micro-enterprise. “THE Small Office/Home Office (SoHo) segment is slowly but surely, becoming a growing trend in the market, especially among those looking for flexibility in their daily working schedules. SoHo is the way to go.” (Mahalingam E., 2010)

Reason for Doing This Topic

We choose to do this topic because we think that this topic is going to be interesting and we totally did not know what “SOHO” means when we first met this term. So, we would like to introduce this modern concept to everyone and provide an overall view of SoHo. This report is going to discover the reason why people would go for SoHo, the advantages and disadvantages of SoHo, strategies of SoHo and the challenges that they faced.

As Soho has become more and more popular and millions of businessmen are starting to apply this modern concept to earn money, we would like to know something about it and maybe one day we could set up our own SoHo as well.

Research Objectives

Objectives of our topic (SoHo):

• To identify the benefits / advantages / reason for
• To have a better understanding of the process and strategies of SoHo
• To discover the issues / problems / challenges that SoHo faces

Report Outline

1.0 Introduction

1.1 Definition

1.2 Home Business Ideas

1.3 SoHo and B2B

2.0 Business Process of SoHo

2.1 Qualities needed for a home business

2.2 Process of setting up a SoHo

3.0 Reasons, Pros and Cons of SoHo

3.1 Reasons

3.2 Advantages

3.3 Disadvantages

4.0 Small Business Marketing Strategies

5.0 Challenges of SoHo & Recommendations

6.0 Conclusion

7.0 References

8.0 Appendix

Literature Review / Background

The history of SoHo started around at the 19^th century. Before the 19th century, and prior to the industrial revolution, almost all of the offices were either or both small offices and home offices. The advent of the personal computer in the mid 1990s, along with breakthroughs in voice and data communication, created opportunities for businesses to decentralize and allowed for a return to the trend of the small office concept. (Beck M., 2007) Near the end of 20th century and the starting of 21st century, this "Small or Home Office” “SOHO” term was used to classify an important of the business niche, and companies were getting interested in targeting the small businesses such as the SoHo or the SME to market their product. Professionals, consultants, real estate agents and surveyors are examples that mostly operating in such home offices.

Requirements and challenges of preservation solutions are also an issue that would be faced by the private users and SOHOs. They differ significantly from those in professional settings caused by different environments, skills, and objectives. The available tools and services, developed for professional settings,have to be adopted to meet the requirements of the SOHO users.(Strodl, Motlik, Stadler, Rauber, 2008)

Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) are basic tools that would help the company greatly and able to change the behavior of their business and their strategies also. To a large extent this divide seems to take shape along the lines of the sector and of the private characteristics of the self-employed owners. This contradicts the traditional economic and organisational studies approach regarding ICT implementation in companies, where the focus is on technological and organisational explanations. (Pierson)

A common difficulty that always occurs is the accession and integration to the communication technology. As SoHo could hardly survive without the technology so the technology is an important aspect for the operation of SoHo. Countries are digitally divided on the access and availability of such technologies. Even in developed countries, minority groups are disadvantaged in terms of technology use because of limited ability to utilize the emerging technologies or access to such technologies. (Beekhuyzen, Hellens, Siedle) Without any doubt, technologies are adopted by SME and SoHo, regardless of the nation and culture.

“Even though technology is becoming more pervasive, there are still more people in the world without access to technology than with. Many people that do have access to technology find the experiences of their interactions difficult, cumbersome and unhappy due to the complexity of such technology. Conversely, even though certain cultures may be somewhat resistant to change, technology can be an overwhelming force under certain sociological and economic conditions.” (Mejias, Shepherd, Vogel & Lazaneo, 1997).

Although SoHo is not as complicated as those huge companies, to keep the data safe and sounds is not easy too. In the Small Office Home Office (SOHO) arena there is equal responsibility to effectively protect data from intrusion and misuse as there is in the large company. The difference lays in capability, knowledge and cost effective nature by which we make this a functional part of reality. Secure your SoHo by due diligence and due care become self aware of the importance of information security in your small office home office. (Gosselin, 2006)

List Of References:

Journal Articles

1. Strodl S.,Motlik F., Stadler. K., Rauber A., 2008, Personal & SOHO Archiving, viewed 10 October 2010, http://www.ifs.tuwien.ac.at/~strodl/paper/fp077-strodl.pdf

This journal articles talks about the importance of the digital preservation for private users and the SoHos.

2. Gosselin C., 2006, SOHO: Cost Effective Techniques for Protecting Your Data, viewed 12 October 2010, http://www.infosecwriters.com/text_resources/pdf/SOHO_CGosselin.pdf

This journal articles mentioned the seriousness of protecting the data and also provided some skills to save cost.

3. Beekhuyzen J., Hellens L. v., Siedle M., 2005, Cultural Barriers in the Adoption of Emerging Technologies, viewed 14 October 2010, http://www.ucd.smartinternet.com.au/Documents/Cultural_Barriers.pdf

This journal article talks about the different culture from different places that will obstruct them from using the technologies.

Other references

4. Niall Roche, Advantages and Disadvantages Working From A Home Office, viewed 24 September 2010, http://ezinearticles.com/?Advantages-and-Disadvantages-Working-From-A-Home-Office&id=849368

5. South West Ireland Weblog, Reasons and Advantages for Becoming an Entrepreneur, viewed 24^th September 2010, http://sohosoloireland.wordpress.com/2009/01/13/reasons-and-advantages-for-becoming-an-entrepreneur/

6. Dr. Ralph F. Wilson, 1996, Can Small Office, Home Office (SOHO) Entrepreneurs Compete with Big Corporations on the Web?, viewed 7 October 2010, http://www.wilsonweb.com/articles/compete.htm

7. SiddSingh, Setting Up a Small Office Home Office, HubPages, viewed 8 October 2010, http://hubpages.com/hub/Setting-Up-a-Small-Office-Home-Office

8. Uttara Manohar, Home Business Ideas, viewed 10 October 2010,
   http://www.buzzle.com/articles/home-business-ideas.html

9. Michal Laleye, Qualities Needed To Operate A Home Business, Buzzle.com, viewed 10 October 2010,
   http://www.buzzle.com/articles/qualities-needed-to-operate-a-home-business.html

10. Manila Oak, Small Business Marketing Strategies, Buzzle.com, viewed 10 October 2010,
    http://www.buzzle.com/articles/small-business-marketing-strategies.html