‘Revenue is vanity, profit is sanity, cash is king.’ Heard that phrase before? It’s probably familiar to you, particularly the last bit about cash. If you’re wanting to grow your business, you need money. Because growth eats cash. This can be a big challenge for CEOs. Assets and liabilities are what you owe, equity is
Inc. Special Issue—The State of Small Business by Jim Collins 1995 IN A WORLD OF CONSTANT CHANGE, THE FUNDAMENTALS ARE MORE IMPORTANT THAN EVER In this era of dramatic change, we’re hit from all sides with lopsided perspectives that urge us to hold nothing sacred, to “re-engineer” and dynamite everything, to fight chaos with chaos, to
by Josh Baron and Vlad Barbieri “What do you mean we can’t pay dividends this year?” Elisa was incredulous. The board of the watch company she and her husband Mark had founded had just reviewed projected end-of-year performance. Usually this meeting was a celebration of another incremental step forward, with moderate growth, no debt, and
We all have the capacity to inspire and empower others. But we must first be willing to devote ourselves to our personal growth and development as leaders. by Bill George, Peter Sims, Andrew N. McLean, and Diana Mayer From the Magazine (February 2007) During the past 50 years, leadership scholars have conducted more than 1,000 studies in an attempt to
“Most people overestimate what they can do in one yearand underestimate what they can do in 10 years.”– Bill Gates What Is BHAG? To put it simply, a Big, Hairy, Audacious Goal or BHAG – a term coined by Jim Collins and Jerry Porras in their book, Built to Last: Successful Habits of Visionary Companies
by David Rock and Heidi Grant Striving to increase workplace diversity is not an empty slogan — it is a good business decision. A 2015 McKinsey report on 366 public companies found that those in the top quartile for ethnic and racial diversity in management were 35% more likely to have financial returns above their industry mean, and those in
By Eric Partaker In work we’re often engaged in some form of negotiation. But most people go about it all wrong, creating unnecessary disharmony and potentially leaving a lot on the table. Here are 6 simple principles you can follow to negotiate better, get more of what you want, and achieve your goals faster. Know
You’ve got a problem. Something needs fixing in your business. Maybe you’re losing margin to a competitor or there’s a service issue that’s hitting customer retention. What’s your first reaction? ‘We need to do something – fast’. Before you know it, you’re focusing on individual tasks. And by doing that, missing the bigger picture. There’s
Do you get a hit from new ideas? Does your serotonin peak when you think about a different approach? And take a nose-dive when you have to implement the activity? You’re not alone. We see these qualities in so many of our new CEO clients. When businesses start, the emphasis is on chasing revenue. Until
by Utpal M. Dholakia Covid restrictions are lifting in some parts of the world and the economy is booming in some sectors. Some labor and material costs are rising due to shortages, as is customer demand. Many brands have high pricing power at the moment, making price hikes almost inevitable. Brand managers may be clued in on the size of their price increase, but it’s
