In Business Magazine - April 2011

APR. 2011

Defining Green: What's in It for Arizona Business?

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Arizona's

Cuban Trade Potential

Empower Your Business Best practices to thrive not just survive

Technology Is in the

Cloud

HR: Engage People to Profit

This Issue National Association of Women Business Owners

Power Lunch By the Numbers Business Calendar

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April 2011

www.inbusinessmag.com In Business Magazine is a collaboration of many business organizations and entities throughout the metropolitan Phoenix area and Arizona. Our mission is to inform and energize business in this community by communicating content that will build business and enrich the economic picture for all of us vested in commerce.

Partner Organizations

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As Partners, each will receive three insert publications each year to showcase all that they are doing for business and businesspeople within our community. We encourage you to join these and other organizations to better your business opportunities. The members of these and other Associate Partner Organizations receive a subscription to In Business Magazine each month. For more information on becoming an Associate Partner, please contact our publisher at info@inbusinessmag.com.

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A p r i l 2011

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Contents

April 2011

26

Empower Your Business: Best Practices to Thrive, Not Just Survive, in 2011 Five Valley industry leaders share with Lori K. Baker their top three best practices in leadership and management, sales, accounting and finance, information technology and human resources.

Departments

11

Features

20 Lifting the Cuban Embargo —

An Opportunity for Arizona Business

Arguments for opening trade with Cuba include business advantages to Arizona. United States Congressman Jeff Flake (R – Ariz.) is among those who discuss with Lila Nordstrom the

Guest Editor

Ángel Cabrera, Ph.D., president of

42

Trickle Up

View from the top looks at how Ann Siner

Thunderbird School of Global Management,

created first-class appeal for a new concept

introduces the “Best Practices” issue.

of second-hand shops.

12

43

Feedback

Top executives Tom Ambrose, Suzanne Klapp

Nonprofit

Make-A-Wish Foundation

potential impact of lifting the decades-old Cuban embargo.

and Hank Mackey respond to IBM’s burning business question of the month.

24 A ‘Cloud’ that Reigns

14

“New Institute Hosts Creative Thinking

in the clouds. Gremlyn Bradley-Waddell shares why, with today’s

“You and Your Personal Computer” and “And the

Seminars for Entrepreneurs,” “New Revenue

technology, a savvy business owner knows “the cloud” could be an

Winner Is: Business Awards Mean Business”

in the Restaurant Scene,” “Expanding Wireless

ideal spot.

Communications Goes Unnoticed,” “Boosting

In the past, it’s been seen as a negative to have your head stuck

Briefs

32

Fashion Designers Successful in Phoenix,” and “Building Bridges Between Phoenix and China”

18

By the Numbers

NFIB Poll on Important Issues for Arizona Businesspeople; Key Economic Indicators provide a sense of the health of the

32

local economy.

The Economy of Green

Communicate

for business and employment in Metro Phoenix and Arizona as

Guiding your partnership to long-term success

a whole. RaeAnne Marsh speaks with green companies from a

38

Enterprise

multitude of different business sectors.

40 Employee Engagement:

The Proven Key to Increasing Productivity, Revenue

Companies have begun to experience negative side effects to their

52

Power Lunch

The Stockyards Serves Cuisine, Comfort and Commerce in Historic Setting. Plus: “Raw Deal: Sushi is Fresh Idea”

66

Roundtable

Nonprofit board experience: Giving back to the community gives back in business through Business on Board

45 On the Agenda

April’s calendar of business events presented by our partners

Clinging to old perspectives leads to a stagnant economy

41

Assets

Networking

36

Sustainability emerges as a strong and growing economic force

50

“High-Tech Conference Room with Google TV,”

Sales for the Second-Home Market,” “Emerging

20

Homeward Bound

Partner Section

Books

Women Business Owners

levels of employee engagement — and why it’s important.

of servin

g the wome

n busine

55 N ational Association of

New releases on Selling Yourself

25 years

Preside

1985

success in stretching resources to keep a strong bottom line during the economic downturn. Max Kipling looks at how to raise the

Celebrating

2010

ss owner

s of Phoen

ix.

SPRING

nt’s Messa

ge

1

NWABO

Best Practices Issue:

NEWS

Our “Best Practices” logo identifies the special Best Practices articles throughout this issue.

8

A p r i l 2011

2011 •

nawboph

x.org

This month we will be Financial focusing Advisor for a number on Finance. This them on track with is a of their personal years. Our firm topic of great Understa importan works with nding the and business t to me key step business finances as I have finances. in running owners of your been a a well managed to educate very busy business is fundame About wearing and help business so many new employee ntal to running NAWB keep is to different Founded a successfu hats. Workingkeep your finances in 1985, O on the businesss, and worrying l business.

NAWBO propels organized about long owner. women A business . Business It is critical cash flow all weigh hours, focusing entrepren Phoenix finances economic owners on your to keep eurs into heavy and are , social finances. business a focus power. Twenty-fi and political You want most importantly goals, hiring on the expense spheres to build your ve years your business, own personal of of your Phoenix later, is still the but not • Increase own wealth. Being only organizatNAWBO Valley that at the financially your costs solely represen ion in the • Increase disorganiz women ed can: your risk ts the interest entrepren • Decrease eurs in all of For more the industries chance informatio . www.naw of real success n, please bophx.org A good visit . way to keep that are on track business is to work partners financial This issue with profession and help profession keep you als al will help living factors on track. you A good to suggest that can adversely understand the Page 2 real cost some of affect your of the hidden wealth.

• New cost of living I would goods Top Five like Mistakes factors can of “planned & Services – to Successf we are include: obsolesce ully Secure Avoid to living in disposab Page 4 ”, goods a Bank le which are made an era Loan means items that to be we are How to constantl choose • Taxation we need to live y replacing the for you and work.

– Business RIGHT accounta with, when there are many Page 7 nt hidden those taxes sometime are identified taxes we all now Keep Cost are faced Cindy Hynes • Lifestyle s it adds up to Under Control… and added almost Try Outsourc together, upgrade President, The reward s – people 50% of our income! ing NAWBO Phoenix who work for long second hours of hard like or third hard work to play house, vacations and more... they can hard. include effect how bigger houses, • Life events much we , etc. These things a save – are unexpect and great, but financial ed life events set aside for security, the future. especially are to earn an income in the area the biggest threat and finish one of the of a disability. to our Phoenix working biggest Metropol The until reasons itan Chapter the National for bankrupt our retiremen ability of Associatio Be sure t date is cy.

Business to consider n of Women Owners, Working with a trusted all of your costs, 4600 E. Washingt pace with including financial on Phoenix, the real those listed cost of living representative AZ 85034 St., Suite 300 organized above. can , protected by helping assist you your expenses against in keeping the unknown you make sure 602-772 . I wish you’re -4985 you all continued and precise www.naw in accountin bophx.org Kindest success Regards, g for in your • info@naw business! bophx.org Cindy Hynes nwabop hx.org NAWBO Phoenix Chapter President 2010-20 11

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Power move.

Family owned.

Family atmosphere.

Family pride.

Your Mercedes-Benz Super Center Scottsdale Road & Loop 101 480.991.1155 • DriveTheBest.com

april 2011 • Vol. 2, No. 4

Publisher Rick McCartney Editor RaeAnne Marsh

Art Director Benjamin Little

Contributing Writers Lori K. Baker Gremlyn Bradley-Waddell Rebel Brown Mike Hunter Max Kipling John Minahan Lila Nordstrom Alison Stanton Photographer-at-large Dan Vermillion

Papago Gateway would not have made it to 2011 without the commitment and efforts of Cassidy Turley’s Mark Stratz and Tyler Wilson. During the most intense circumstances they never gave up. Mark and Tyler believed in the project and they made sacrifices to help move Papago Gateway forward.

Thank you Mark, Tyler and the Cassidy Turley team!

Lee Chesnut, Chesnut Properties

Editorial Interns Kayla Karp Melissa Mistero

COVER IMAGE BY James Thew

Advertising

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Inform Us: Send press releases and your editorial ideas to editor@inbusinessmag.com.

President & CEO Rick McCartney Financial Manager Ryan Cope Editorial Director RaeAnne Marsh Senior Art Director Benjamin Little

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Vol. 2, No. 4. In Business Magazine is published 12 times per year by InMedia Company. POSTMASTER: Send address changes to InMedia Company, 6360 E. Thomas Road, Suite 210, Scottsdale, AZ 85251. To subscribe to In Business Magazine, please send check or money order for one-year subscription of $24.95 to InMedia Company, 6360 E. Thomas Road, Suite 210, Scottsdale, AZ 85251 or visit inbusinessmag.com. We appreciate your editorial submissions, news and photos for review by our editorial staff. You may send to editor@inbusinessmag.com or mail to the address above. All letters sent to In Business Magazine will be treated as unconditionally assigned for publication, copyright purposes and use in any publication, website or brochure. InMedia accepts no responsibility for unsolicited manuscripts, photographs or other artwork. Submissions will not be returned unless accompanied by a self-addressed, stamped envelope. InMedia Company, LLC reserves the right to refuse certain advertising and is not liable for advertisers’ claims and/or errors. The opinions expressed herein are exclusively those of the writers and do not necessarily reflect the position of InMedia. InMedia Company considers its sources reliable and verifies as much data as possible, although reporting inaccuracies can occur; consequently, readers using this information do so at their own risk. Each business opportunity and/or investment inherently contains certain risks, and it is suggested that the prospective investors consult their attorney and/or financial professional. © 2011 InMedia Company, LLC. All rights reserved. No part of this magazine may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means without written permission by the publisher.

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A p r i l 2011

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Ángel Cabrera, Ph.D., Thunderbird School of Global Management

Guest Editor

Onward and Upward

Ángel Cabrera, Ph.D., is president of Thunderbird School of Global Management, the No. 1-ranked school of global business worldwide. Dr. Cabrera is a world-renowned global leader and management educator whose work and expertise have been recognized and tapped by the World Economic Forum and other top international organizations.

I am pleased to have been asked to be the guest editor for the Best Practices Issue of In Business Magazine. As you well know, the downturn in the economy has posed great challenges to the business community both locally and worldwide. But with those challenges come great opportunities for innovation and creative thinking that can positively impact our organizations, our communities and the world at large.

Business plays a pivotal role in driving economic and social change, and it is more important than ever before that we, as business leaders, sharpen our skills, think outside of the box and turn to one another in sharing of best practices. In these complex and changed times, it is imperative that we operate, not within competitive silos, but rather with an inclusive mindset that allows us all to play a part in rebuilding a healthy economy.

This April 2011 issue of In Business Magazine is one of many issues dedicated to directly improving business for us locally. In this month’s cover story, Lori K. Baker sought the advice of some of the Valley’s top businesspeople to give their perspective on best practices in the spheres of leadership and management, sales, finance and accounting, information technology and human resources. Their insight and expertise will help readers navigate from where they are now in business to where they want to be. Valuable tools and education are the keys to keeping any business owner in line and on track to succeed.

As part of this Best Practices Issue, editor RaeAnne Marsh has led a team of writers to compile a series of articles on incorporating best practices in business in many different ways. John Minahan, author of The Business Mechanic: 9 Simple Ways to Improve Your Business, describes some of the best practices in preparing for successful partnerships. Rebel Brown writes about status quo being the death of business and explores the concept of shaking up that which has always been, to reveal new, forward thinking ways of doing things.

Max Kipling focuses on management in his article on some of the proven keys to improving productivity and revenues in the workplace.

A sector of great interest, sustainability is producing economic opportunities in widely diverse fields, from energy generating plants and their associated supply chains to entrepreneurial endeavors in services and products for the environmentally conscious. In her article on this topic, Marsh examines the breadth of this developing economic force in exploring its potential impact in Arizona.

While most business owners are working hard on bettering their businesses, I hope that you find this Best Practices Issue of In Business Magazine a useful tool to sharpen some of your skills and introduce opportunity to build success in these challenging times.

Ángel Cabrera, Ph.D. President • Thunderbird School of Global Management

The Business Owner Matters Dr. Cabrera was our one and only choice for guest editor of this issue as he is so vested daily in the “science” of what it takes to run a business. His leadership within our community is also well known.

We thank him for his support.

As I look at what it takes to run a company, I am reminded how important the drive and passion of us as company owners is in building business. Yes, we often hear, “It’s not work because I love what I am doing.”

That may be true for many business leaders, but these days it has often been that extra push that is making

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the difference. Whether you are working “on” your business or “in” your business, as the phrase goes, good leadership means knowing what practices will get you to that next level of business. Our purpose at In Business Magazine is to continue to bring you that information as it pertains to us locally and to our success.

More education, better structure, the right people and strong sales may be what we live for, but doing it right is the difference that will empower us and the people who work for us. Enjoy our Best Practices issue.

—Rick McCartney, Publisher

Connect with us: Story Ideas/PR: editorial@inbusinessmag.com Business Events/Connections: businessevents@inbusinessmag.com Marketing/Exposure: advertiser@inbusinessmag.com Or visit us online at www.inbusinessmag.com

I n B u s i n e s s Ma g a z i n e

11

Feedback

Q:

Valley Leaders Sound Off

Executives Answer Business owners and executives are often are given advice — solicited and unsolicited. What is the best advice ever given to you in business, and how have you applied it?

Suzanne Klapp

Tom Ambrose

Owner FastFrame Sector: Retail When starting up my first business in the mid-1980s, I learned that entrepreneurs tend to be too optimistic about sales projections and often do not factor into their business plans all the costs associated with a new business. Thus, they often overextend themselves with too much debt and find it difficult to make payments to their lenders. Cash flow might be OK during the upturns in the economy, but it can devastate a business in the downturns.

I have followed the philosophy of careful borrowing and resistance to unwarranted expansion. Also, when a large customer that owed me significant money went bankrupt, I learned a new lesson about extending too liberal payment terms to customers.

During this latest economic downturn, I was able to survive while others were failing because I had kept my debt commitments very low and maintained strict payment requirements from customers. In the last few years of a devastating economy for small businesses, I have survived well from this realistic approach to the ups and downs of business.

Executive Director Big Brothers Big Sisters of Central Arizona Sector: Nonprofit I began my public relations career in Phoenix in 1971 working for Bill Shover at The Arizona Republic. On his desk was a small sign that said “THERE IS NO LIMIT TO THE GOOD A MAN CAN DO, IF HE DOESN’T CARE WHO GETS THE CREDIT.” Those are words I have tried to live by ever since.

Subsequently, during my 37-year run with Jerry Colangelo and the Phoenix Suns, the best lesson I learned was: “Have the self-confidence to surround yourself with talented people who are capable of replacing you.”

Not only did that philosophy make our Suns front-office team one of the best in the NBA, but it also created enough front-office talent to spin off and support the successful creation of MLB’s Arizona Diamondbacks in 1995.

Working with many nonprofit organizations in the community, I learned: “If you don’t have a particular expertise, find somebody who does. Don’t be afraid to seek professional counsel and experience.” That attitude helped us bring the Children’s Museum of Phoenix from a simple “grassroots” idea in the late 1990s to one of the best children’s museums in the country today.

Top-level manager, business owner and Scottsdale councilwoman, Suzanne Klapp has devoted many years to profit/loss responsibility and financial management, advertising/ marketing, communications, operations management, human resources and labor relations, sales and sales force development, and strategic planning. Klapp is focused on applying business experience to community leadership and to politics and public policy.

Tom Ambrose is currently the executive director for Big Brothers Big Sisters of Central Arizona. During his career, he has served on numerous community boards, including Phoenix Zoo, Cystic Fibrosis Foundation, Partnership for a Drug Free America — Arizona Affiliate, Phoenix Chamber of Commerce, Children’s Museum of Phoenix and Phoenix Suns Charities.

FastFrame scottsdaleframing.com

Big Brothers Big Sisters of Central Arizona helparizonayouth.org

Hank A. Mackey Principal H. A. Mackey & Associates Sector: Insurance The best advice I’ve received was to know your clients. Knowing our clients has shaped our business. This knowledge has determined the course of the company. The relationships and understanding of our clients’ business has been the catalyst for the continuing growth and direction of the company. These relationships are built on a foundation of mutual trust, enabling both parties to create value for each other. Having the client’s best interest is always and the only way to serve the client.

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A p r i l 2011

Understanding their business creates a road map for us to follow. The business environment is constantly changing and, in order to assist our clients, we need to offer proven ideas that will improve productivity and profitability. Understanding their business keeps us focused on the on specific niches that we target. Concentrating on certain industries provides us with practices specific to that industry and adds value to the services we provide for clients.

Hank Mackey founded H. A. Mackey & Associates in 2005. A native Phoenician, he began his career in 1985 following graduation from ASU, working as a broker and, later, becoming vice president of a national brokerage agency, vice president of a third-party administrative company and large group sales representative for an insurance company.

H. A. Mackey & Associates hamackey.com

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Briefs

Quick and To the Point

Emerging Fashion Designers Successful in Phoenix

New Revenue for the Restaurant Scene

Metro Phoenix’s fashion industry entrepreneurs are making national successes of their up-and-coming hip clothing lines. The founders of both Empowered Clothing Company and Noctis Ink, LLC had one thing in mind when designing their new styles: creating a positive, trendy fashion line that appeals to all ages.

Phoenix-based Empowered Clothing Company was created by Javier Gamboa and Chuck Crothamel as a counter to the “guns and drugs” shirts commonly sold at action sports events.

Empowered Clothing Company designs each product with positive, inspirational graphics and tag lines so the youth will believe in themselves, says Gamboa. To promote its line in the community, the company printed 5,000 stickers and handed them out to kids in Phoenix, along with interacting with fans on social media and posting pictures of new designs to get feedback. Empowered’s clothing is shipped nationally and its crown logo is seen at more and more action sports events.

Two Tempe neighbors launched Noctis Ink, LLC, a chic clothing line for men and women. John Zukie, an experienced fashion designer, and Andrew Higgins, for whom taking care of the business aspect fulfills his entrepreneurial dream, form a fitting relationship that works.

