A woman looking to retire said to author and valuation expert Tim McDaniel, “I need to sell my business for $2.5 million to support my country club lifestyle.” The reality was that her business was worth $750,000. How could she have been so wrong? As McDaniel—a veteran of over 2,000 valuation engagements and dozens of M&A deals—knows all too well, most owners work in their businesses and not on their businesses. He has seen the look of surprise on client faces far too often: “It’s only worth that much?!” In the rush of day-to-day work and decisions, business owners sometimes forget that their business is an investment—and something they need to watch, nurture, and care for just as they would a valuable antique vase or painting. Know and Grow the Value of Your Business: An Owner's Guide to Retiring Rich shows readers how to develop the “investment mindset,” value the business, bolster that value and maximize the return on their investment, and, finally, exit the business either through a sale to outside parties or by passing it on to family or other business insiders. This information couldn’t be more important: Typically, 60–80% of a business owner’s wealth is tied up in the value of the business. This is their most important asset, but they usually guess at its value and have no concrete plan to increase it. That’s why this book shows: The importance of treating your ownership interest in a business as something deserving near-daily attention. How a company is valued, and how others outside the business view that value. Steps you can take immediately to increase the value of your business. The different kinds of potential buyers and what attracts them. How to remove yourself from the day-to-day work of the business to plan for a brighter future. How to exit the business on your terms. In short, this book helps business owners get the most for their business when they decide it’s time to move on. What you’ll learn The importance of treating your ownership interest in a business the same way you would treat the shares in your stock portfolio: “Like an Investment.” How a company is valued, using terms that business owners can understand. The ways you can increase the value of your business and how an outside buyer will view your company. Existing exit strategies, and the advantages and disadvantages of each. Why timing might be the most critical component of your exit strategy. How to begin the succession planning process and knowing the critical components of a good succession plan. Who this book is for Those with businesses with revenues up to about $30 million—90 percent of all business owners in the U.S., according to the United States Census Bureau. This amounts to over 12 million businesses in the United States alone. The principles the book espouses will be just as valid in countries besides the U.S. except for the tax advice author Tim McDaniel offers. Table of Contents Country Club Lifestyle The Investment Mindset Valuation Fundamentals Valuation Approaches Growing Your Value Selling Your Business The Hardest Step: Succession Planning Know Your Exit Options Know your Exit Strategy Time for Action Epilogue IRS Revenue Ruling 59-60 Sample Engagement Letter Sample Due Diligence Request Sample Family Business Creed AICPA Statement on Standards for Valuation Services No. 1

A practical approach to business transformation Fit for Growth* is a unique approach to business transformation that explicitly connects growth strategy with cost management and organization restructuring. Drawing on 70-plus years of strategy consulting experience and in-depth research, the experts at PwC’s Strategy& lay out a winning framework that helps CEOs and senior executives transform their organizations for sustainable, profitable growth. This approach gives structure to strategy while promoting lasting change. Examples from Strategy&’s hundreds of clients illustrate successful transformation on the ground, and illuminate how senior and middle managers are able to take ownership and even thrive during difficult periods of transition. Throughout the Fit for Growth process, the focus is on maintaining consistent high-value performance while enabling fundamental change. Strategy& has helped major clients around the globe achieve significant and sustained results with its research-backed approach to restructuring and cost reduction. This book provides practical guidance for leveraging that expertise to make the choices that allow companies to: Achieve growth while reducing costs Manage transformation and transition productively Create lasting competitive advantage Deliver reliable, high-value performance Sustainable success is founded on efficiency and high performance. Companies are always looking to do more with less, but their efforts often work against them in the long run. Total business transformation requires total buy-in, and it entails a series of decisions that must not be made lightly. The Fit for Growth approach provides a clear strategy and practical framework for growth-oriented change, with expert guidance on getting it right. *Fit for Growth is a registered service mark of PwC Strategy& Inc. in the United States

"A book you can read in an hour, and get ideas you can use for a lifetime!" The old expression about good things coming in small packages definitely holds true in Growing Your Business!.. Nationally acclaimed small business expert, Mark LeBlanc, offers insights you can put to use immediately if you're serious about making more money in your business.

Run your company. Don’t let it run you. Most business owners started their company because they wanted more freedom—to work on their own schedules, make the kind of money they deserve, and eventually retire on the fruits of their labor. Unfortunately, according to John Warrillow, most owners find that stepping out of the picture is extremely difficult because their business relies too heavily on their personal involvement. Without them, their company—no matter how big or profitable—is essentially worthless. But the good news is that entrepreneurs can take specific steps—no matter what stage a business is in—to create a valuable, sellable company. Warrillow shows exactly what it takes to create a solid business that can thrive long into the future.

Ten years of research uncover the secret source of growth and profit … Those who center their business on improving people’s lives have a growth rate triple that of competitors and outperform the market by a huge margin. They dominate their categories, create new categories and maximize profit in the long term. Pulling from a unique ten year growth study involving 50,000 brands, Jim Stengel shows how the world's 50 best businesses—as diverse as Method, Red Bull, Lindt, Petrobras, Samsung, Discovery Communications, Visa, Zappos, and Innocent—have a cause and effect relationship between financial performance and their ability to connect with fundamental human emotions, hopes, values and greater purposes. In fact, over the 2000s an investment in these companies—“The Stengel 50”—would have been 400 percent more profitable than an investment in the S&P 500. Grow is based on unprecedented empirical research, inspired (when Stengel was Global Marketing Officer of Procter & Gamble) by a study of companies growing faster than P&G. After leaving P&G in 2008, Stengel designed a new study, in collaboration with global research firm Millward Brown Optimor. This study tracked the connection over a ten year period between financial performance and customer engagement, loyalty and advocacy. Then, in a further investigation of what goes on in the “black box” of the consumer’s mind, Stengel and his team tapped into neuroscience research to look at customer engagement and measure subconscious attitudes to determine whether the top businesses in the Stengel Study were more associated with higher ideals than were others. Grow thus deftly blends timeless truths about human behavior and values into an action framework – how you discover, build, communicate, deliver and evaluate your ideal. Through colorful stories drawn from his fascinating personal experiences and “deep dives” that bring out the true reasons for such successes as the Pampers, HP, Discovery Channel, Jack Daniels and Zappos, Grow unlocks the code for twenty-first century business success.

The"New York Times"bestselling author and"Morning Joe"cohost Mika Brzezinski examines the enemies of women s success both in the workplace and at homeand reveals strategies to overcome them."

A straight-talking guide for the newest members of the workforce, with road-tested advice for landing a job, navigating the new world of work, establishing a personal brand, and getting the recognition (and money) you deserve. The whirlwind of job applications, interviews, follow-up, resume building, and networking is just the beginning. What happens after you've landed the job, settled in, and begun to make a difference-where do you go from here? What if you feel stuck in what you thought would be your dream profession? New York Times bestselling author Mika Brzezinski and producer Daniela Pierre-Bravo provide an essential manual for those crucial next steps. Earn It! is a practical career guidebook that not only helps you get your foot in the door; it also shows you how to negotiate a raise, advocate for more responsibility, and figure out whether you're in the career that's right for you. A blueprint for your future success, Earn It! features insightful and inspiring interviews with leaders in media, fashion, and business, recruiters, HR, execs, and kickass young female entrepreneurs like Danielle Weisberg and Carly Zakin of theSkimm, Vimeo CEO Anjali Sud, and Jane Park, founder of the cosmetic subscription company Julep.