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So, why not jump into the deep end right now by reading Business Finance is about much more than finance
I’ve said before that leaders don’t have the luxury of confining their interests to just a few things
If you’ve ever exercised by lifting weights, you know that the amount of the weight on the bar is only one variable that needs to be considered for a particular exercise
If you’re doing a bench press, you can add more weight because your chest and shoulder muscles help your arms to lift the weight
But if you put 50% of that total weight on each of two dumbbells, you can’t lift either one
You’ve probably also learned that you can’t use the same weight for curls as you do for bench presses
[pullquote]“Make everything as simple as possible, but not simpler
” ~ Albert Einstein[/pullquote]
Likewise, if you’re going to do only one repetition, you can handle more weight than if you’re going to lift it ten times
If you are lying flat, (more…)
‘Always ask why. Dig deeper. Get the facts.’ Avoid the crowd mentality“Ask Why” was their motto.
“Wheel Out,” “Fat Boy” “Death Star” and “Get Shorty” were some of the nicknames applied to their strategies.
Confirmation letters of successful trades were addressed to names like “Mr. M. Yass and “Mr. M. Smart” … and I think you can parse the underlying contempt.
“Rank & Yank” described their people performance system, “Pump and Dump” their trading strategy.
About $70 billion of market value was destroyed, more than 20,000 employees lost their jobs and pension funds worth $3.2 billion were destroyed, more than two thirds of which belonged to retirees with little chance to rebuild.
I had always intended to watch “The Smartest Guys in the Room,” the 2005 movie based on a book by the same name from co-authors Peter Elking and Bethany McLean, but it got lost in the shuffle until last week.
It chronicles the Enron cataclysm, whose meteoric ascent was violently terminated with its bankruptcy on Dec. 3, 2001.
It’s hard to believe this happened almost 10 years ago since to be “like Enron” still reverberates as an ignominious curse. It’s really more like a viral infection, though, because so many of the forces that drove its destruction have cleaved similar fissures in scandals from (more…)
Too busy to clean the barn because all the horses are running loose? Our recent series featuring the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse was a grim reminder that regardless of how many people are lined up outside our door, how many calls we have to return, whether we’re in the top ten for inbox clutter – we’re not absolved of our duty to master our most precious resource: cash flow. That’s why Warren Buffett calls it the “lifeblood of business.” Whether you’re unable to make payroll, can’t finance growth, can’t raise money or find that your business value is a black hole, mastering this process is the centerpiece of excellence.
So, what do we do about it? Although I didn’t start out to create a long series about business finance, so many of you have asked about how to make these improvements that I’ve decided to create a path to help you get there.
The first step on every knight’s journey is to slay any dragons in his path … so we’re going to kill off a few misconceptions about business finance. The most important is that you can learn these basic principles. As I’ve said before, you don’t have to be an MBA, CFO or accounting major to understand these essential concepts. If you focus on the core principles, you can direct your team and be sure that everyone’s paying attention to the right things.
Another dragon in our path is EBITDA. (more…)
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Why is this so hard? We find ourselves entrenched in the quagmire of a lingering and painful recession … more companies than ever need stronger financial management … and yet so many of them remain painfully slow to recognize it. Sure, many have trimmed costs and are paying closer attention to nickels and dimes, but few of them have a comprehensive financial strategy.
So, in some misguided way, I guess it feels good to have some company … because the need for financial discipline was a common refrain among wine industry cognoscenti at this year’s Symposium, Competing in a Rapidly Changing Global Wine Market. The economic shock waves of the last 24 months have rocked the wine industry, dragging many of its members, in some cases kicking and screaming … into an era where professional management and greater financial discipline are demanding front row seats alongside the entrepreneurs and artisans that have reigned over the California wine industry
[pullquote]Stronger financial management is overdue in the California wine industry.[/pullquote]
Building a bridge between the financial community and the wine industry is one of the founding precepts of the Wine Industry Financial Symposium formed in 1992. Last Monday, I was privileged to lead a 90 minute workshop devoted to Practical Strategies to Improve Cash Flow, in which I shared a few “diamonds in the rough” about how to get more juice into your bank account … and how the California wine businesses can integrate Strategic Finance into their everyday business decision making.
During the preceding From Survival to Prosperity – Strategies for Transition session, (more…)