Less than six months after launch, Noctis Ink was featured in the 2010 Phoenix Fashion Week and received 2nd place in the emerging designers category.

—Melissa Mistero

The restaurant industry has gotten noticeably more creative with the realization that they must add something new and exciting to their dining experience in order to attract new customers, and to keep them coming back.

James Spiers, senior lecturer of marketing at Arizona State University, attributes the change to the desire for business progression, as well as the impact on the restaurant industry of the current economic downturn. “There is always change, because consumers like to see improvements. Right now, changes are being pushed by the economy.

People weren’t going out to restaurants in big numbers like they were before, so those businesses came up with new ideas to expand what they have.”

Among the many restaurants making changes to their business model is Tuscan Oven restaurant in Glendale’s Westgate City Center, which recognized opportunities in the traffic generated by its location. To boost business since its opening last September, it has adopted a fresh marketing campaign and expanded restaurant hours for a nightlife experience that starts at 9:00 p.m. Westgate is a popular destination for Valley residents, for its many dining as well as shopping options. Tuscan Oven is seeing steady business though competing with well-known chains restaurants such as Yard House and Gordon Biersch. “We have built a night club business within the restaurant on certain days of the week, and we have adopted very aggressive marketing campaigns. We really are competing for several different demographics at once,” says restaurant manager Cody Lewien. According to Lewien, the heavy marketing and live night entertainment are worth the incurred expense, with night sales sometimes exceeding combined lunch and dinner business.

Restaurants all around the Valley are taking different approaches to strengthen their appeal. Lewien says the changes they have made at have sparked a very positive response from customers. “We are seeing much more sustainable sales and traffic trends.” Although environments and factors of interest vary with the individual establishment, restaurants are launching new features to modify the expected dining experience for guests.

—Kayla Karp

Empowered Clothing Company www.empoweredclothing.com Noctis Ink, LLC www.noctisthreads.com

New Institute Hosts Creative Thinking Seminars for Entrepreneurs The thought of an innovation institute began as a mere conversation between then-Governor Janet Napolitano and George Land, Ph.D., co-founder of FarSight Group, Inc. Napolitano envisioned Arizona as the state of innovation and wanted FarSight Group, an established research company, to provide content. When she left office to serve in Washington, the Arizona Technology Council continued with her planning and founded the Arizona Innovation Institute.

The types of creative decision-making and methodology classes offered through the institute have previously been offered only to large organizations and are quite costly. The Arizona Innovation Institute is offering the same courses for 25-40 percent less than the usual price and making them available to the public. “Our real intent is to give back to the state of Arizona. This is an

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opportunity to share what we know about growth and change,” says Kim Kressaty, senior partner with FarSight Group.

Classes offered at the institute range from how to discover an opportunity in a problem to igniting creative thinking in customers so a company knows where to innovate. Last year, the institute hosted an Opportunity Discovery Process course to help those unexpectedly unemployed identify themselves in a new way and move on to another job.

The classes are offered at Telesphere in Scottsdale, but the institute may add classes in Tucson. “We will go wherever the demand is,” says Kressaty.

—Melissa Mistero Arizona Technology Council aztechcouncil.org FarSight Group, Inc. farsightgroup.com

Tuscan Oven

Telesphere telesphere.com

W. P. Carey School of Business wpcarey.asu.edu

diceglendale.com

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At Waste Management, giving back is a responsibility we take to heart.

Learn more at www.wmofarizona.com

A community partner.

Waste Management is a valued and trusted community partner. Every year, we give back tens of thousands of dollars to community organizations in need.

Waste Management is proud to support Big Brothers Big Sisters of Central AZ, the Special Olympics, Keep Phoenix Beautiful and Habitat for Humanity.

1-800-796-9696

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Briefs

Quick and To the Point

Boosting Sales for Second-Home Market

Building Bridges Between Phoenix and China

In the glut of luxury homes on the local real estate market, entrepreneur Wayne Wilkins recognized opportunity for an innovative approach to second-home sales. His objective to revamp real estate and improve slumps for both Valley realtors and prospective buyers was manifested in his recently launched, Scottsdale-based Southwest division of Ownermatch International.

Wilkins initiated the concept in Western Canada in 2004, and has arranged nearly 100 successful “ownermatches.”

In a time when consumers are hesitant to make real estate investments and a place where there are many high-end properties for sale, Wilkins considered the Scottsdale area a prime location for business expansion.

Ownermatch pairs up individuals with complementary intentions who are searching to buy a vacation home and facilitates the property purchase. Once properly matched, co-owners create an ownership agreement made upon the property transaction specifically outlining guidelines and protections for each party.

“Ownermatch is firstly about creating cost-effective investment opportunities for buyers of lifestyle properties. Secondly, it is about creating a smart, new product and business opportunity for real estate agents who are attempting to sell luxury properties during very challenging times,” says Wilkins.

In Wilkins’ vision, co-ownership also means the property is being occupied twice as much, meaning the two homeowners will contribute to the local economy by spending at local businesses more frequently. Currently, according to insurance industry statistics, the average use of second homes in the United States is approximately 50 days out of the year.

—Kayla Karp

“There’s a tremendous amount of outward investment coming to the States, and we want to position Arizona to capitalize on that and become a hub of Chinese investment,” said Rudy Vetter upon his recent return from China’s biggest solar trade show. Vetter, senior vice president of international business with the Greater Phoenix Economic Council, attended the expo with representatives from the Arizona Commerce Authority, Arizona State University and Phoenix law firm Quarles & Brady. Such a delegation was constructed, he said, “so we could deliver a complete package to every kind of Chinese prospects to get informed about opportunities in Arizona.”

The International Photovoltaic Power Generation Expo in Shanghai is China’s biggest tradeshow. But it’s “not a place where you come back with a deal,” Vetter noted, explaining it takes time to build the relationship necessary for the Chinese companies to be confident about doing business in Arizona.

So the delegation’s goals were focused long-term: enriching and deepening existing relationships, making new contacts, understanding the Chinese system and building a relationship with those who influence decision-making, and creating awareness by connecting with the press.

“We feel we outperformed,” said Vetter, reporting the delegation’s events for business and Party leaders were well attended and expressing appreciation to Suntech (a Chinese solar energy giant that recently opened a plant in Goodyear) for connecting them with some of its strategic partners. A boon to the delegation’s efforts to tell Arizona’s story, Vetter spoke on “Abundance of Sunshine, Abundance of Opportunity” as part of the expo’s official program — with Arizona the only State afforded that opportunity.

—RaeAnne Marsh Greater Phoenix Economic Council gpec.org Arizona Commerce Authority azcommerce.com Arizona State University asu.edu

Ownermatch International ownermatch.com

Quarles & Brady LLP quarles.com

Expanding Wireless Communications Goes Unnoticed The increased use of Internetconnected hand-helds has placed a big draw on the major wireless carriers to provide the wireless coverage. They need something low to the ground to enhance their service and keep the precise and even coverage demanded by a 90 percent market saturation and heavy use of the products, explains Jason Sears, site development manager with Pennsylvania-based Crown Castle, one of four companies nationally that help fill that technological niche.

Crown Castle’s fiber optic DAS

16

A p r i l 2011

(Distributed Antenna System) network, Sears says, is more expensive than a big tower but “it’s becoming more cost-effective to install these” thanks to technological changes. The major wireless carrier that hires Crown Castle to build the system is the “anchor tenant,” and the system can handle up to three additional carriers.

Because they are low-power and smaller in size, Crown Castle’s towers are more easily hidden than the major cell towers.

Some of Crown Castle’s handiwork may be seen in Paradise Valley — for those who look closely. Thirty-seven new

saguaros have recently been added to the landscaping in PV’s public-right-of-way corridors — that is, 37 towers have been “planted” in housing specially created to look like a saguaro. So effective is the camouflage, relates Sears, that passers-by have stopped to ask his team why they are painting the plant. “We’re pretty proud of the saguaro, the way it turned out,” he says.

Five other nodes have been piggy-backed in more traditional style: on traffic signals and street lights.

—RaeAnne Marsh Crown Castle International crowncastle.com

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By the numbers

Metrics & Measurements

NFIB Poll Addresses Important Issues for Arizona Business

Key Indicators

Every year, the National Federation of Independent Business polls its members on state and national issues vital to their survival as entrepreneurs and centers its lobbying positions on the responses. NFIB’s 2011 ballot to its approximately 7,500 Arizona members asked five questions.

1. Business Personal Property Tax Exemption

Yes

No Undec.

Should Arizona’s business personal property tax exemption increase to 75% 21% 4% an amount closer to $1 million from the current $66,440 amount?

BACKGROUND: Property taxes in Arizona are imposed on both real and personal property which is considered to be movable and not permanently attached to real estate. Business personal property is non-real-estate property used for commercial, industrial and agricultural purposes.

The Arizona Constitution exempts the first $66,440 (adjusted to inflation) of full cash value from the business personal property tax.

2. Business Real Property Taxes

Yes

No Undec.

Should Arizona lower the relative level of taxation on business real property 82% 11% 7% to one that is closer to the level of taxation on residential real property?

BACKGROUND: For the purposes of taxation, property in Arizona is separated based on its use into nine classes. Different property classes are assigned different assessment ratios that are the basis for determining assessed valuation. Commercial and industrial property (Class 1): 20 percent; vacant or agricultural land (Class 2): 16 percent; owner-occupied residential property (Class 3): 10 percent (and a 1 percent cap on primary taxation plus an automatic homeowner rebate of up to $600 annually from the state general fund).

3. Uniform Statewide Transaction Privilege (Sales) Tax Base

Yes

No Undec.

Should Arizona adopt a uniform TPT base to replace the current system that 54% 32% 14% allows cities to add items not taxed by the state into their local TPT base?

BACKGROUND: In Arizona, individual cities and towns retain the right to determine the items subject to or exempt from the transaction privilege tax (TPT or sales tax), thereby leaving the determination of the local sales tax base up to the individual city or town council. Though similar to municipal TPT bases, the state’s TPT base often varies in important areas as well as allowing for a two-level tax structure on big-ticket items.

4. Unemployment Insurance Trust Fund Solvency

Yes

No Undec.

Key indicators for the Metro Phoenix economy are provided in each issue to identify those key numbers that give readers a sense of the health of our local economy.

Economic Indicators (Metro Phoenix) Unemployment (Dec. 2010)

2.7

1733.8

1.1

Housing Permits (Nov. 2010)

494.0

-31.8

Consumer Confidence (Q4 2010)

56.3%

2.0

Consumer Price Index* (US) (Dec. 2010)

219.2

1.6

Retail Sales (in thousands)

November 2010

YOY % Change

Total Sales

$4,253,800

7.8

Job Growth (Dec. 2010) in thousands

Eller Business Research

Retail Sales (Metro Phoenix)

Retail

2,707,846

7.3

Food

656,930

14.5

Restaurants & Bars

509,582

0.1

Gasoline

379,443

12.6

Contracting

456,753

-15.6

Eller Business Research

Real Estate Commercial: Office*** Vacancy Rate Net Absorption

Should Arizona redirect the job training surcharge on employers’ 74% 16% 10% unemployment insurance taxes to offset higher unemployment insurance rates and help return the unemployment insurance trust fund to solvency?

BACKGROUND: Arizona imposes a 0.1 percent job training tax on employers based on the first $7,000 in annual wages paid to each employee, intended to support the design and delivery of training programs that meet Arizona employers’ unique industry standards and challenges.

Increased joblessness caused by the recession has depleted Arizona’s unemployment insurance trust fund and forced the state’s UI fund to go into $250 million in debt to the federal government.

5. Public Employee Pension Reform

No Undec.

Should Arizona public employee pension systems transition to defined 66% 11% 23% contribution plans from the current defined benefit plans?

BACKGROUND: Defined benefit plans typically provide pension benefits as fixed retirement income based on longevity and peak earning years. The amount the state pays into the fund depends on a formula rooted in the changing value of fund investments. Defined contribution plans provide pension benefits based on lifetime investment in an individual’s personal account.

The state pays into the plan a fixed percentage of the employee’s wages.

Founded in 1943 as a nonprofit, nonpartisan organization, NFIB is the nation’s leading small business association, with offices in Washington, D.C. and all 50 state capitals. Visit nfib.com for more information.

18

A p r i l 2011

YOY % Change

8.4%

Rental Rates (Class A)

Yes

Number

Commercial: Indust.*** Vacancy Rate Net Absorption Rental Rates (Class A)

Residential Total Sales Volume

Q4 2010

Q4 2009

28%

18.6%

(100,127)

(61,651)

$24.72

$26.25

Q4 2010

Q4 2009

14.5%

15.2%

105,408

1,318,152

$0.53

$0.53

Feb. 2011

Feb. 2010

6,535

6,157

Total Median Sale Price

$120,100

$135,000

New Build Sales Volume

347

422

New Median Sale Price

$224,575

$238,298

6,188

5,735

$116,000

$130,000

Resale Sales Volume Resale Median Sale Price

* Consumer Price Index refers to the increase or decrease of certain consumer goods priced month over month. ** Sales Tax refers to Arizona Transaction Privilege, Severance and Use Taxes. *** Cassidy Turley/BRE Latest data at time of press.

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I n B u s i n e s s Ma g a z i n e

19

Trade

Imports & Exports

Lifting the Cuban Embargo – An Opportunity for Arizona Business

by Lila Nordstrom Arizona Congressman Jeff Flake is no fan of Socialism. A life-long Republican who represents a conservative suburb of Phoenix, he nonetheless has been leading a fledgling Republican resistance to the United States embargo against Cuba, an unpopular position in a party still very much uneasy about the Cuban government’s organizing principles. Flake claims he is vocal on this issue primarily because he adds an unexpected voice to the debate. “This is a freedom issue for me,” he says, adding, “It’s always bothered me as a Republican that our foreign policy on this issue is so schizophrenic. We talk about the importance of business and trade and then we turn around and say we can’t trade with Cuba.”

As Flake suggests, among the arguments for opening trade with Cuba are the business

advantages of doing so — advantages that extend to Arizona. Domingo Amuchastegui, a Miami-based political analyst who writes about the Cuban economy, explains why.

“Although Cuba is not a big economy like Brazil or Mexico, it is very significant because Cuba depends on a large scale on imports.”

On the National Scene Nationally, the agricultural and pharmaceutical sectors have long been vocal supporters of lifting the embargo against Cuba. Though the Trade Sanctions Reform and Export Enhancement Act of 2000 granted both sectors the right to sell items to Cuba in limited quantities, most agree that trade would expand dramatically were there less regulatory red tape.

Joe Sigg of the Arizona Farm Bureau believes there is enormous potential for trade with Cuba in the Arizona agricultural sector.

“There would be a big market [in Cuba] for Arizona vegetable crops,” he begins. “Also, we have a lot of dairies in Arizona. We already ship a lot of powdered milk overseas. Between dairy, cheese and powdered milk, there would be a lot of opportunity there. And beef would be another area of opportunity.” Additionally, Lora Mwaniki-Lyman, a research economist at the University of Arizona, points out that Arizona companies produce fertilizers and pesticides for the Mexican market, two products for which Cuba has a dire need in their own agricultural industry.

Sigg notes that Cuba already imports almost $1 billion a year in agricultural

Trinidad, Cuba

20

A p r i l 2011

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Potential Arizona exports to Cuba include:

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commodities, including as much as $30 million a year in dairy products and $14 million a year in red meat products from the United States. So, assessing how much Arizona agriculture stands to gain from trade with Cuba, he asserts, “I have to believe that, given proximity and so forth, it would be a relatively large figure.”

The story is slightly more complicated for the pharmaceutical industry, which has been lobbying at a national level not just for the ability to sell to Cuba but for access to their medical research facilities, which are distinguished in the areas of biotechnology, vaccines and tropical disease research.

Arizona’s pharmaceutical and medical supply industry, which employs about 1,000 people, would benefit greatly from access to the Cuban market, according to Mwaniki-Lyman.

Between 2004 and 2006, Cuba imported $367.5 million in medical instruments.

Arizona now counts optical and medical machinery among its top 10 exports, so this is already an area of common interest between Cuba and Arizona.

Tourism and Foreign Investment Beyond the traditionally recognized benefits of trade with Cuba are some new opportunities that will open as the Cuban government continues to retool its economic policies. For example, Cuba recently began seeking foreign investment in its nickel mining sector, which could impact not only Arizona-based mining

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21

Commerce impetus for political change. “If [Cuba] eventually wants to take advantage of travel and tourism, the infrastructure is really bad and, in order to get investment, they are going to have to change their rules of engagement.

They are going to have to allow rights to property, et cetera.”

Amuchastegui believes these changes will be discussed at Cuba’s Communist Party Congress scheduled for April. Furthermore, he believes the U.S. is missing a major opportunity during this period of change by continuing its policy of disengagement. “Cubans are right now working on initiatives that would encourage foreign investment. How will the United States be able to get a share of that?”

Vinales Valley, Cuba

companies like Freeport-McMoRan Copper & Gold, Inc., but also Arizona’s large mining service sector, which employs 25,000 people and includes consultants who already work internationally.

Cubans are also beginning to seek out investment to expand their tourism sector. The island is looking to hire foreign construction companies to build tourism-related structures, according to Amuchastegui, and MwanikiLyman points out that Arizona’s high-tech sector and telecommunications industry could find a market for services and consulting once the move to expand the tourist infrastructure is further underway.

Beyond investment, Amuchastegui points out that there is a market for luxury goods to feed, clothe and entertain the 3 million tourists who visit the island annually. As tourism increases, so will the need for these goods, many of which would be most easily purchased from the U.S. “It’s wholesale opportunities that are being lost,” he warns.

State of Flux As a matter of course, almost everybody has a difficult time nailing down how much the U.S. economy stands to gain from trade with Cuba because the economy is rapidly evolving.

According to Texas A&M AgriLife Research’s 2009 findings, the immediate removal of financial and travel restrictions on Cuba would

22

A p r i l 2011

result in up to $365 million a year in new U.S. exports and would generate an estimated $1.1 billion in business activity and 6,000 new jobs.

