The holidays are officially behind us, which means folks are getting back to work and back to their routines. But what happens when your routine just isn’t cutting it for you? For many small business owners, routines can actually hurt you… or more specifically, your business… if you don’t allow yourself to mix things up, try new things and approach business from a different perspective every now and again. To help jump-start your 2016, consider incorporating these three things into your business – whether for the first time, with more robust efforts than in the past or as a second attempt to a failed first endeavor.

#1: Attend Educational Experiences Unique to Small Businesses or Your Unique Business Category

#2: Seek Data From Unexpected Places

#3: Participate In Omni-Channel Marketing

Finally, challenge yourself to view your business from a variety of perspectives other than your own. Consider how your employees perceive your business, how your customers perceive your business, how your competitors perceive your business and even how local, non-competitive businesses perceive your business. Are you 110% satisfied with what you believe they see? Or how theyunderstand your business to be? If not – and for nearly ever business, this should be the case – aim to strengthen the areas in which your business may be perceived poorly.

Read the full article directly from the Original Source: Three Things Small Businesses Need To Do In The New Year – Forbes

Or Read more from Next Chapter Solutions Source

The new year is here, and issues new and old await legislative action in 2016.

1. The energy overhaul. Michigan’s energy laws are poised for an overhaul, but the legislature is still hammering out the details of what that might look like. Issues in contention include energy provider competition, renewable energy, energy efficiency, solar energy changes and competitive bidding of power plants. House legislation has moved out of committee and awaits floor action, while a Senate package is still in the Senate Energy and Technology Committee. With heavy utility pressure for a final measure and Gov. Rick Snyder asking for changes in the first half of the year, 2016 is likely the forum for energy changes.
2. Marijuana. Multiple ballot proposals to legalize marijuana are vying for a spot on the 2016 ballot. Meanwhile, the legislature is considering changes to the medical marijuana industry that would regulate plants from seed to sale and allow non-smokable forms of the plant — changes that could also happen in 2016.
3. The budget. The state has to turn in a balanced budget, and lawmakers have delivered it several months early during Gov. Rick Snyder’s tenure. This year’s budget could still be impacted by big tax liabilities that changed the math last year. In addition there are several ongoing conversations with budget implications, including those over the Health Insurance Claims Assessment and Detroit Public Schools restructuring, that could get inserted into the annual debate.

If you want to see the rest of them – check out the Source: Marijuana, LGBT protections and prevailing wage? 16 Michigan political issues to watch in 2016 | MLive.com

Massachusetts medical marijuana purchases and the quantity of cannabis sold are surging now.   Talk about pent-up demand.

With more dispensaries opening, the inventory concern has subsided, and MMJ is easier to obtain for patients across the state.

Though businesses still face many challenges with lab testing – not to mention the 12 other dispensaries that have been granted provisional licenses but are awaiting final approval – early indicators of the viability and robustness of the state’s MMJ market are very encouraging.

Source: Massachusetts Medical Marijuana Market Quickly Gaining Steam – GeoShepard

Medical marijuana is growing in New York but it remains unclear just when patients will be able to obtain the drug.

State health officials insist the program is on track to open in January — the timeframe stipulated in the 2014 legislation that legalized medical marijuana in New York.

Five companies were chosen last summer to grow and distribute marijuana in New York. Each grower is allowed to operate up to four dispensaries.

Teddy Scott, co-chief executive officer of marijuana grower PharmaCann, said he does not expect his Bronx dispensary to open until late January but was not concerned about the program getting off to a slow start.

“Everybody is doing something exceptional,” Scott said. “It is not just us, it is all of the licensees and the state… You should see these systems and to put them in as quickly as we have, it is amazing.”

Source: Medical marijuana program launch remains unclear – NY Daily News

Adilas420 consultants are available to help with the application writing and organization process. Ask an Adilas420 consultant for help with your application by clicking here.

The Oregon Liquor Control Commission early Monday opened the state’s online application system for marijuana licenses.

The agency initially planned to staff a call center with staff and policy experts to take questions from people completing applications, but Sunday’s winter storm prompted the state to close its Portland office buildings Monday.

Source: Oregon opens application process for marijuana licenses | OregonLive.com

Motion-capture software is also one of the fastest growing industries?! How could we incorporate motion capture into Adilas software marijuana? For monitoring plants? For Security? Distribution? Imagine the ways… should we ask the Adilas developers to start working on it?

Cider production. Motion-capture software. Telehealth services. Marijuana. Here are the sectors that are projected to see the greatest spikes in revenue in 2015.

Source: The 5 Fastest-Growing Industries in the U.S. | Inc.com

A factory once owned by Hershey in Canada now makes products that offer a slightly stronger buzz than a milk chocolate kiss. The site in Smith Falls, Ontario, has 168,000 square feet that is licensed by the government for medical marijuana production. Tweed’s sales could reach C$100 million a year for its many home-grown varieties and blends. Photographer: James MacDonald/Bloomberg

Source: Growing Green: Weed From an ex-Chocolate Factory in Canada – Bloomberg Business

“The ArcView Group, which sells research data to industry investors, says legalization of recreational use in California could more than double the national marijuana market – currently estimated at $2.7 billion in annual sales in states with legal medicinal or social use. But the Golden State initiative is merely another unfolding chapter in the fast-evolving market for marijuana-related businesses in California, Colorado, Washington, Oregon, Canada and beyond.

Though many investors remain hesitant to fund marijuana cultivation, they’re putting money into startups that provide services for cannabis businesses. The industry also is attracting top talent from technology, banking and finance.”

Read more from the Source: Tech mavericks see green in burgeoning marijuana industry | The Sacramento Bee

California’s new medical marijuana laws were supposed to provide more structure and clarity for the state’s loosely regulated, billion-dollar industry, but in the past few weeks, dozens of municipalities have ignored that intention by moving quickly to ban delivery and other activities codified by the legislation. Advocates and legislators hope the bans are only a minor setback in the effort to show federal regulators and voters that California — the first state to legalize medical marijuana two decades ago — can provide order to a medical weed sector that has been haphazardly regulated. Having a well-regulated medical marijuana system in place could help voters feel more confident that California will be able to manage a system of recreational marijuana for adult use, which is expected to be on the November ballot.

Advocates had hoped that the new regulations would make cities and counties more secure in being able to treat the cannabis industry like any other business, complete with requirements and regulations and a fee structure.

Read more from the Source: Glitch in new marijuana law has some California cities scrambling – San Francisco Chronicle

It is important for small start up businesses getting into the marijuana industry to keep control of their own data, progress and contributions to their communities. Consumers will appreciate their neighborhood markets and locally grown products as long as they are educated. America’s recent rebel against “big agriculture” supports this concept.

“Rick Steves offered up that advice in an interview he did with KUOW a few weeks back. The comments came as Rick Steves was discussing the need for Washington State to add a home cultivation provision to its marijuana legalization law. As it stands right now, Washington is the only state to legalize marijuana but yet not allow home cultivation.”

Source: Travel Guru Rick Steves Has The Best Advice For Fighting ‘Big Marijuana’ | The Weed Blog