These numbers, however, do not take into consideration the impending changes to the Cuban economy, which is still quite restrictive toward foreign investment and only recently began allowing private initiatives.

As Rep. Flake points out, the move to expand tourism in Cuba will likely be the

Change Now? Despite the challenges inherent in overturning a 50-year-old policy that has severe political implications for a powerful lobby, Flake is optimistic about the future of U.S. policy toward the island. “Every way you slice it, every segment of the [Cuban population in Florida] favors travel. And this freshman group [in Congress] is a different group. They have no reason to vote for the embargo or travel ban.”

Arizona Farm Bureau azfb.org Freeport McMoRan Copper and Gold fcx.com Representative Jeff Flake flake.house.gov Texas A&M — Texas AgriLife Research agriliferesearch.tamu.edu

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23

Tech

Innovations for Business

A ‘Cloud’ that Reigns Firms of all sizes can benefit from cloud computing

by Gremlyn Bradley-Waddell In the past, it’s been seen as a negative to have your head stuck in the clouds. Nowadays, a savvy business owner knows “the cloud” could be an ideal spot.

The cloud in this case, of course, is the oft-mentioned concept of “cloud computing,” which refers to a business outsourcing its computing tasks to another provider with an off-site server or host of servers. In many ways, it makes sense. After all, on-site computers inevitably break down or need pricey upgrades or newer components and require considerable physical space. Add to that the fact that in-house IT employees are often out of the price range of smaller business owners. Or maybe the firm needs loads of computing power but only on a sporadic basis.

With the cloud, all that is really needed is a simple desktop computer; the cloud takes care of just about everything else.

Not ‘If,’ but ‘When’ So, whether they know it now or not, cloud computing is all but a given for a lot of firms.

In fact, David Shelley, president of BVA Inc., a Valley firm that provides cloud computing and other IT solutions, says there’s an industry saying about the practice: “It’s not a question of ‘if,’ it’s always a question of ‘when.’ ” While the term seems like a pretty new one,

cloud computing actually has been around for at least five years, Shelley says. One of the first players on the scene was Google, which introduced a free e-mail service boasting a gigabyte of storage back in 2004. Today, Amazon.com is among the top names in the business, along with Microsoft and smaller operations like Rackspace.

But how does a business get to the cloud in the first place? Shelley says the smart business owner will first shop around for a reputable cloud computing provider and do due diligence by talking with other companies to see what their experiences have been. After that, a typical owner who chooses to work with BVA Inc., for instance, can expect Shelley to take the small business’s two or three on-site servers, create a data center and balance the load among 13 to 15 servers, which may be located

just about anywhere in the country or the world. Spreading the computing over multiple servers maximizes the computational power while minimizing response time and chance of overload. After that, the business owner just needs to pay a monthly fee, which can vary depending on the company’s computing needs. Many companies wish to migrate only their e-mail service to the cloud, Shelley says, but a few of his clients have moved their entire computing environments there.

Big Threat, Shoestring Budget The buzz around cloud computing these days has to do with its high rate of reliability, which is so important for just about any business that views time as money. Shelley says balancing loads among servers is what makes the service so reliable and practically

Cloudy Benefits Before sending their business data into the cloud, businesspeople would be well advised to stop and look around and ask a lot of questions of potential providers, says David Shelley, president of BVA Inc. “You have to do all your homework up front.” Here’s the lowdown on some other aspects of the practice: Cost. Unlike many other experts, Shelley doesn’t believe that cloud computing at this point is particularly cost-effective. “It’s never cheaper,” he says. “It’s just a better alternative to buying another server.” He does not see cloud computing becoming a cheaper way to do business for perhaps another 10 years, “when there are more clients and there’s more storage,” he says. At the same time, Julie David Smith points out that the maintenance fees for on-site computing needs can be astronomical. In fact, she notes that one service call alone, amortized over time, could run thousands of dollars. Mike Benner says that, for AuthorityLabs, the cloud

24

A p r i l 2011

has been cost-effective, allowing the company to do a lot of work with minimal manpower and equipment costs.

Security. Shelley says there are various levels of encryption and, depending upon the business’s needs, upgrading may be an option. A standard level is 128, but there are levels available in the 200s and 300s.

“We’re talking about less than 1 percent of the hacker community (being able to) break a 200-level encryption,” he notes. In addition, backing up data and keeping a copy in a separate location is always a good idea.

Performance. “The cloud is slower,” Shelley says. “Don’t let anyone tell you differently.” User experiences simply will not be the same if a data center is 30 miles away as opposed to in the next room.

AuthorityLabs authoritylabs.com BVA Inc. bvainc.com

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“Healthy Employees Are Productive Employees” eliminates downtime for his clients. In addition, if there’s an outage or a hiccup on the power grid or an Internet pipe goes out, the businesses using his service will likely never experience a disruption. Cloud computing “plans for the worst,” he says. “You can have two or three things fail at once,” he adds, “and still not be affected. If one [server] goes down, it flips to the other carrier.”

Mike Benner, chief technical officer for AuthorityLabs in Chandler, is a fan of cloud computing, thanks in part to its efficiency and reliability. “I’m one person and I can manage 800 servers with one or two buttons,” he says. “And if one stops working, I just spin up a new one.”

But perhaps even better is the sheer power that cloud computing gives a company like AuthorityLabs. Every night, Benner explains, the three-employee firm requires “a lot of horsepower” to search the Internet, accumulate data and determine where companies rank on search engines such as Google, Yahoo and Bing. In fact, Benner says the company’s massive workload has “taken down” some of the data centers with which it is contracted. Even a mere five years ago, AuthorityLabs would not have been able to do what it does, he notes. But the cloud changed everything. “It lets us be a threat to these larger companies, on a shoestring budget,” he says.

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Bring on the Cloud Julie Smith David, Ph.D., director of the Center for Advancing Business through IT (CABIT) at ASU’s W. P. Carey School of Business, says the time has come for even smaller businesses to realize that the cloud is here to stay — and that it has many advantages. She notes that outsourcing e-mail makes sense for most firms, as does using office applications such as Google Docs, which typically have an “enhanced benefit” in that employees can use the worksheets, presentation files and spreadsheets in a collaborative manner, all at the same time.

The cloud “enhances productivity, which, in a way, is going to reduce costs,” David says, and it also allows a company to reach out to customers, “which increases your revenue.”

Those points are difficult for any entrepreneur to argue against. So, bring on the cloud!

AuthorityLabs authoritylabs.com BVA Inc. bvainc.com Center for Advancing Business through IT wpcarey.asu.edu/seid/cabit/

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I n B u s i n e s s Ma g a z i n e

25

Empower Your Business Best practices to thrive, not just survive, in 2011

by Lori K. Baker

26

A p r i l 2011

inbusinessmag.com

“In this current strained economy, cash management is one key item that should be on everyone’s best practices list.”

—John Scherer

B

y now, you have adopted all seven habits of highly effective people, know how to win friends and influence people, and are still trying to think and grow rich. Still, if you’re like most business owners, you’re just too busy to read all the great self-help business books, attend all of your industry’s top conferences and keep track of the latest words of wisdom dispelled by business thought leaders.

“The reality is, the classic small and mid-sized business owner isn’t going to stay on the bleeding edge of trends in best business practices,” says Rick Johnson, a principal and co-owner of Executive Forums, a facilitated peer advisory board service that helps top executives navigate from where they are now to where they want to be by leveraging best practices and tools.

The solution? We sat down with five Valley industry leaders to discover their top three best practices in leadership and management, sales, accounting and finance, information technology and human resources.

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I n B u s i n e s s Ma g a z i n e

27

Leadership and Management Michael K. Maynard shares his expertise in leadership and management. Maynard is senior associate of global clients with The Predictive Group, Inc., a licensee of PI Worldwide, which provides human capital analytics to the world’s corporations. He says it’s important to build “bench strength” in your leadership and management teams today so your company can be ready to ramp up the delivery of goods and services when the economy pulls out of the slump.

Start looking now for your company’s leaders. Maynard has read the tea leaves from the 2010 U.S. Census Bureau’s preliminary findings and says it’s more important now than ever before for business owners to be on the lookout for leadership talent. “This year marks the first time in history that under-35-year-olds are now the majority of American workers,” he says. “The retirement of Baby Boomers has fully begun. As the upper end of the workers are leaving, there are 81 million Millennials — people under 35 years old — who are beginning to enter the work force. So you’re going to need leaders who understand younger workers.” Meanwhile, Maynard says there will be a shortage of workers in the 35-to-45 age bracket, what he calls the “sweet spot for managing younger workers.”

“It’s going to surprise business operators how hard it gets to find qualified front-line managers over the next three to five years,” he predicts.

Focus on finding the superstar, not screening out the bad applicant. “The worst mistake a business owner could make is failing to notice that some potentially great person was sitting in their lobby

28

A p r i l 2011

applying for a job,” Maynard says. “And the person walked out, left, didn’t get an interview, didn’t get a second interview. Then they go down the street to a competitor and they’re a superstar. That’s a devastating cost to the company that let them slip through the process undetected.

But when I have conversations today with business owners, I find all they talk about is, ‘When the economy turns around and we start hiring, we’re sure not hiring another bad sales manager like we did last year.’

OK, I get it. But where’s the discussion on what you’re going to do to go find a great sales manager? It’s absent from the conversation.”

Measure your leaders’ performance by business results and leadership skills. “Leading companies today are moving toward ‘dual appraisal systems,’” Maynard says. “That means in addition to measuring a leader’s business results, these companies are also looking at their skills on the people side of the business, such as finding and selecting key contributors for the business, holding direct reports accountable to clearly communicated goals and objectives, ejecting or demoting poor performers and getting along with peers and senior leaders.” What can happen if a company measures a leader only by business results? “You’ve seen the movie,” Maynard says. “It’s the quintessential Western where the town is beset by criminal rogue gangs so they hire a gunfighter to come in and save the town. And he saves the town all right, but he also sleeps with the mayor’s wife, drinks too much at the bar and shoots up signs. The gunfighter accomplished what the town wanted him to accomplish, but now he’s out of control.”

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Sales Mike Toney, founder and CEO of Conquest Training Systems, Inc., which provides sales training and coaching to clients, provides proven sales techniques. To feed your bottom line, your company must know how to compel customers to take action — from attending an initial sales presentation to continuing to buy your goods and services over the long term, Toney says.

Avoid being seen as a commodity. “Make sure you look and sound different than your competition. By changing your sales strategy, you can’t be commoditized. A lot of my clients struggle with getting beat up on price. They’re being bid against each other. If you’re going to try to break the cycle of commoditization, you have to eliminate looking like the competition. Customers can’t beat you up on price if you’re not providing the exact same product. First, make sure your salespeople aren’t doing the same thing your competition is doing. That could be as simple as not selling features and benefits, as do most salespeople who want to qualify, present and close.” Toney also advises salespeople to avoid worn-out phrases such as, “If I showed you a way, would you buy it from me today?”

Keep score — beyond sales revenues. Toney advises clients to track success in both prospecting and account management systems. “To

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measure a prospecting system, you have to measure activity, not results.

Sales is really a holistic system. I have a rule that says, ‘Don’t manage the numbers; manage the behavior.’ We use that rule to make sure we’re using a system that is clone-able, repeatable and predictable.”

Set up appointments to guarantee the close. “The number one reason why I see sales people with poor closing ratios is they don’t set up appointments correctly. They don’t know how to set up the appointment to guarantee the close. The first strategy, before you hang up the phone, is to make sure you set the customer’s expectations on what’s going to happen in the meeting, so there isn’t going to be a mystery. For a lot of salespeople, as soon as they hear, ‘Yeah, I’ll meet with you,’ they hang up the phone all excited. That’s the time to stay on the phone and say, ‘Let’s make sure our meeting is successful. What two or three things would you like to make sure we discuss that’s most important to you?’ Then you guarantee an outcome, which is going to sound something like, ‘If we accomplish those goals, and I’m not a good fit, would it make sense if we just part as friends? But if it does make sense to move ahead, we can make an agreement for another meeting or start doing business together.’ It’s one of the simplest things a person can do to make sure the meeting is successful.”

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Information Technology

Accounting and Finance John Scherer, a partner with Tatum, a professional services organization specializing in financial and technology leadership, contributes practical lessons in accounting and finance strategies. He says navigating the turbulent waters of today’s economy requires financial discipline, including a good cash management philosophy, budgeting and forecasting systems.

Fine-tune your cash management system.

“In this current strained economy, cash management is one key item that should be on everyone’s best practices list,” Scherer says.

“Beyond a good cash management philosophy, you need tools so you’re able to properly forecast where your business is going to be several weeks out so that you can manage the various components of cash flow. The first step is to give your financial expert a seat at the table so they understand the various parts of the business, know when the business model changes and remain connected to people who can impact cash in the business. For example, the sales and marketing department might have grand plans to really accelerate growth in the business, but if the financial guy isn’t aware of that plan, then, when the spending occurs, the company can get upside down quickly.”

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Incorporate solid financial projections into all business strategies and action plans. “Another best practice is to develop financial projections that clearly represent your company’s strategies and action plans. Any financial person worth his salt will have the ability to financially model, to take what he or she is hearing and fold that into what I call an integrated financial planning model — which is not just a profit and loss projection, but it’s a balance sheet and cash flow monitor. By doing this, you can be certain that you can afford your strategy. There is still a liquidity crunch, and you have to pay attention to cash because your financial institution may or may not be there for you. That’s a tough thing to say, but we’ve seen numerous incidences of businesses that have failed because they didn’t have liquidity.”

Don’t drive business decisions without this dashboard. Scherer says the best dashboards give CEOs access to information on key business drivers with a couple of key strokes.

Dashboards also need to concisely represent information at a glance, with key variables such as inventory turns, receivable days or profit as a percentage of sales. “There’s a whole laundry list of potential metrics,” Scherer says.

“It’s whatever the management team requires to manage the business — computations they’d like to see every day, every week, every month or every quarter.”

Sindi Major-Martinez, president and CEO of Sindel Technologies, LLC, which specializes in connecting business and technology, advances best practices suggestions in the constantly evolving world of information technology. Today’s digital age promises new efficiencies that were unheard of even three years ago, but companies must invest in technology wisely or they’ve just bought an expensive new toy, she says.

Develop a technology strategy before you invest in it. “These days, businesses of all sizes need to have a technology strategy. It’s an exciting time, especially for smaller businesses, because cloud computing and mobility are offering new opportunities that may have been cost-prohibitive before. But not all investments in technology have the same impact. Having a strategy about how you’re going to implement technology is the best place to start. Before you run out and start investing your dollars, step back and look at your business and your processes. Then ask yourself: ‘How can we leverage what we’ve got, and what do we need to add to the mix?’”

Implement a security policy for all mobile devices. “A security policy will reduce the chance of an outsider seeing private company information. It could be a real problem if your company has a breach of security or your client’s information is made public, especially when you consider regulations in all types of businesses.

The first really simple thing to do is to set up a timer on your desktop or devices. If the device is left idle for a certain length of time, it needs a password to get back in.”

Implement policies on your employees’ use of social media. “It’s time to re-evaluate your employee policies on social media, which is now part of business. When can your employees be on it? What can be said? What do you need to be careful of? Once it’s out there, it becomes viral and you can’t get it back. So you really must outline how it can be used.”

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Human Resources Susan Williams, president and founder of HR Choice, offers insight into maximizing the personnel potential in a company’s work force. The basic building block of a company is its work force, making the recruitment and development of employees a key to success.

Use tools of employee engagement.

“Today, it’s more important that ever to do employee engagement, because employees aren’t leaving, they’re staying,” says Williams, who recommends a strategy that begins with a written employee engagement plan and includes knowing your team members: What motivates them? How do they do their jobs? What do they like and dislike? Next, create opportunities for growth, beginning

A Closer Look

with structured training as part of their new employee orientation and building a career ladder in your organization, which can be as simple as job titles that reflect varying levels of expertise.

Discover the value of values. “One way to inspire team members is by making sure you have really strong values in your organization,” says Williams, who recommends not only writing the values but posting them to increase employee awareness. “Leaders must find a way to live those values and communicate them in whatever way they can, including incorporating your values into job descriptions and performance evaluation documents. That way, your values become who you are, part of your culture. You inspire your team because

they feel they are all working toward the same values and the same cause.”

Communicate, communicate, communicate. “Team members really want to hear what’s going on in the company,” says Williams, who recommends developing an internal communications plan that covers how to convey your company’s mission and vision, annual goals, business policies and new hires, to name a few points.

Conquest Training Systems, Inc. conquesttraining.com HR Choice hrchoice.com Predictive Group predictivegroup.com Executive Forums, LLC executiveforums.com Sindel Technologies sindel.com Tatum tatumllc.com

It’s All in the Execution Now that you’ve learned 15 best practices designed to take your business to that next level, “it’s all about execution,” says Rick Johnson, a principal and co-owner of Executive Forums, who offers these tips on how to integrate and institutionalize best practices: Don’t take them off the shelf and try to plug them in. “That’s a mistake. Imagine that you’re sitting there looking at a shiny new rock, and the shiny new rock is a best practice, and it’s proven. You know it’s used in a lot of businesses. Well, maybe you need a shiny blue rock instead of a shiny red rock. If you can pull out of that the templates, the tools, the thinking behind the best practice and adapt and adopt it to what’s going to work best in your business, and the people get engaged and are part of building and integrating that best practice, the more buy-in you’re going to have and the more successful you’re going to be.”

Incorporate best practices in a one-page (two-sided) business plan. “What you will discover pretty quickly is, it’s not so much about the document itself, but it’s about the process that forces you and your team to go through to make strategic decisions. The result is an engaged leadership team that’s singing off the same sheet.”

Start with a three-year view. You and your leadership team need to decide what success looks like in three years and plug in the numbers — of new markets and new products, revenues or percentage growth in profitability. Next, decide the three to five key initiatives you need to hit those objectives. Afterward, break those objectives down to yearly goals. “Here’s where the hard work starts: knowing where the team wants to be a year from now and how to break the goals down for the next four quarters,” Johnson says. “What do you need to accomplish in the next four quarters? What are the key projects? Who on the team owns them? And what is their measurement of success? Once you have that plan developed, each of the leaders goes and drives that down through the organization. It’s the process that drives success.”

Executive Forums executiveforums.com

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Sector

Industry At Its Best

The Economy of Green From solar plants to golf balls, green is sustaining business in Arizona

by RaeAnne Marsh

Solar

Solar has been dominating the headlines of late. Spain’s Abengoa Solar is building the world’s largest parabolic trough photovoltaic plant in Gila Bend, and related businesses have begun establishing themselves locally, thus ratcheting up the job opportunities. The City of Surprise anticipates that incoming Spanish companies Rio Solar, which makes the curved panels used in solar, and Gestamp Solar Steel, which manufactures the steel components that support the solar structures, will generate at build out 200 and 300 jobs, respectively. Hundreds are employed at the present time in construction of the facilities.

The manufacturers also have staff working out of the city’s business accelerator, AZ TechCelerator, which may lead to further business development for local companies.

Our 321 days of sunshine each year is an obvious plus for solar generation projects, but Chris Camacho, executive vice president of

Greater Phoenix Economic Council, says GPEC’s focus is on component manufacturers because they have a much higher job-multiplier effect.

“There is a whole value chain aligned around a solar system,” he notes.

A study out of ASU’s W. P. Carey School of Business and published in The Electricity Journal ranks Arizona first in the nation in solar potential. While the report’s author, Assistant Research Professor Matthew Croucher, notes that realizing this potential will require investing in infrastructure — because the current transmission system was created for fossil fuel generation — the state has already indicated its support by naming renewable energy one of the key job sectors for the Arizona Commerce Authority to pursue. Camacho, relating that the U.S. Department of Energy projects nearly half a million jobs will be created in renewable energy in the next five years, calls renewables “Arizona’s next technological evolution.”

Leslie Lindo, president of Sonoran SBAP, the Arizona provider for the National Sustainable Building Advisor Program — which trains architects, community officials and other professionals to be leaders in

Photo: Perfect Power Solar

The banner of “green,” or sustainable, encompasses businesses involved in the production of renewable energy from a variety of sources as well as businesses that provide a product or service that improves the energy efficiency of facilities and operations.

Taken as a broad sector — although the individual companies represent a multitude of business sectors of their own — green is a strong and growing economic force for business and employment in Metro Phoenix and Arizona as a whole.

Civic Space Park, Downtown Phoenix

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sustainability — notes that utility companies and municipalities are developing programs to encourage sustainability. Other businesses are stepping up to deal with rain water collection and gray water systems. And there are layers within industries, “not just the obvious ones you’re thinking about,” she adds.

In addition to jobs in related manufacturing, solar projects will need environmental engineers for site assessments; hydro will need geologists. “We’re looking at solutions to last well into the future,” Lindo says. “These are long-term industries.”

Photo: Salt River Project

Other Power

Wind currently accounts for a greater percentage than solar of SRP's sustainable portfolio (7 percent vs. 4 percent). Susan Sloan, director of state relations for the American Wind Energy Association, says 120 megawatts of wind production had been installed in Arizona by the end of last year.

“Arizona is not the windiest state, but there is a lot of opportunity” — in part because Arizona has a policy to use renewable energy. She notes wind is commercially cost-effective. “You can do 20-year contracts at a fixed price because you know the cost of fuel will not go up, and you won’t have environmental regulations that might cost more money.” It’s a very site-specific effort, requiring locations where wind can blow unobstructed, such as flat or elevated areas like mesas, and most suitable Arizona locations are in the northern part of the state.

Operations and maintenance of wind farms generate about 85,000 jobs in the country, but Sloan points out they are good-paying jobs in areas where employment opportunities have become sparse. “We’ve seen a lot of growth in manufacturing in the last few years,” she says, citing new companies in wind turbine components as well as such local businesses as cranes, concrete and telecommunications.

In other cases, companies are retooling their manufacturing centers, exploring the industry and looking at what they can provide. Longtime fastener manufacturer and distributor Copper State Bolt & Nut Co. now includes products specifically for the wind industry. Speaking to the change in the last few years, Sloan says less than 30 percent of components for wind turbines were U.S. manufacture. “Now, it’s more than 50 percent, even with more turbines in the field.”

Biofuel has been proposed as a viable renewable energy source for the future,

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Dry Lake Wind Farm, Navajo County

although also generating heated argument against dedicating agricultural land to a purpose other than food. At February’s National Biodiesel Conference & Expo in Phoenix, Arizona was touted as a perfect location for growing algae — which has potential as a source of biofuel with the added advantage of being a “crop” that could be farmed on land that cannot support food crops (such as corn, from which ethanol is produced). While the technology to mass-produce algae-based fuel is still in the future, another biofuel is generating profits now for local entrepreneur Dan Rees, co-founder and president of REV Biodiesel — although he believes the blanket term does a disservice to his product by lumping it together with ethanol.

Biodiesel, Rees emphasizes, is made from waste products and the process uses no water; in comparison, ethanol requires 2,000 gallons of water in crop irrigation and processing to produce one gallon of fuel. Additional benefits of biodiesel include lowering greenhouse emissions by at least 50 percent and generating 85 percent less emissions than

regular diesel. Comparing energy required in production with the energy actually produced, the biodiesel ratio is 1:4.5 units; ethanol is 1:1 units; petroleum is 1:0.8 units. The only byproduct in biodiesel processing is glycerin, which actually represents another revenue stream as it is used in hand-soaps and other liquid products.

Rees has been producing and selling biodiesel since 2008, and says he was immediately overwhelmed with customer demand. Selling only through the website, his then-company, Arizona Biodiesel, would post the information when product was available, and “within hours, we would sell out of the one-to-two thousand gallons we could produce in a day.” His new plant in Gilbert, now in phase one of operations, is being ramped up to produce 10 million gallons per year but will eventually handle 30 million.

“There’s a fantastic demand [for biodiesel],” he says, observing that “there are biodiesel plants all over” in the nearby states of California, Oregon and Washington, and that “Arizona is one of the states left behind.”

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Two 6,000-gallon tanks for acid esterification, four 15,000-gallon tanks to store the waste cooking oil, and two tall 4,000-gallon tanks for transesterification at the REV Biodiesel plant

Most alternative fuels, he explains, require some modification to the engine in order to use it, but biodiesel does not. “It’s a straight substitute for diesel. And it gets better mileage and is better for the engine.” It’s also non-toxic, and, in a recent TV appearance, Rees drank some of the liquid to demonstrate. If there were to be a spill at his plant, he says, the EPA’s directive is to just wash the highly soluble product into the ground.

Resources are plentiful: Rees cites an ASU study through the Desert Biofuels Initiative which found that, in Maricopa County, available material includes 16 million gallons of restaurant oil waste, 23 million gallons of underground sewage (now being dumped in landfills) and tallow and other animal fats from cattle processing plants; biodiesel does not use food crops, although it can use the soy oil that is a byproduct of making soybean food. Federal subsidies help biodiesel remain competitive with diesel — a product that, Rees points out, is part of the heavily subsidized oil industry ($455 billion in 2008) — but Rees believes there is tremendous potential for growth in this type of energy.

Products

Equally enthusiastic about potential in another sustainable market, Perfect Power Solar CEO Lynn Paige says she would welcome more companies in her niche.

“One little company can’t make a dent in the tide that needs to change.” Her 33-year-old

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company’s specialty is high-performance solar electric systems with building-integrated photovoltaic — solar energy production systems that are incorporated into the construction of a building, such as being built into windows on the south side of a high-rise.

“It’s adding purpose to a product that’s already serving a purpose,” she observes. Among the projects by Phoenix-based Perfect Power Solar are a custom-manufactured roof for the spa atop Optimum Biltmore Towers and the undulating, see-through solar system of the installation in Downtown Phoenix’s Civic Space Park.

“There’s a growing interest in energyproducing and energy-saving [products], especially in commercial buildings,” says Paige, noting there are government mandates to improve sustainability. “It’s an entire integrated building [design] that includes low-flow toilets and special paint.” Observing that the U.S. is just picking up on technology that has been available in Europe for the past 10 years, she says the movement has “nowhere to go but to increase — exponentially — in ideas to decrease energy consumption and make spaces more livable.”

Advances in lighting have resulted in CFLs becoming mainstream, but Beyond the Horizon owner Stan Zenda, who has multiple decades’ experience with energy management products and systems, recommends induction lighting to his clients. They have no electrodes, but rather have magnets to create a magnetic

field. They render color more accurately than gas lamps or high-intensity discharge lights, but can be muted down to the dim sodium color for use in areas that preserve a dark night sky. Although 20-25 percent more expensive in first-cost terms, their cost over their life cycle is a fraction of the cost of comparable HID lighting. Used just dawn to dusk out of the 8,760 hours in an average year, they will last 23 years. “I tell my clients, ‘Make sure you tell your grandson what it is you did, so when it comes time to replace it, he’ll be able to,’” says Zenda.

Lindo notes there is a trickle effect to sustainability as consumers are, increasingly, making purchasing decisions based on whether the product supports their values.

“Even Walmart … is focused on supplying these types of products, so they’re requiring that of their suppliers and their vendors.”

And with the increased interest in building to LEED (Leadership in Energy & Environmental Design) standards, there is a greater market in construction for sustainable products. Says Zenda, “More and more is incorporated into the original build.”

Products like the 3SR motor control from Scottsdale-based 3P Motor Controls (formerly Precision Power Labs, Inc.) can sense the variable loads on motor-driven machinery such as elevators and rock crushers, and adjust voltage and amperage (electricity requirements) commensurate with the load’s needs. For instance, explains Zenda, an escalator at the airport is required by building code to accommodate 450 pounds per step, yet not only is that weight seldom exerted by a passenger but there are slow times when no one at all is even on the escalator.

“Business has been increasing,” says 3P Motor Controls owner Chuck Wheeler, whose company not only designed and builds the 3SR motor control but will do the engineering on the products they handle from other suppliers to make them fit the customer’s needs. Working mostly with commercial and industrial applications, Wheeler says his products can fit anything with an electric motor. Additionally, 3P Motor Controls is both a trade ally and qualified service provider with SRP. “We work with SRP and APS to help customers get rebates on qualifying energy-saving measures.

Three years ago, nobody cared — it was too difficult to fill out the paperwork. Now, it’s almost the first thing out of their mouth.”

“In some cases, the jobs are the same but

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Photo: REV Biodiesel

Sector

they’re just applied to new markets,” says Richard Condit, vice president with Sundt construction company and currently the president of Arizona Business Advancing Sustainability. AzBAS, he says, has grown in the last four years, as “green” has attracted more players and generated more jobs. Noting that Sundt is working on the Gila Bend solar project, he observes, “These are huge projects, and somebody’s got to build it.”

While AzBAS encourages members to share best practices in demonstrating social responsibility, some members have also found new markets that help grow business and create new jobs, says Condit. For instance, he says, “Dixon Golf makes recyclable golf balls.

They have no heavy metals in them.”

Services

Other companies see business opportunity in services within the green sector. Scottsdale public relations firm Sherri May & Co. pooled the passion and expertise of its staff to launch a national contest that would help promote awareness of sustainability. Offering a targeted marketing plan as the prize, they wanted to assist one municipality in inspiring its residents to help improve citywide energy efficiency and realize a positive economic impact. “We’re convinced that the small steps make a difference in the grand scheme, and we wanted to help cities educate and inform their residents that small steps make a difference,” says agency manager Sue Thomas.

An unexpected result was hearing from Dunn Edwards Paints, offering to contribute paint from its line of eco-friendly paints.

Says Thomas, “We found there are a lot of companies out there that offer these kinds of products.”

Beyond Green president Steven Lopez took aim at “what products are going most of the time or expelling the most carbon dioxide or particulates,” and settled on transportation as his realm of impact. He launched Clean Air Cab in 2009 with a fleet of Toyota Priuses. Noting the cars get 48-51 miles per gallon, he says current gasoline prices may force some cab companies to add a fuel surcharge but “we will not change our price.” The hybrids produce 66 percent less emissions than standard cars, and, going for a zero carbon footprint, Lopez pays carbon credits to another local company to offset the remaining carbon dioxide. Clean Air Cab uses recycled oil from Pioneer Distributing Company in Phoenix, and cleans the cars with a waterless system. With

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15 employees and approximately 60 independent contractors, Lopez believes at least a part of his business comes from people who support his philosophy of sustainability.

Employment

The job opportunities associated with renewables reach into every industry and job category, asserts Tom Rand, author of Kick the Fossil Fuel Habit. Making an analogy to the automobile industry, which employs people in such diverse occupations as electrician and accountant and requires related infrastructure in a highway system, he predicts renewables “will be the largest infrastructure build in human history.” As a venture capitalist in the clean air sector, he put his money where his mouth is and founded the private venture VCi Green Fund in 2005.

Observing that GPEC and the Arizona Commerce Authority are “steadily attracting these [businesses and job opportunities] to the state, Maricopa Workforce Connections program administration manager Curtis Shaw says, “We’re doing a lot in green-related training.” With a $6 million State Energy Sustainability Partnership grant, Maricopa County, Maricopa Community Colleges and the City of Phoenix are collaborating to provide training that will make a work force available to employers. “We’re contacting all the businesses we’re aware of that qualify as green-related businesses and identifying skills and opportunities.” And he notes that Pathways Out of Poverty, a program operated

by Goodwill Industries and Opportunities Industrialization Center — each with its own significant grant funding — is designed to train people in these green-related occupations.

With Gestamp, Rio Glass and other major green projects, thousands of jobs have been created in the construction phase, and hundreds of permanent jobs are expected once construction is completed, says Shaw. Pointing out the construction jobs range from highly skilled engineering and technician positions to entry-level labor, to be followed by operational opportunities from maintenance up to engineers and technicians, Shaw says, “This is a broadbased opportunity, so it is good for Arizona.”

Future

While the debate rages over whether an economy built on tax incentives can sustain itself in the long run, Arizona’s Renewable Energy Tax Incentive Program (signed into law

June 2009) seems to be effective in attracting more foreign direct investment interest in Greater Phoenix. Another incentive is simply the attraction of already-established companies.

“Everyone likes to follow the leader,” observes GPEC’s Rudy Vetter, senior vice president of international business, referring especially to the Suntech Power Holdings Co. solar panel factory in Goodyear. Additionally, ASU has become a leader in renewable energy research, with such promising efforts as growing algae for biodiesel and plastics.

“There’s always something new coming on the horizon,” says SRP’s Patty Garcia-Likens.

The utility’s sustainable portfolio includes investments in wind, hydro, geothermal and landfill gas, she points out, adding, “We hope for industries to grow.” By 2025, 15 percent of the state’s energy is required by the Arizona Renewable Energy Standards to come from alternative technologies, and, although renewable energy is currently more expensive than fossil fuel, Garcia-Likens says she sees great potential in it for the economy. “The technology is always changing; getting better, more efficient and more cost effective.”

3P Motor Controls precisionpowerlabs.com Abengoa Solar abengoasolar.com American Wind Energy Association awea.org Arizona Business Advancing Sustainability azbas.net Arizona Commerce Authority azcommerce.com Arizona TechCelerator surpriseaz.gov Beyond the Horizon bthreps.com City of Surprise surpriseaz.gov Clean Air Cab cleanaircab.com Copper State Bolt & Nut Co. copperstate.com Dixon Golf dixongolf.com Dunn Edwards Paints dunnedwards.com The Electricity Journal elsevier.com Gestamp Solar Steel gestampsolarsteel.com Greater Phoenix Economic Council gpec.org Maricopa Workforce Connections maricopaworkforceconnection.com Perfect Power Solar perfectpowernetwork.com REV Biodiesel revbiodiesel.com Rio Solar Ltda. riosolar.com Sherri May & Co sherrimayco.com Sonoran SBAP sonoransbap.com SRP srpnet.com Sundt

sundt.com

Suntech Power Holdings Co. suntech-power.com U.S. Department of Energy energy.gov VCi Green Fund vcigreenfunds.com W. P. Carey School of Business wpcarey.asu.edu

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Communicate

Louder than Words

Business Patnership:

Guiding Your Partnership to Long-Term Success

by John Minahan

Never have more partners than you can fit in an elevator. It’s a comment that seems like a joke but is deadly serious when you’re starting a business. Too many partners will create conflicts you don’t need. Even the most bonded of partnerships will fray under the pressure of competing interests. While it is important to have partners who each bring skills to the table, these choices must be made carefully and with an eye toward keeping the group a manageable size. Every partner you add increases the possibility of an interest that will stray from the good of the company.

What’s more, a big group of partners is simply difficult to manage. Good communication is key to a successful partnership, and when the partner group is too large, that communication becomes more complicated. There is always the risk that one partner will hear important news last and be aggrieved as a result or that some other critical piece of information will get to some partners but not all. A big group is added complexity. Keep the partners group compact and manageable.

If you’ve run into problems, there are rules to follow to improve a partnership.

Rule 1: Schedule regular and open

communication. A formal meeting once a month, either in person or at least by phone, is a must. Review the past month’s performance

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and talk to each other as owners, not as managers. Discuss matters in your common role as owners.

Rule 2: Clarify ownership versus executive.

Owners own the company. Owners don’t run the company. When I go into the corner office of a company and I ask that individual what he or she does, nine times out of ten, I hear, “I’m the owner.” That’s the wrong answer. The owner might be who you are, but it’s not what you do.

What you do is your job title: You are the CEO, the CFO, the VP of sales. That’s the phrase that tells people what you do all day. You can’t be an owner all day. If you take “owner” as your title, then all day you will be operating in your mental state as an owner, and that might mean worrying about your investments, wondering whether you will make enough money to send your kids to college — all kinds of things that have no business being in the mind of a manager. A manager must work at all times for the good of the company. Owners must recognize that if they are going to be involved in the day-to-day experience of the company, they can’t operate as owners. They must operate as their job titles dictate. Otherwise, they might steer the company away from its best path forward.

Not only are owners hobbled by their own conflicted interests but also employees are undermined. When they have a question,

instead of respecting the clear management hierarchy, employees might shop around from owner to owner while looking for the answer they like. Owners need to know their management roles and respect them. If an employee comes to the owner/CEO with a payroll question, the CEO should respond, “That’s not for me. Take that to the CFO, and whatever the CFO says is your answer.”

Rule 3: Define roles and responsibilities.

An offshoot of defining owners versus executives is defining roles and responsibilities.

The most efficient way to run a company is to have employees assigned to specific tasks without overlap. This is true for partners and owners as well. The greater the definition of their roles, the less likely there is to be conflict.

This is a key principle because when roles are allowed to overlap, it’s often a disaster.

Take this example from the U.S. military: The military has a method of covering as much ground during an assault as possible, and it is called the Buzz Saw. Here’s how it works.

Consider there are three professional snipers and their mission is to protect a certain area while under attack. Implementing a strict division of territory, each is given an area to cover that does not overlap with the other two snipers’. That way they can cover as much ground as possible without waste. This seems inbusinessmag.com

Your Business businessmechanicbook.com

John Minahan includes a chapter on how to work with business partners in his book The Business Mechanic: 9 Simple Ways to Improve Your Business.

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Co-founder and owner of a multi-million-dollar media company that was named one of the fastest growing private companies by Inc. Magazine, and trusted advisor to CEOs and executives as well as a certified public accountant, Minahan has 15 years of

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like a very simple concept: Each sniper has a separate area of responsibility.

There are downsides to it, to be sure. If one sniper fails to achieve the goal, the other two might not be aware until it is too late.

It is necessary for all three to communicate effectively and efficiently.

But let’s take a look at what happens when their division of territories overlaps. Because each sniper does not have a personal area of responsibility, the method of sharing risk will fail. Yes, certain areas are better covered, but each person is now stretched. Terms and phrases such as “bandwidth,” “stretched too thin” and “scope of responsibility” all mean the same thing: You are stretching your resources.

Now let’s look at this in the context of three business owners. When owners do not have defined roles and they share duties, risks appear because now there is overlap. That can create conflict. Who is in charge of the areas where there is overlap? That confusion can lead to paralysis or two individuals working at crosspurposes, neither of which is good for a business.

What’s more, not only do you have overlap but also you have gaps. You have the CEO and CFO worried about finance and the CFO and COO worried about accounting. So who is focusing on sales and delivery? When individuals are stretched over multiple areas of responsibility, key elements fall through the cracks. On the battlefield, that can mean defeat. It’s the “shoot everything that moves” method of attack. It wastes time and resources.

It is far less likely to succeed than the “shoot only in a defined area” method. This concept is just as applicable in the business world.

Too often, we are conditioned to see sharing as a good thing, a frame of mind in which we should all strive to be. That might be true in our personal lives, but it can have negative consequences in other settings. The battlefield is one. The business world is another.

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pract ices not ju to THR IV st SU RVIV E E

Pow By th er Lunch Businesse Numbers Calendar

experience with both public and private companies.

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Enterprise

Risks & Rewards

Is Your Status Quo Killing Your Business?

Clinging to old perspectives leads to a stagnant economy

by Rebel Brown The more things change, the more they stay the same — especially in business.

And that’s the problem. As much as we all acknowledge how the world has changed over the last two decades, businesses and corporations tend to continue doing things the same way they’ve always done them. I can’t count the number of times executives have told me, “Well, that’s the way we’ve always done it.”

The truth is that most companies talk about change far more than they actually engage in it. That’s because they are afraid of making any change out of fear — of Big Bang disruption, of the wrong change or of leaving the safety and comfort of the known. We’re stuck in the way we’ve always done it.

The key to evolving and prospering is to not only challenge some of our most basic business assumptions but, in some cases, to reject them outright. Businesses that let go of the status quo will begin to rise above their competition, defying gravity in a sense. In order to start that process, executives need to start questioning some of the most common sacred cows of business, including:

“It’s Our Best and Biggest Seller”

Sometimes, clinging to the cash cow can lead to a complacency that prevents new companies from staying in sync with what the market needs. Instead, these companies become slavish to the needs of one client and ignore the changes in the marketplace. What’s worse is that the big seller may represent strong revenue, but all the extra attention

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this client commands may actually mean that it’s big only in revenue but not in profits.

What’s worse is that your company may end up completely incapable of surviving if that big seller stops selling, because myopia has prevented them from evolving to meet the changing needs of their customers.

Are they? Sometimes, our best customer commands more attention than the rest, which cuts into the actual profitability of that customer. It may also take our attention away from other customers who could account for as much profit if the time and effort were taken to help those relationships grow.

Moreover, focusing on a very select set of big customers makes us unobservant to the changes in our industries, often preventing us from capitalizing on other opportunities for growth and expansion.

big domino to fall, other big ones will follow.

But the reality is that those plans aren’t always sure things. Remember, huge opportunities aren’t always inherently opportunities for success. They can be opportunities for failure, as well.

Let’s face it — two years ago, we never expected the emergence of social media as a way to communicate with and market to our customers and prospects. And five years ago, many didn’t expect the Web would become the major revenue driver it’s become. So, if the world around us is changing so dramatically, so quickly, why do we cling to the oldest ideas in business? If we truly want to defy gravity, we must first untie the tethers that bind us to old assumptions. We can use our innate human abilities to learn to think differently about our businesses by listening to our markets and shifting our perspectives — from gravity to growth.

“It’s a Huge Opportunity”

Rebel Brown rebelbrown.com

“They’re Our Biggest Customer”

The big deal, the dream client, the huge order — all things that businesses strive for — may not wind up being that profitable in the long run. We’ll discount; deal; sacrifice strategy; dedicate extra resources; and throw out the baby, the bathwater and the tub to get those deals. And once we have them, we celebrate and take our victory lap, but what have we really won? We rationalize that we’ll make up whatever we spent to get the deal over the lifetime of the contract. We justify the extra effort by thinking if we can get this

Rebel Brown, author of Defy Gravity, is a consultant who has more than 20 years’ experience working with clients that range from larger companies to smaller, more entrepreneurial concerns, in start-up, growth and turnaround situations. She brings her strategy, launch and turnaround expertise, along with leadership and motivational skills, to companies in diverse industries in the U.S. and abroad.

inbusinessmag.com

“life is about relationships” Daniel F. Rychlik, MD, Fertility Centers of Arizona, PC Alerus Bank & Trust Commercial Banking Customer

“It’s amazing what you can do when you build relationships versus just making connections. At Alerus Bank & Trust, they listen, they understand, and they care.

That’s what I want in my banker.”

Read the Fertility Centers story—and others—at alerusbiz.com.

480.905.2430

| 17045

N Scottsdale Road

| Scottsdale,

AZ 85255

Ken Blanchard College of Business | College of Education | College of Nursing & Health Sciences | College of Liberal Arts | College of Fine Arts & Production

Online • Campus

Get started today! Call or visit: 877-319-3244 | www.gcu.edu Grand Canyon University is regionally accredited by the Higher Learning Commission of the North Central Association of Colleges and Schools. (800-621-7440; http://www.ncahlc.org/ ).

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HR

People Are Key

Employee Engagement:

The Proven Key to Increasing Productivity, Revenue

by Max Kipling

Over the past few years, most front-line managers have been forced to accomplish more with less — less in resources, less time, fewer costs. While a lot of companies have succeeded in maintaining or increasing their bottom line (despite unfavorable economic conditions), they’re also beginning to see the unfortunate side effects of that success.

To wit: Employee engagement levels have plummeted to their lowest level in 15 years, according to a national study by Hewitt Associates. That represents a consistent decline over the past five years, mostly due to the fact employees feel they have little or no stake in the company’s overall direction, regardless of how much additional responsibility they’ve agreed to take on since the recession began.

There is hope, however, for managers who need to make do with limited resources.

The study found organizations that have maintained high levels of employee engagement throughout the downturn generated 19 percent higher revenues than their competitors. And the key to effecting

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that employee engagement, in many cases, is a matter of making employees feel empowered, as if they have a certain degree of autonomy.

Do employees have a voice in the way the department is run? Does the company encourage employees to pursue their own initiatives? Does it promote from within?

Does it acknowledge and reward longevity?

Does the company have an outlet for positive and negative employee feedback? Does it act on that feedback? Does upper management effectively communicate what’s new and/or changing? Does it ask for input from mid- or even low-level employees on new initiatives?

Do low-level employees not always feel like they’re the “last to know”? Is there a profitsharing plan? Does the company encourage departments to work with, rather than against, one another? Does the company sponsor regular events aimed at increasing collegiality?

Management and policy strategies that lead to a “yes” response to these questions are proven to boost the level of engagement, which — in turn — contributes to increased employee

loyalty, morale, productivity and revenues.

At the same time, managers may need to consider how their hiring decisions may be affecting the overall dynamic of the department, and — more importantly — what they can do to compensate for poor hiring decisions they’ve made in the past.

Mike Toney, CEO and founder of Phoenixbased Conquest Training Systems, Inc., has spent the bulk of his career assessing local and national companies’ sales performance, offering expert guidance on how to pinpoint (and capitalize on) hidden opportunities. He recalls the story of a mid-sized company that became aware of some of its performance problems as a result of the recession. “Good economies hide a lot of bad behavior,” Toney explains.

After monitoring the company’s day-to-day operations, Toney recognized the company had two types of salespeople — “Victims” (frequently referred to in sales circles as “average order takers”) and “Producers” (i.e., top performers). The Victims, who represented more than half of the sales force, blamed the

inbusinessmag.com

Books economy, the leads and the company for their inability to generate new business. The Producers, who represented roughly 45 percent of the sales force, were wholly committed to maintaining high closing rates no matter what (to the extent they were willing to take risks and learn new strategies in order to succeed). This example is indicative of something a lot of companies are experiencing right now: the downside of poor hiring decisions made before the economic downturn began.

According to Toney, one way managers can inspire the whole team without straining the budget is to offer non-cash incentives that are personalized for each team member. Cash incentives are just a means to an end — family, travel, security, etc. If travel is important to an individual; Toney suggests offering him/her a trip in return for meeting a long-term goal. If family is important, offer some time off in return for reaching an agreed-upon benchmark. The key: Make sure the incentive is offered with the employee in mind.

It’s also crucial for today’s managers to be proactive when it comes to recruiting. One tactic from which a lot of companies have benefited is the use of an employee profile.

Managers utilize a number of criteria (e.g., surveys, metrics, annual reviews) to develop a list of skills and personality traits their highest performers have in common. This way, companies can make hiring decisions based on who provides the “best fit” for their department rather than who has the most experience.

In terms of motivating long-term employees, recent research proves workers crave more flexibility in their schedule so they can achieve a healthy work/life balance.

The value of this work force intangible is recognized in the Alfred P. Sloan Award for Business Excellence in Workplace Flexibility, which considers employers of all sizes, in both public and private sectors, whether for-profit or notfor-profit. The Arizona Foundation for Legal Services & Education has won the award two years in a row, in recognition of several progressive policies that include a 12-week maternity leave and the right to bring new babies into the office for the first six months. The Foundation reports that not only does its staff, given the security of being able to bring their babies to work, stay focused while in the office, but the policies have helped it avoid costly turnover due to employees quitting or requesting a parttime schedule.

While very few companies are set up in such a way that they could successfully implement the same type of postmaternity policy, any type of initiative that lets employees know the company supports them (not only in the office but also in their personal lives) goes a long way toward reducing turnover, increasing productivity and ensuring that long-term employees know the company recognizes (and appreciates) the sacrifices they’ve made on its behalf.

Conquest Training conquesttraining.com Hewitt Associates hewittassociates.com

inbusinessmag.com

Selling Yourself

Win: The Key Principles to Take Your Business from Ordinary to Extraordinary From Rupert Murdoch to Steve Wynn, from Fred Smith to Michael Bloomberg to Roger Ailes, and many more, Frank Luntz, Ph.D., takes their stories and brings them to life in the exploration of communication excellence and what it takes to win. Winning was not in any way the communication approach for most of the great innovators of our generation. In business, winners rarely talk about the bottom line or profitability or even success. Rather, their message is about seeing a deficiency in the human existence and fixing it by finding a product or service that makes life easier or better.

Dr. Frank I. Luntz $25.99 • Hyperion • April 2011

Tell to Win: Connect, Persuade, and Triumph with the Hidden Power of Story To validate the power of telling purposeful stories, Peter Guber includes in this book a remarkably diverse number of “voices” — master tellers with whom he’s shared experiences. They include YouTube founder Chad Hurley, NBA champion Pat Riley, clothing designer Normal Kamali, “Mission to Mars” scientist Gentry Lee, Under Armour CEO Kevin Plank, former South African president Nelson Mandela, magician David Copperfield, film director Steven Spielberg, novelist Nora Roberts, rock legend Gene Simmons and physician and author Deepak Chopra. After listening to this extraordinary mix of voices, you’ll know how to craft, deliver and own a story that is truly compelling — one capable of turning others into viral advocates for your goal.

Peter Guber $26 • Crown Publishing Group • April 2011

Strengths Based Selling: Based on Decades of Gallup’s Research into High-Performing Salespeople Strengths Based Selling explains talent and how to identify and maximize it, and then covers the basic steps of the selling process, including prospecting, cold calling, assessing opportunity, identifying solutions, building advocacy, negotiating, closing, servicing, retaining and growing. The reader can take the Web-based Clifton StrengthsFinder Assessment (access code included), discover his or her own unique strengths, learn to apply them to sales, and formulate strategies to triangulate individual talent and job role.

Tony Rutigliano and Brian Brim $24.95 • Gallup Press • On shelves and online

Flash Foresight: How to See the Invisible and Do the Impossible From small businesses to multinationals, individual careers to entire industries, Flash Foresight looks at how Burrus’s seven radical flash foresight “triggers” have transformed dozens of careers, fortunes and lives. Both engaging and enlightening, Flash Foresight provides an easy-to-implement blueprint for applying the same strategies to your own business, enabling you to see the invisible and do the impossible. In the past, flash foresight was useful. Today, as the pace of technological change accelerates almost beyond the point of comprehension, it’s an imperative.

Daniel Burrus and John David Mann $27.99 • Harper Collins • On shelves and online

I n B u s i n e s s Ma g a z i n e

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Trickle Up

A View from the Top

Ann Siner Gives First-Class Appeal to Second-Hand Shops

The Siner Side of Resale ■■

Siner was inspired to open a high-end resale shop after visiting a consignment shop while on a business trip in Texas that she says was “dark, dirty and dingy.”

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My Sister’s Closet first opened in 1991, My Sister’s Attic began in 1999, and Well Suited opened in 2001.

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Whenever possible, Siner opens one of each of the three businesses in the same shopping complex.

■■

Best-sellers are designer handbags and accessories, St. John knits, trendy label jeans, current designer clothing and designer jewelry.

■■

Siner and her staff look for items that are no more than four to five years old, have a retail value of at least $40, and are in like-new and clean condition.

The newest My Sister's Closet, at Scottsdale and Lincoln roads

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If there is one thing Ann Siner has learned in her almost-20 years as chief executive officer of My Sister’s Closet, it is to never rest on her laurels. “We can have a good year, and sales will be great, but we will not take it easy.

I am always looking ahead,” says Siner, who founded the company that will celebrate its 20-year anniversary in August.

My Sister’s Closet is a high-end resale shop that features what Siner calls “better items,” including men’s and women’s clothing and accessories, and home furnishings. Between 2,500 and 4,000 new items come in every day, and Siner says most sell within about 30 days.

“We take what is cute, current and clean,” she says. “Nothing tends to be more than four to five years old.”

Siner explains that her company is, technically, made up of three separate stores: My Sister’s Closet features clothing for women, My Sister’s Attic stocks furniture and home furnishings, and Well Suited carries men’s clothing. Siner followed up the opening last year of a 12,000-square-foot My Sister’s Closet at Scottsdale and Lincoln roads in Scottsdale with a My Sister’s Attic and a Well Suited at the same shopping center, bringing the total number of stores to 10, all in Scottsdale, Phoenix and Chandler.

Over the years, Siner has weathered her share of economic storms. She says she’s been through “at least two recessions” but, although the one in 2001 was tough for her and her business, 2007’s didn’t really register as a blip on her company’s financial radar. “In fact, in 2007 we had 20 percent growth, and then last year we were also 20 percent over the previous year, and in 2009 we were 20 percent above 2008.”

Opening her business in 1991 tested Siner’s philosophy of “keep trying until you find a way to reach your goals.” When

she attempted to open her first store, she learned that second-hand clothing shops were classified as pawn shops. “So, according to codes, we couldn’t go into all the shopping centers we wanted,” she says. “I said ‘We’re just selling used clothing here!’ but we couldn’t do it.” Undaunted, Siner kept trying to find a suitable place in which to set up shop. But her first lease came with a caveat from the landlord. “I had to put a clause in the first lease that they could close us down if they wanted to,” she says. “But I had so much faith I could make it work better, and now we are in great areas like Scottsdale Road and Pima Road.”

Siner, who worked as director of marketing for PetSmart before opening My Sister’s Closet, says her company is “very much a local thing.” She employs 170 area people, and, if an item does not sell within 60 to 90 days, she donates it to a local charity, with the receipt going to the customer. “We donate to really good organizations, like Sojourner Center, which helps battered women and children, and Friends of Animal Care and Control, and HALO animal rescue.”

Another bonus of her business, Siner says, is that it helps give people what she calls “easy found money” for items that they might otherwise have given away or sold at a garage sale.

“They can arrange to have a moving truck come to their home, or they can stop by the store anytime with their items,” she says. “We try to make it easy for them.” Once items sell, customers can receive 55 percent in store credit or 45 percent in cash. “In theory, you can sell your furniture and then buy a whole new wardrobe,” Siner says, laughing. “What sets us apart is that we pay when you want to get paid. If you come in, we will pay you in cash on the spot.”

Siner says she loves the way customers who used to come in “with their heads down” and not wanting people to see they were browsing in a resale store, now praise My Sister’s Closet as their favorite place to shop. “We have definitely changed the face of consignment stores.”

My Sister’s Closet mysisterscloset.com

inbusinessmag.com

Photos: My Sister's Closet

by Alison Stanton

Investing in Community

by Alison Stanton

NonProfit

Make-A-Wish Foundation: Proves the Power of a Wish to Seriously Ill Kids Make-A-Wish Foundation of Arizona helps make wishes come true for children who have life-threatening medical conditions.

The Foundation grew from a Good Samaritan effort in 1980 for a young boy from Phoenix with leukemia who wanted to be a highway patrolman. “Many people don’t realize that this wonderful organization, which has 65 chapters in the United States and 35 national affiliates, was founded in Arizona,” says Elizabeth Reich, president and chief executive officer of Make-A-Wish Foundation of Arizona. “In fact, we are the only national and international nonprofit organization both founded and headquartered in Arizona.”

By 1982, Make-A-Wish Foundation had granted eight wishes to Phoenix-area children when the national news program “NBC Magazine” ran a story about the young boy becoming a highway patrolman. The story showed how much the wishes meant to

the children and their families, and inspired millions of people to help. A year later, in May of 1983, the Make-A-Wish Foundation of America was officially incorporated.

Currently, Make-A-Wish Foundation operates on an annual budget of $3 million.

The nonprofit does not accept any government funding, but relies on donations from individuals, corporations and foundations to fund the many wishes it grants to children ages 2½ to 18. The organization runs with the

help of 18 staff members and more than 450 volunteers, who have assisted in granting more than 3,600 wishes over the past few decades.

Make-A-Wish Foundation of Arizona wishaz.org

Event: The 16th Annual Wish Ball will be held on May 14 at the Westin Kierland Resort in Scottsdale.

Children who are granted their wish are those who have been diagnosed with a life-threatening medical condition.

In 2010, the organization granted a record-breaking 253 wishes.

The wish experience is designed to be shared by the wish kid’s entire immediate family.

All wish expenses are fully covered, including travel and spending money.

The average direct cost of granting a wish is $7,500.

Wishes fall into four categories: I Wish to Be, I Wish to Have, I Wish to Meet and I Wish to Go.

Homeward Bound: Skills to Escape the Cycle of Homelessness and Domestic Violence individual donations, corporate giving, private foundations, community sponsorships, Community Development Block Grants and fundraising events held throughout the year.

Homeward Bound hbphx.org

EVENT: A Derby Affair, A Day at the Races, will take place from 1:00p – 4:30p, Sat., May 7 at The Arizona Biltmore Derby Lawn in Phoenix.

Homeward Bound currently owns and operates 162 housing units, which can house close to 600 people, more than 400 of whom are children.

Each family who participates in the program contributes 30 percent of its adjusted gross income for housing, utilities and support services.

In 2000, the nonprofit opened The Thunderbirds Family Village, a five-acre secured campus with 80 two-bedroom housing units. This housing is for young mothers and children who have survived domestic violence and homelessness.

In 1993, Homeward Bound was a recipient of the President’s Volunteer Action Award, chosen from 4,200 applicants. The award was presented by President Bill Clinton at the White House.

In business to do good for the community, nonprofits enrich the lives of those who contribute as well as those who receive. In Business Magazine showcases two nonprofits in each issue, focusing on their business organization and spotlighting an upcoming fundraising event. inbusinessmag.com

I n B u s i n e s s Ma g a z i n e

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Photo: Make-A-Wish Foundation of Arizona

Homeward Bound was founded in 1990 due to the determination and hard work of a group of community activists. The nonprofit organization is a transitional housing program for homeless families with children and those affected by domestic violence throughout metropolitan Phoenix.

Pamela Martin, Ph.D., the organization’s president and executive director, says Homeward Bound’s mission focuses on the fact that homelessness and domestic violence destroy families in our community.

“Homeward Bound breaks multi-generational cycles of homelessness, welfare dependence and domestic violence, and creates self-reliance through housing and comprehensive client-centered services.”

The staff at Homeward Bound strives to help families become healthy both emotionally and physically, while learning valuable life skills they will need to become financially independent. The organization offers safe and well-maintained housing, case managers who work with the families to help them outline and achieve their desired goals, employment services and a children’s services program that assists with social development as well as medical and dental care.

In order to provide services to its clients, Homeward Bound relies on a $4.6 million annual operating budget. Funding sources include

Service Opening Worlds of Opportunity through the Science of

There’s a science to competing through service, which is why we are worlds apart from other universities and consulting organizations.

As a thought leader and groundbreaking research center, The Center for Service Leadership (CSL) brings together insights from the academic world and business strategy from the real world to solve the unique set of challenges companies face today.

Science We are in the business of the science of services – we base our understanding on research, not just platitudes.

Significance We are in the business of developing and sharing what works in the real business world, not just pure theory.

Symbiosis We are in the business of building a network that can discover ways to compete through service, not just business as usual.

To learn more about how you can compete strategically through the science of service, visit wpcarey.asu.edu/csl today.

Arizona State University

n

W. P. Carey School of Business P.O. Box 874106 n Tempe, AZ 85287-4106 Phone: 480-965-6201 n Fax: 480-965-2180 wpcarey.asu.edu/csl Twitter.com/WPCCSL

www.inbusinessmag.com

April 2011

O n t h e Ag e n D a

A listing of Greater Phoenix business organizations and their events. Visit www.inbusinessmag.com for an expanded monthly calendar of educational, networking and special business events.

Arizona Technology Council

Career Summit

Mesa Chamber of Commerce

Leadership Awards Dinner

Wed., April 27 — 1:00p – 5:00p

Tues., April 19 — 5:30p Reception; 6:30p Dinner

The Arizona Technology Council’s first Career Summit is a half-day event intended to benefit job seekers and companies. Offered to the public ($25 for Council members, $35 for nonmembers), the event will provide both prospective employees and companies searching for new employees with facts and knowledge on the job market in Arizona and nationwide.

Keynote speaker Aaron Aaron Matos Matos, founder and CEO of Jobing.com, will share his insights on how to maneuver in the Arizona job market. In addition, Matos will discuss how Jobing.com got started, its growth in the Valley and the possibility of its further expansion.

The Career Summit is comprised of two panel discussions, both pertaining to resumes. The first, led by president and CEO of WorkInSports.com John Mellor, pertains to posting and searching for resumes on the Web. Several business professionals will lead the second panel, which covers the key components that resumes should hit.

Career Summit will address how companies find the employees they desire. “One of the biggest issues that Arizona companies face is finding and retaining talent,” says Leigh Goldstein, managing director of programs and events. “We want to help educate them on the tools the [Arizona Technology] Council’s Web site has to help them do just that.” And she says job seekers will learn how to create an impressive cover letter and post a resume on a job Web site. “For job seekers, we want to help them find jobs here in Arizona and not take their talents out of state.”

—Kayla Karp

One element that makes a strong city is the active participation of engaged leaders and involved businesses, strong community servants and a well-supported educational arena.

Without this, a city cannot prosper. This understanding has shaped the Mesa Chamber of Commerce Leadership Awards.

“It’s important for a city to take a step back, identify those who are doing good in the community and recognize their efforts of excellence,” says Peter Sterling, Mesa Chamber of Commerce President and CEO. “Each year, the Chamber makes a point of this, and it serves as an inspiration for others to emulate this leadership.”

Over the last century, the Mesa Chamber of Commerce has been honoring outstanding leadership in business, community and education. These community leaders have been the cornerstone of Mesa, and have helped it thrive and grow into the third-largest city in Arizona and the 38th-largest city in the United States.

On April 19, 2011, the latest group of businesses, community servants, educators and students will be honored at the 99th Annual Mesa Chamber Leadership Awards dinner. Held at the Hilton Phoenix East/Mesa, the awards dinner is Mesa’s reason to gather and celebrate great things happening.

—RaeAnne Marsh

Arizona Technology Council aztechcouncil.org Jobing.com jobing.com WorkInSports.com workinsports.com

Mesa Chamber of Commerce mesachamber.org

Notable Dates This Month Tue., April 19 Passover Fri., April 22 Earth Day Good Friday Sun., April 24 Easter Agenda events are submitted by the organizations and are subject to change. Please check with the organization to ensure accuracy. www.inbusinessmag.com.

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Ag e n d a

April 2011

AHWATUKEE FOOTHILLS CHAMBER OF COMMERCE Dinner Club

Tues., April 5 5:30p – 7:30p

Networking and eating, what could be better!

Appetizer or dinner purchase required.

Ruffino Italian Cuisine 4902 E. Warner Road, Phoenix ahwatukeechamber.com

Wake Up Ahwatukee Tues., April 12 8:00a – 9:30a

activities feature the business awards, a ballroom dance competition, an elegant dinner and live music and dance at the after-dinner cocktail party.

Members: $300; non-members: $350.

AZHCC special promotional hotel rate: $129 AZ Grand Resort 8000 S. Arizona Grand Parkway, Phoenix Lorena Rodriguez, (602) 294-6081

Buenos Dias Networking Breakfast Tues., April 12 8:00a – 10:00a

Networking event Members: $5; future members: $15 Sam’s Club 700 N. 54th Street, Chandler ahwatukeechamber.com

Free (everyone is welcome to attend) Grainger 4465 E. Broadway Road, Phoenix azhcc.com

SCORE Counseling

Wed., April 20 9:00a – 10:00a

Thurs., April 14 9:00a – Noon

Event is for chamber members.

Free Ahwatukee Chamber of Commerce ahwatukeechamber.com

Third Annual Chamber Masters Tournament

Fri., April 15 Registration: 11:00a; start time: 12:30p

Largest Fundraiser of the year for our Red, White & Boom Community Fireworks Celebration. Presented by the AFCC, Lennox and Brewers Air Conditioning Single: $100; team: $375 Club West Golf Club 16400 S. 14th Avenue, Phoenix ahwatukeechamber.com

After Hours Ahwatukee Weds., April 20 5:30p – 7:30p

Members: $5; future members: $15 Ahwatukee Carpets 15215 S. 48th Street, Phoenix ahwatukeechamber.com

SCORE Counseling Thurs., April 28 9:00a – Noon

Event is for chamber members.

Free Ahwatukee Chamber of Commerce ahwatukeechamber.com

ARIZONA HISPANIC CHAMBER OF COMMERCE La Epoca de Oro/ Black & White Ball and Business Awards Sat., April 2 6:00p – Midnight

This year's theme for the gala pays tribute to La Epoca de Oro, The Golden Age of Latin American cinema. Honoring the achievements of entrepreneurs and business leaders statewide, the evening's

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New AZHCC Member Orientation Free (new AZHCC members only) AZHCC 255 E. Osborn Road, Phoenix azhcc.com

Business Empowerment Series / Hispanic Women’s Alliance Click It - You’ve Got Business: Media Strategies That Work Wed., April 20 10:30a – 1:30p

Members: $10; non-members: $20; students: $5 DeVry University 2149 W. Dunlap Avenue, Phoenix azhcc.com

AZ Social Networking Thurs., April 21 9:00a – 10:30a

Meet other Business Owners! Come to network, find new customers, and have fun while doing it. Bring your Business Cards, Flyers, Brochures, and ANYTHING that helps the group understand what you do. Hear how others have overcome hurdles and achieved success. Free Aloft Hotel 951 E. Playa Del Norte Drive, Tempe meetup.com/azsocialnetworking

ARIZONA SMALL BUSINESS ASSOCIATION Green drinks: Phoenix Green Chamber of Commerce + ASBA Tues., April 5 5:30p – 7:00p

Join the Phoenix Green Chamber of Commerce and Arizona Small Business Association (ASBA) for Green Drinks.

Contact Tamara at greendrinks@ phoenixgreenchamber.org with questions.

ASBA and PGCC members: $5; non-members: $10; additional $5 if purchased at the door The House at Secret Garden 2501 E. Baseline Road, Phoenix RSVP by April 4: conta.cc/fUuHkQ

ASBA Sales Exchange Wed., April 6 8:30a – 10:00a

Regardless of whether you are a seasoned sales professional, just beginning, or need a refresher, you will take away valuable tips and tools to increase your sales skills. Facilitated by: Mike Leeds, Pro Sales Coaching Members: free; non-members: $25 ASBA’s Business Education Center asba.com/events

ASBA Media Expert Panel Thurs., April 7 9:00a – 11:00a

Join us for the second part of the exciting two part series on the importance of PR, how your business can gain media coverage and how to effectively pitch your stories to the media. There will be a panel of journalists from each medium of media including print, TV, radio and blog to answer questions specific to your business. Mediated by David Eichler and Sam Alpert with David and Sam PR. Members: $10; non-members: $35.00 ASBA’s Business Education Center asba.com/events

ASBA + BNI Arizona Referral Success 101 Fri., April 29 8:00am – 10:30am

Business owners understand the value of referrals but often don’t invest the time it takes to get them.

This session will give you specific tactics to use to increase your referral business. This class will open your eyes to networking in a way that creates more referrals. Unless you can find more time and work harder than you already are, you can’t afford to miss this class.

ASBA and BNI Arizona members: free; non-members: $99.00 ASBA’s Business Education Center asba.com/events

ASBA + ASBB Medicare 101 Thurs., April 28 8:00a – 9:00a

ASBA Entrepreneurial Development Exchange Tuesday, April 12 9:00a – 10:30a

Join other small business owners and entrepreneurs to discuss the latest opportunities to grow out a business from the grassroots level and problem solve, share best practices and ideas to successfully run a small business.

Connect and network on a monthly basis with other businesses owners that share interests and needs along with ways to best solve common problems.

Members: free; non-members: $25 ASBA’s Business Education Center asba.com/events

ASBA Fast & Curious Speed Networking™ — Central

Medicare made easy, Arizona Small Business Benefits (ASBB) can help! Whether you are looking at a Medicare Advantage plan, or Medicare Supplement plan, we take the time to help you navigate to the plan that makes the sense for you. Please join us for this informational meeting.

Free ASBA’s Business Education Center asba.com/events

ARIZONA TECHNOLOGY COUNCIL Lunch and Learn: LinkedIn for B2B Marketing LLC Tues., April 5 11:30a – 1:00p

Tues., April 12 3:00p – 4:30p

This is a “ready-set-go” style of networking that allows members to meet other members in 3-minute intervals, maximizing participants’ time and gaining them many valuable contacts in 90 minutes. This is a fun, fast-paced format. Bring your business cards and brush up on your 30-second commercial.

Members: free; non-members: $10.00 ASBA’s Business Education Center asba.com/events

ASBA Fast & Curious Speed Networking™ — NE/Scottsdale Tues., April 26 3:00p – 4:30p

contacts in 90 minutes. This is a fun, fast-paced format. Bring your business cards and brush up on your 30-second commercial.

Members: free; non-members: $25 The Compound Grill 7000 E. Mayo Blvd., Phoenix asba.com/events

This is a “ready-set-go” style of networking that allows members to meet other members in 3-minute intervals, maximizing participants’ time and gaining them many valuable

Donovan Hardenbrook, president of Leap Innovation, will explain how to harness the power of LinkedIn, enhance your profile, increase brand awareness, build credibility and market your product or services.

Members: free; non-members: $15 Telesphere 9237 E. Via de Ventura, Scottsdale aztechcouncil.org

Progress Forum: The Power of Relationships Wed., April 6 3:30p – 7:00p

Jim Hayden will deliver the keynote for this event, sharing how “The Power of Relationships” continues to positively impact his companies, partners and employees. This high-profile event is tailored to the leaders within your organization who are looking for more

Please confirm, as dates & times are subject to change.

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ways to engage in the community.

Members: free; non-members: $20 Trans-West Network Solutions 5202 S. 39th Street, Phoenix aztechcouncil.org

CHANDLER CHAMBER OF COMMERCE

GLENDALE CHAMBER OF COMMERCE

Networking @ 9

First Friday New Member Reception

Lunch and Learn: How to Drive Improvement in Your Organization

Free Western International University 55 N. Arizona Place, Chandler chandlerchamber.com

Tues., April 19 11:30a – 1:00p

The program will provide an overview of the Arizona Quality Alliance and the Performance Excellence Program to drive improvement in organizations.

We will discuss the benefits of the Baldrige-based performance excellence award program, review the application and assessment process, have an award recipient discuss their recent experience with this process, and briefly review the opportunity to be trained and serve as an Examiner.

Members: free; non-members: $15 Telesphere 9237 E. Via de Ventura, Scottsdale aztechcouncil.org

VIP Networking Event Thurs., April 21 5:00p – 7:00p

Please join the Arizona Technology Council Board of Directors, Brain State Technologies employees, Arizona State legislators and many other VIP guests at this great event.

Food and drink are included in this special networking event.

Members: $15; non-members: $25 Brain State Technologies Central Building Lobby 15150 N. Hayden Road, Scottsdale aztechcouncil.org

AZTC Career Summit Wed., April 27 1:00p – 5:00p

The Career Summit is designed to educate both job seekers and hiring companies on the ever-changing job market both in Arizona and the rest of the country. The Career Summit will feature two panel discussions and the Keynote will be led by Aaron Matos, founder and CEO of Jobing.com.

Members: $25; non-members: $35 National Bank of Arizona Conference Center 6001 N. 24th Street, Phoenix lgoldstein@aztechcouncil.org

CENTRAL PHOENIX WOMEN Cocktail Reception Wed., April 13 5:30p – 7:30p

Contact for cost The Ritz Carlton, Phoenix 2401 E. Camelback Road, Phoenix centralphoenixwomen.org

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Fri., April 1 8:45a – 10:30a

Business Golf Wed., April 6 7:00a – 11:00a

$29, all-inclusive Crowne Plaza San Marcos Golf Resort 1 N. San Marcos Place, Chandler chandlerchamber.com

Wake Up Chandler Wed., April 13 8:45a – 10:30a

Members: $5; non-members: $15 Bedmart 1400 S. Arizona Avenue, Chandler chandlerchamber.com

Technology Corner Lunch Seminar Series Thurs., April 14 11:30a – 1:00p

Members: $5; Non-members: $10 Chandler Chamber of Commerce chandlerchamber.com

Lunch Club

Mon., April 18 11:30a – 1:00p

Free Chandler BBQ 2040 S. Alma School Road, Chandler chandlerchamber.com

Business After Business Thurs., April 21 5:00p – 7:00p

Members: $5; non-members: $15 Chandler Auto Body 1505 N. Arizona Avenue, Chandler chandlerchamber.com

Member Welcome Breakfast Thurs., April 28 7:30a – 9:30a

Free Chandler Chamber of Commerce chandlerchamber.com

ECONOMIC CLUB OF PHOENIX Economic Club of Phoenix Luncheon Thurs., April 14 11:30a – 1:30 p

Honoring Executive of the Year – Richard Adkerson, president and CEO of Freeport-McMoRan Copper & Gold, Inc. The Westin Kierland Resort 6902 E. Greenway Parkway, Scottsdale wpcarey.asu.edu/Economic-Club

Fri., April 1 7:30a – 9:00a

Free Bitzee Mama’s Restaurant 7023 N. 58th Avenue, Glendale glendaleazchamber.org

Membership Blender Thurs., April 21 5:00p – 7:00p

Free Wigwam Resort 300 E. Wigwam Blvd., Litchfield Park glendaleazchamber.org

Procurement Fair Tues., April 26 8:00a – 11:30a

Free Glendale Civic Center 5750 W. Glenn Drive, Glendale glendaleazchamber.org

MESA CHAMBER OF COMMERCE Morning Mixer Tues., April 5 7:30a – 8:30a

Networking and continental breakfast.

Morning Mixers are hosted by the Mesa Chamber of Commerce to give you a chance to network and socialize with other business professionals from all over the Valley. If you are a “morning person” who enjoys networking, this event is for you!

Attend a Morning Mixer and you’ll get more done before 9 a.m. than some people do all day!

Members: $5; non-members: $15 Humana 5943 E. McKellips Road, Mesa mesachamber.org

Good Morning East Valley Fri., April 8 6:30a – 9:00a

It’s a great way to start off a Friday morning by networking with other businesses! Enjoy the delicious hot buffet the Mesa Country Club serves and take advantage of the opportunity to promote your business. All this with a program and an opportunity to win great door prizes makes this one of the most popular events the Chamber has.

Members: $20 with reservation, $25 at the door; non-members: $30.00 Mesa Country Club 660 W. Fairway Drive, Mesa mesachamber.org

Grow Your Business Tues., April 14 11:30a – 1:00p

Help your business grow by attending Grow Your Business lunch. Great food and good networking opportunity.

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Members: $15; general admission: $25 Carrabba’s Italian Grill 1740 S. Clearview, Mesa mesachamber.org

2011 Business Awards Dinner Tues., April 19 5:30p – 9:00p

The annual Mesa Chamber of Commerce Business Awards Dinner recognizes businesses and organizations that have provided service to the community above and beyond the normal course of doing business. $50 per person; table of 10: $450 Hilton Phoenix East/Mesa 1011 W. Holmes Avenue, Mesa (480) 969-1307, ext. 26

NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF WOMEN BUSINESS OWNERS East Valley Happy Hour Thurs., April 7 4:30p – 6:30p

Join us for an evening of conversation, connection and fun at one of the Valley’s hot spots. Our monthly networking events provide a good forum for our members and guests to connect with other women business owners and expand our business relationships. It’s open to NAWBO Phoenix members and guests alike. Special Happy Hour pricing on drinks and appetizers.

Bring a door prize and get a chance to spotlight your business!

Free Trader Vic’s 6850 E. Main Street, Scottsdale nawbophx.org

NORTH PHOENIX CHAMBER OF COMMERCE Power Network Industry Specific Lunch

Mondays throughout the month Noon – 1:00p

Members: free; non-members: $10; Networking Phoenix Passport member: Chamber member price Rock Bottom Brewery 21001 N. Tatum Blvd., Phoenix Edward Gomillion, (602) 482-3344

Master Mind Round Table

Tuesdays throughout the month 7:30a – 9:00a

Free Rustic Café 20811 N. Cave Creek Road, Phoenix Edward Gomillion, (602) 482-3344

Biz for Breakfast

Wednesdays throughout the month 7:30a – 9:00a

Members: free; non-members: $10; Networking Phoenix Passport member: Chamber member price Rustic Café 20811 N. Cave Creek Road, Phoenix Edward Gomillion, (602) 482-3344

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April 2011

Power Network Industry Specific Lunch

Wednesdays throughout the month Noon – 1:00p

Members: free; non-members: $10; Networking Phoenix Passport member: Chamber member price Catch 22 18725 N. 32nd Street, Phoenix Edward Gomillion, (602) 482-3344

Coffee Club Meeting

Fridays throughout the month 8:30a – 9:30a

Free Heart & Soul Café 4705 E. Carefree Highway, Cave Creek Edward Gomillion, (602) 482-3344

Power Network Industry Specific Lunch

Fridays throughout the month Noon – 1:00p

Members: free; non-members: $10; Networking Phoenix Passport member: Chamber member price Catch 22 18725 N. 32nd Street, Phoenix Edward Gomillion, (602) 482-3344

Business Networking Group Tues., April 5 Noon – 1:00p

Members: free; non-members: $10; Networking Phoenix Passport member: Chamber member price Rochelli Pizza House 21043 N. Cave Creek Road, Phoenix Edward Gomillion, (602) 482-3344

Kiwanis

Mon., April 11 7:00a – 8:00a

Members: free; non-members: $6; Networking Phoenix Passport member: Chamber member price Mimi’s Café @ Desert Ridge 21001 N. Tatum Blvd., Phoenix Edward Gomillion, (602) 482-3344

Business Networking Group Tues., April 19 Noon – 1:00p

Members: free; non-members: $10; Networking Phoenix Passport member: Chamber member price Rochelli Pizza House 21043 N. Cave Creek Road, Phoenix Edward Gomillion, (602) 482-3344

Business 2 Business Mixer Thurs., April 21 5:00p – 7:00p

Members: free; non-members: $10; Networking Phoenix Passport member: Chamber member price California Pizza Kitchen @ Desert Ridge 21001 N. Tatum Blvd., Phoenix Edward Gomillion, (602) 482-3344

Kiwanis

Meet & Mingle

Breakfast Meeting Speaker: Carolyn Dryer. Topic: Writing Effective Press Releases $10 Rock Bottom Restaurant & Brewery 7640 W. Bell Road, Glendale peoriachamber.com

Mon., April 25 7:00a – 8:00a

Wed., April 20 5:00p – 7:30p

Members: free; non-members: $6; Networking Phoenix Passport member: Chamber member price Mimi’s Café @ Desert Ridge 21001 N. Tatum Blvd., Phoenix Edward Gomillion, (602) 482-3344

Join us as we network in a relaxed casual atmosphere! Great food & drink Specials Members: free; guests: $10 Armitage 20751 N. Pima Road, Scottsdale armitagewine.com/scottsdale

NORTH SCOTTSDALE CHAMBER OF COMMERCE

Business Resource Lunch

Networking & 9 Golf Event Date TBD 2:00p – 6:00p

You will have the chance to introduce yourself and your business to the other players that you may not have been paired up with.

Members: $45; guests: $55 Location TBD northscottsdalechamber.org

Please join us as we welcome a special guest speaker from the City of Scottsdale to talk about growth and development in Scottsdale.

Members: $15; guests: $25 Monterra at Westworld 16601 N. Pima Road, Scottsdale monterracatering.com

Come enjoy a Hot Breakfast & great networking!

Members: $15; guests: $25; Location TBD Preregister: northscottsdalechamber.org

$4 Fratello’s Café & Catering 13560 N. 94th Drive, Peoria peoriachamber.com

Wed., April 6 7:30a – 9:00a

Tues., April 5 7:30a – 8:30a

Business Resource Lunch

Ribbon Cutting & Grand Re-Opening

Please join us for our twice monthly networking lunch. Enjoy great food and networking in a casual business atmosphere.

Members: $15; guests: $25 Athena Greek Cuisine 7000 E. Mayo Blvd. Phoenix athenagreekcuisine.com

Adopt A Road Sat., April 16 7:00a – 9:00a

Speed Connectors is sort of like “speed dating” for your business. Exciting and fun-filled networking event where you have the opportunity to meet dozens of business people in a fast-paced “speed networking” environment!

Members: free; guests: $10 The Compound Grill 7000 E. Mayo Blvd., Phoenix thecompoundgrill.com

Thurs., April 7 3:00p – 7:00p

Wed., April 13 11:30a – 12:30p

$20 Rio Vista Recreation Center 8866 W. Thunderbird Road, Peoria peoriachamber.com

Tues., April 19 7:30a – 8:30a

Tues., April 19 3:30p – 5:00p

Scottsdale Airpark Tradeshow

Luncheon

Speed Connectors — Networking

Thurs., April 14 5:30p – 6:30p

Get down to business at the Scottsdale Airpark Tradeshow — the largest tradeshow in the Airpark! Generate leads, build relationships and create brand awareness with more than 50 exhibitors and 800 attendees.

Exhibit booths: $495-$595; attendance: free Monterra at WestWorld 16601 N. Pima Road, Scottsdale scottsdalechamber.com

Inspire Luncheon Wed., April 20 11:30a – 1:15p

$5 The Tasting Room 28465 N. Vistancia Blvd., Peoria peoriachamber.com

Connect to a community of business women for personal and professional development and hear from Dr. Connie Mariano, the White House Doctor!

Members $35; guests $45 (with advance registration) Gainey Ranch Golf Club 7600 Gainey Club Drive, Scottsdale scottsdalechamber.com

Networking Group $4 Fratello’s Café & Catering 13560 N. 94th Drive, Peoria peoriachamber.com

Champions Breakfast: No Rules Networking

Mixer

Wed., April 20 5:00p – 7:00p

Members: $15; guests: $25 (with advance registration) Location TBD scottsdalechamber.com

New and renewing Chamber members are invited to join us at our monthly Member Orientation! Meet and network with other Chamber members, staff and volunteer leaders, learn about the resources available to you through your membership and identify specific strategies to help you reach your business goals.

Free Scottsdale Area Chamber scottsdalechamber.com

Wilhelm Automotive 8245 N.W. Grand Avenue, Peoria peoriachamber.com

Connecting the Chamber & Community

Fri., April 1 7:15a – 9:00a

Wed., April 6 7:30a – 9:00a

Tues., April 12 10:00a

Join us as we celebrate the Scottsdale City wide Litter Pick-Up Event. We will be meeting at the blue spire located at the Scottsdale Promenade Shopping Center Free Frank Lloyd Wright Blvd., between Hayden and Scottsdale roads Wes Dryden, 480-415-3416

First Friday Airpark Breakfast

Member Orientation

PEORIA CHAMBER OF COMMERCE Networking Group

Wed., April 13 11:30a – 1:00p

SCOTTSDALE AREA CHAMBER OF COMMERCE

Wed., April 27 11:30a – 1:00p

NSCC Member Breakfast

Tues., April 26 7:30a – 8:30a

Free Wet N’ Wild 4243 W. Pinnacle Peak Road, Glendale peoriachamber.com

Thurs., April 21 7:15a – 9:00a

Members: free; guests: $20 Location TBD scottsdalechamber.com

Please confirm, as dates & times are subject to change.

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SOUTHWEST VALLEY CHAMBER OF COMMERCE Whoopee Daze Festival Fri. – Sun., April 8 – 10 Times vary per day

Live entertainment, carnival rides, and more! Parade at 10a on April 9.

No entrance fee Tolleson Verteran’s Park 8601 W. Van Buren, Tolleson Randy Babchuk, (623) 936-2705

Networking at Noon Wed., April 6, 13 Noon – 1:00p

No-host lunch The Paseo Apartments 4200 N. Pebble Creek Parkway, Goodyear Danielle, (623) 932-2260

SURPRISE REGIONAL CHAMBER OF COMMERCE First Friday Brown Bag Lunch Fri., April 1 Noon – 1 :00p

BYO Lunch and network with other chamber members at the Chamber Conference Center. Due to space limitations, this event is open to the first 30 registrants only. Each attendee will be given the opportunity to provide a 35 second commercial for their business.

Free Surprise Regional Chamber Conference Center Mary Orta, (623) 583-0692

Capture A Customer Training for Members Wed., April 6 6:00p – 7:00p

This class will be hosted by Jeanne Brovelli from Chamber Nation and will take our members through an online presentation about growing your business. The overview will take approximately 30 minutes and after the presentation members will have an opportunity to ask questions about this program.

Free This is an Online Meeting surpriseregionalchamber.com

Sam’s Club Networking Event Thurs., April 7, 21 7:30a – 9:00a

Networking Group meets at Sam’s Club in Surprise on the 1st & 3rd Thursday of each month. This is sponsored by Sam’s Club and supported by the Surprise Regional Chamber. Bring those door prizes and business cards and join us for valuable networking time!

Free Sam’s Club 16573 W. Bell Road, Surprise Dee Baginski, (623) 583-0692

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City of Surprise Green & Be Healthy Fair Sat., April 9 9:00a – 3:00p

The third annual event will embrace eco-friendly products, services and organizations, as well as focus on healthy lifestyle for all.

Free (confirm this) Surprise Stadium 15960 N. Bullard Avenue, Surprise Marla.Babb@surpriseaz.gov

Party Planet Grand Opening & Ribbon Cutting Sat., April 9 9:00a – 1:00p

Grand Opening & Ribbon Cutting Party Planet, Surprise’s party supply store. Ribbon Cutting at 10:00am.

Food, prizes, entertainment...clowns, balloon lady, DJ, face painting. First 50 people receive free gift.

Free Party Planet 13833 W. Bell Road, Surprise Betty Boon (623) 980-8706

Monthly Chamber Breakfast Tues., April 12 7:30a – 9:00a

Join us for our monthly Chamber Networking Breakfast. Bring your business collateral materials to share, and any gifts for the raffle.

Members: $15 early registration, $20 at door; guests: $25 The Colonnade 19116 Colonnade Way, Surprise Mary Orta, (623) 583-0692

Surprise Regional Chamber’s Can’t Miss Mixer Thurs., April 14 5:00p – 7:00p

Free to members.

This is a recurring event that will be held at a different Chamber Business each month.

Location TBD Michelle Burnett, (623) 334-3505

Comfort Inn & Suites 13337 W. Grand Avenue, Surprise Please RSVP: Paulette Davis, (602) 989-8990

Business Education Seminar Wed., April 27 8:30 – 10:00a

Come join us at the UltraStar Theaters in Surprise as we continue our Business Education Seminar Series. As always, in addition to great training, there will be a continental breakfast, prizes given away and great networking before and after the presentation.

Free Ultrastar Cinemas 13649 N. Litchfield Road, Surprise Mary Orta, (623) 583-0692

New Member Orientation Thurs., April 28 3:30p – 4:45p

Join in this networking event and explore the full range of benefits available from your membership in The Surprise Regional Chamber of Commerce.

From networking events to committee organization. Bring business cards and meet up with other new members.

Free to members Surprise Regional Chamber Conference Center Mary Orta, (623) 583-0692

Spirit of Community Awards Fri., April 29 6:00p – 10:00p

Now more than ever, thriving local businesses will lead the way as our regional and national economy gets back on the path to recovery.

Recognizing and celebrating our local businesses and their leaders is an exciting part of this process, and we invite you to participate in the Surprise Regional Chamber of Commerce’s Celebrating the Spirit of Community.

Individual tickets: $60 The Colonnade 19116 Colonnade Way, Surprise Mary Orta, (623) 583-0692

Monthly Newsmakers Luncheon

TEMPE CHAMBER OF COMMERCE

Join us for this fun and informative networking opportunity, and great food to be enjoyed by all.

Members: $10 early registration, $15 at door; guests: $20 The Communiversity at Surprise 15950 W. Civic Center Plaza, Surprise Mary Orta, (623) 583-0692

New Member Briefing

Fri., April 15 11:30a – 1:00p

Ribbon Cutting Event for Paulette Davis Fri., April 22 10:30a – 1:00p

Please join Paulette Davis for her ribbon cutting event. Ribbon cutting at 11:00AM. There will be food, prizes, and refreshments for all.

Free

Tues., April 5 9:00a – 10:00a

New members meet the Chamber staff and committee chairs and network with other new members at this informative and fun event.

Members: Free Heidi’s Events & Catering 2095 W. 15th Street, Tempe tempechamber.org

Networking @ Noon Thurs., April 14 11:30a – 1:00p

Learn the art of relationship building, enjoy a fantastic lunch and have fun

Ag e n d a

promoting your services at this “speed dating for business” event.

Members: $25; non-members: $35 Location TBD tempechamber.org

Business Before Hours Tues., April 19 7:30a – 8:30a

Bring brochures and business cards and be ready to give a 30-second commercial about yourself or your business. A light breakfast is provided.

Members: free; non-members: $7 TruWest Credit Union Call the Chamber for address tempechamber.org

Hot Topics and Lunch: Margaret Hunnicutt, 2010 Business Woman of the Year Thurs., April 21 11:30a – 1:00p

Unlock your memory power! This presentation is loaded with ideas and tips to help you and your organization become less stressed, more effective and, ultimately, more profitable.

Members: $25; non-members: $35 Fiesta Resort Conference Center 2100 S. Priest Drive, Tempe tempechamber.org

Business After Hours Wed., April 27 5:30p – 7:00p

This informal mixer provides a casual atmosphere where you can mingle with other members of the business community.

Members: free; non-members: $10 House of Tricks 114 E. 7th Street, Tempe tempechamber.org

WEST VALLEY WOMEN Hats Luncheon Tues., April 5 11:30a – 1:00p

Wear your favorite hat to our annual hats luncheon. Prizes will be awarded for the following: Vintage, Made by Hand, So Beautiful and It’s All About Me. $35 per person SKYE Fine Dining 16844 Arrowhead Fountain Center Drive, Peoria westvalleywomen.org

WOMEN OF SCOTTSDALE Hats Luncheon Fri., April 15 11:30a – 1:00p

Wear your favorite hat to our annual hats luncheon. Prizes will be awarded for the following: Vintage, Made by Hand, So Beautiful and It’s All About Me. $35 per person The Westin Kierland Resort and Spa 6902 E. Greenway Parkway, Scottsdale womenofscottsdale.org

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ASSETS

We Value What We Own

By Mike Hunter

You and Your Personal Computer

High-Tech Conference Room with Google TV

Whether you are a PC or a Mac, your personal computer is no doubt your best business asset. The question becomes, “Just how reliable is it?” These days, with viruses, hackers and security issues, our computers’ health is a matter of life and death. Your IT guy may need to be your best friend, but in case you do not have one (an IT guy, we mean), here are some great new-found friends:

Imagine that you are in your conference room meeting with an important client who suddenly wants to look something up for clarification or to strengthen a point. Direct them to the television (a likely fixture in any well-stocked conference room), grab the wireless keyboard, click the search icon button and start your Google search right before their eyes.

That is the theory behind the new Google TV at the office.

With an HDTV, you will have never seen a better picture. It will be an eye-opening experience, as your conference room becomes a high-tech tool. It will quickly become the best way to show off your website and/or demonstrate the use of your Web services.

You also get apps created just for your TV, including Netflix, NBA.TV, Pandora® and more. The Logitech Revue™ with Google TV™ is easy to hook up and gets you instantly surfing via WiFi or by Ethernet cable. Sony’s version, the Sony® Internet TV, includes a full Blu-ray player.

Logitech provides a full keyboard and mouse touch-pad, while the Sony is a glorified (and much more complex) remote.

Apple Store — Yes, you will need an appointment, but services at the Apple Store will solve your Mac problems. There is nothing more to say here. apple.com/support The Geek Squad — Of course we know what you’ve heard, but the play on “geek” is no reason not to become friends with this outfit (Mac or PC). Their services are available through local Best Buy stores and you may reach them online. However, we suggest a call to your local geek to set up an appointment — or head in immediately for that emergency call. geeksquad.com Microsoft Store — We are home to the very first brick-and-mortar store, and its services are a match to what Apple created years ago for the Mac. Call or go online for an appointment, but these guys are the resident PC experts and will get you back in service in no time. As knowledgeable as one can get, these “sleeks,” as they are referred to, know their stuff. microsoftstore.com

Logitech Revue™ With Google TV $299.99 logitech.com Sony® Internet TV Blu-ray With

>>

Google TV $399.99 sonystyle.com

And the Winner Is: Business Awards Mean Business In business there are obstacles, including employee concerns, best practices to think about and, certainly, the economies of doing business.

A true asset to business owners is recognition Impact Award for accomplishments in these areas and running a strong business. This is realized through business awards.

“Our business awards are, fundamentally, a measure of excellence and achievement,” says Gonzalo de la Melena, president and CEO of the Arizona Hispanic Chamber of Commerce, “but we also actively consider whether the companies and individual entrepreneurs we

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honor are contributing to the betterment of Arizona in general and the Latino community in particular.” The Hispanic Chamber will hold its annual Black & White Ball and Business Awards on April 2 at the Arizona Grand Resort.

Most business organizations representing the Valley have a business awards program. The Impact Awards, the Greater Phoenix Chamber of Commerce’s annual business awards program, is given in five categories. As with many local groups’ business awards, selection includes a nomination process of member companies.

A panel of past winners, chamber staff and other member company owners narrows the candidate field down to a small group of finalists, then interviews the finalists to choose a winner in each category. The winners and

finalists are celebrated at the annual luncheon.

This year, the Impact Awards luncheon is on May 19 at the Arizona Biltmore Resort & Spa. Winners do get perks. While the process of nomination can involve intense work on the part of the nominee, businesses benefit greatly from it and from the award itself. Each Impact Awards finalist is interviewed on camera, and the Chamber produces a high-quality video it gives each finalist and winner. This on top of press, accolades from colleagues and a nice, shiny award to display in the office.

Arizona Hispanic Chamber of Commerce azhcc.com Greater Phoenix Chamber of Commerce phoenixchamber.com

inbusinessmag.com

18th annual

enterprise

business awards luncheon

celebrating the best in business

May 5th, 2011

Time: 11:15 am - 11:45 am | Networking + Registration 11:45 am - 1:30 pm | Luncheon + Awards Ceremony Location: Arizona Biltmore | Frank Lloyd Wright Ballroom 2400 E Missouri Ave | Phoenix, AZ 85016

Emcee Robin Sewell, Arizona Highways TV

To learn more about sponsorship opportunities contact, David Drennon | ddrennon@asba.com

Purchase your seats TODAY | Seating Limited!

Visit asba.com or call 602.306.4000

presented by

U.S. Small Business Administration

Power Lunch

Meals that Matter

Raw Deal: Sushi is Fresh Idea Chefs of the raw know how to impress. Sushi options among colleagues and clients is always a hit as long as you know you are eating at a reputable establishment.

Show your creative or adventurous side by studying the menus at these “anything but fishy” hot spots.

Moira Sushi — Downtown Phoenix

Described as hip with a cool vibe, this downtown joint is authentic and creative. You’ll enjoy the sushi standards and some unique options for lunch. Perfect for that creative meeting and conveniently just a short distance off the Light Rail. This will quickly become your Little Tokyo.

215 E. McKinley Street (602) 254-5085 • moirasushi.com

Pure Sushi Bar — Scottsdale

by Mike Hunter Perhaps no other restaurant in town is better known for being the place to do lunch, make that big deal or bring people together than The Stockyards. Soon to be 65, Arizona’s original steakhouse is more than a landmark from the heyday of Arizona’s cattle industry. It serves up some impressive “Western grub” that embraces the culture and culinary trends of the Southwest.

An innovative twist to what many might expect as “Old West cuisine” is anything but. Utilizing fresh, high-quality indigenous ingredients, the team behind the lunch menu created some new classics of their own. The spinach salad with seasonal berries, candied almonds, feta cheese and poppy seed vinaigrette has quickly become a favorite. From “light for lunch” salads to The Stockyards specialty sandwiches and Everyday Specials of half a sandwich and a cup of soup or a salad, the midday menu brings daylight to this otherwise evening steakhouse. The Stockyards Steak Soup, the Shaved Prime Rib & Cheddar on Rye sandwich and even a starter shrimp cocktail will give your lunch meeting the history, credibility and flavors it’ll need.

A visionary team worked hard in 2004 to restore the place and helped earn The Stockyards a name on the City of Phoenix’s register of historical buildings.

The restaurant was honored because of its role in Arizona’s cattle history and its relevant architectural style. Restoration meant keeping tradition alive with the Barry Goldwater Booth and having the honor of being a part of Arizona’s Centennial Celebration with events and promotions over the next year.

RA Sushi — Throughout the Valley

This hip, hot spot recently introduced updated dinner, sushi and beverage menus, adding a wide variety of new dishes and cocktails to its selection. RA is a quick, no-nonsense stop for that midday meeting over lunch. Menus now include a greater selection of sushi, appetizers and tapas items.

Locations in Scottsdale, Phoenix, Mesa and Tempe rasushi.com

Sushi Roku — Scottsdale

With its locations in West Hollywood, Las Vegas, Pasadena and Santa Monica, you’ve got to know there is something special about this place. The finest and freshest ingredients available — and something to be said about the uber hip location at the W Hotel — make this a perfect spot for that important meeting.

7277 E. Camelback Road (480) 970-2121 >> sushiroku.com

The Stockyards

5009 E. Washington Street, Phoenix 602-273-7378 stockyardssteakhouse.com

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Photo: The Stockyards (left), Sushi Roku (right)

Cuisine, Comfort and Commerce Combine in Historic Setting

A chic, elegant atmosphere inside and out, Pure is a trendy locale for the North Scottsdale set. It’s a bit off the beaten path, but the sushi and the menu are worth it. Maybe you are meeting that client and then going to play golf for the afternoon — this is the place to start. It is Vegas for an hour or two.

20567 N. Hayden Road (480) 355-0999 • puresushibar.com

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medicare 101 presented by asba + asbb

register today! asba.com/events | 602.306.4000

Thursday, April 28 8:00 am - 9:00 am Medicare made easy, Arizona Small Business Benefits (ASBB) can help! Whether you are looking at a Medicare Advantage plan, or Medicare Supplement plan, we take the time to help you navigate to the plan that makes sense for you. Please join us for this informational meeting. Friends and family welcome!

FREE for ASBA Members and Non Members

ASBA’s Business Education Center 4600 E. Washington St. Suite 341 Phoenix, AZ 85034

capture your best side

it’s simple at vermillion photo

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vermillion phot o www.vermillionphoto.c om 60 2.253.600 5

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inbusinessmag.com

Celebrating 25 years of serving the women business owners of Phoenix.

Spring 2011 • nawbophx.org

President’s Message 1985

2010

About NAWBO Founded in 1985, NAWBO Phoenix propels women entrepreneurs into economic, social and political spheres of power. Twenty-five years later, NAWBO Phoenix is still the only organization in the Valley that solely represents the interest of women entrepreneurs in all industries.

For more information, please visit www.nawbophx.org.

This issue Page 2 Top Five Mistakes to Avoid to Successfully Secure a Bank Loan Page 4 How to choose the RIGHT accountant for your Business Page 7 Keep Cost Under Control…

Try Outsourcing and more...

Phoenix Metropolitan Chapter of the National Association of Women Business Owners, 4600 E. Washington St., Suite 300 Phoenix, AZ 85034

This month we will be focusing on Finance. This is a topic of great important to me as I have been a Financial Advisor for a number of years. Our firm works with business owners to educate and help keep them on track with their personal and business finances.

Understanding the finances of your business is fundamental to running a successful business. A key step in running a well managed business is to keep your finances organized. Business owners are very busy wearing so many different hats. Working long hours, focusing on your business goals, hiring new employees, and worrying about cash flow all weigh heavy on the business owner. It is critical to keep a focus on the business finances and most importantly your own personal finances. You want to build your business, but not at the expense of your own wealth. Being financially disorganized can: • Increase your costs • Increase your risk • Decrease the chance of real success A good way to keep on track is to work with professionals that are business partners and help keep you on track. A good financial professional will help you understand the real cost of living factors that can adversely affect your wealth. I would like to suggest some of the hidden cost of living factors can include: • New goods & Services – we are living in an era of “planned obsolesce”, goods are made to be disposable which means we are constantly replacing items that we need to live and work.

• Taxation – there are many hidden taxes we all now are faced with, when those taxes are identified and added together, sometimes it adds up to almost 50% of our income!

• Lifestyle upgrades – people who work hard like to play hard.

The reward for long hours of hard work include bigger houses, a second or third house, vacations, etc. These things are great, but they can effect how much we save and set aside for the future.

• Life events – unexpected life events are the biggest threat to our financial security, especially in the area of a disability. The ability to earn an income and finish working until our retirement date is one of the biggest reasons for bankruptcy.

Cindy Hynes President, NAWBO Phoenix

Be sure to consider all of your costs, including those listed above.

Working with a trusted financial representative can assist you in keeping pace with the real cost of living by helping you make sure you’re organized, protected against the unknown and precise in accounting for your expenses. I wish you all continued success in your business!

Kindest Regards,

602-772-4985 www.nawbophx.org • info@nawbophx.org

nwabophx.org

Cindy Hynes NAWBO Phoenix Chapter President 2010-2011

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Top Five Mistakes to Avoid to Successfully Secure a Bank Loan

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Mistake #1:

Wait until you need a loan to contact the bank.

The worst time to introduce yourself to a banker is when you need a loan. Business owners need to establish a relationship with multiple bankers even if they are only thinking of starting a business. Owners who show up at the bank hoping to get a loan based strictly on a business plan are at a disadvantage. Bankers need to get a sense of your personal integrity. Build a positive history with multiple bankers—these are the friends who will go to bat for you with the credit committee when you apply for a loan. Now’s the time to act—if you do not know a banker, ask other professionals, such as accountants, attorneys and other business leaders, to make an introduction.

Mistake #4:

Ignore competitive advantages.

Many corporations are looking for women-owned businesses to satisfy their contract needs. To qualify as a women-owned business, the value of certifications is undeniable. Though certifications may not be right for every type of business, they can lead to securing corporate, retail and government contracts. You can get a leg up on competitors, especially if your customers are large, publicly held corporations. Certification is a marketing tool for raising your firm’s visibility and tapping into decision makers with an interest in diversity. Once you get the certification share the news of your certification and resulting successes with the bankers you know.

Mistake #2:

Show up with sloppy books.

Secure a reliable and knowledgeable bookkeeper. Presenting clean, professional financial statements right from the start is key. First impressions count. Once you have your numbers together, ask an outside advisor to look at your financial statements. An experienced outside advisor can objectively review your financials and ask the questions that will be on the minds of the bankers. Candidates for financial statement review include part-time CFOs and certified public accountants. To find an advisor, check with other business owners as well as organizations that support women-owned businesses—like your local NAWBO chapter.

Mistake #3:

Put off creating a strategic plan.

Mistake #5:

Wait to build your team of advisors.

A bank is more likely to look favorably on your business when you are supported by a great team of advisors. Get your attorney and accountant in place upon establishing the business, if not prior.

Befriend part-time chief financial officers and seek their advice regularly. Surround yourself with professional service providers who are connected with the business community. Your team of advisors can help you identify the right bankers for your business and can often make an introduction. Seasoned accountants, attorneys and CFOs usually enjoy long-term relationships with local bankers. In the banker’s eyes, a strong professional service team implies a vote of confidence in you and your business.

Actively network with other female founders through associations that support the female business owner, like NAWBO. Female founders not only provide helpful information, they can lead to opportunities you would not have otherwise encountered. Not to mention, local bankers are often members or sponsors of associations focused on women business owners.

Many business owners “jump in with both feet and get to work” without creating a business plan.

“In the venture world, you have to have your act together to secure funding. Business owners without the immediate need for financing are not forced to create a business plan, so many simply do without one. Having no plan is a mistake. During the loan application process, bankers are looking for a solid strategic plan, along with financial projections. They want to know how the company will be managed. While a business owner may intuitively understand where the business is headed, it is important to communicate the specifics. You want a five-year plan with a financial picture that projects your revenue level, required financing, number of employees and profitability, among other factors.

nwabophx.org

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NWABO NEWS

How to choose the RIGHT accountant for your Business

By Barbara Appenzeller CPA, Treasurer for NAWBO Phoenix 2010/2011 Choosing the certified public accountant for your business is one of the most important decisions you will make as a business owner.

This person should be looked at as a part of your management team and must have the right personality and credentials to be able to work with you to make your business as successful as possible. When choosing your accountant you Barbara Appenzeller should not be afraid to ask for references, what is their education and experience, how many clients has the practitioner had audited, what types of clients do they have and are they available after April 15. You will have many financial business decisions to make long after the tax return is filed and you need to know the accountant you choose will be there for you when you need her.

When you meet with your accountant, it is important that you are as organized as possible so the meeting can be efficient, thereby saving you money. If you are using Quickbooks, bring a backup of the database

to the meeting. A good accountant will need to make sure your bank account(s) are reconciled before beginning any work for you. If the bank account is not reconciled, then there is no way of insuring all the income and disbursements are being reported.

One important item all business owners should remember, do not pay your personal expenses from the business account. Instead, write a check from the business to your personal account and then pay your personal expenses from there. There are many legal reason why you should do this but it is also a much cleaner accounting method.

Your accountant should not just be there to prepare your tax returns.

The financial statements for the business should be a management tool, not just used to prepare the tax return. If you don’t understand your financials, don’t be afraid to ask for an explanation as to how to read and analyze them. Remember, your accountant is your business partner and you each have an area of expertise. If the accountant you choose isn’t willing to be that partner, then move on. Your business is too important to not work with someone who has your company’s financial future at heart.

NAWBO Phoenix Membership Drive NAWBO is in FULL DRIVE. Become a member during March and April and get more!

NAWBO’s “Can’t Miss” Events: • Monthly Luncheon Meetings 2nd Wednesday of the month | Central Phoenix location

• Monthly NAWBO University workshops

1.

$25 discount off your membership

2nd Wednesday of the month | Central Phoenix location

• Monthly FREE Happy Hours (Various dates & locations)

2. Certificate for a complimentary NAWBO luncheon

• June Awards Gala

3. FREE business “WeIlness Check Up” compliments of

• December Red Affair

Davis Miles Law firm

Visit our web site today for membership information.

6 0 2 -772 - 49 8 5

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NAWBO ® and Women Mean Business 4

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i n fo @ n aw b o p h x . o rg

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NAWBO Board of Directors Executive Committee

Board of Directors

President Cindy Hynes Hynes Benefits Consulting, LLC

Ambassador Norma McCormick Clean ‘N Fresh Cleaning Service, LLC

Secretary Marnee Weber Meaningful Methods, LLC Finance Director Barbara Appenzeller Barbara Appenzeller CPA, P.C. President-elect Kristine Kassel, Benefits By Design, Inc.

Public Policy Corner

Issues that business owners should to keep an EYE ON! The Arizona Competitiveness/Jobs Package passed by the legislature and signed by the Governor as HB 2001 in 2nd Special Session contains a number of reductions in tax rates, both in the corporate tax rate in addition to business property tax reductions in the assessment ratio-- from 20% to 19% in tax year 2012, and 18% in tax year 2013 for class one property. Additionally, the assessment ratio is reduced for agricultural property (class 2) from 16% to 15% in tax year 2013. The corporate rate reductions phases down the corporate income tax rate from nearly 7% to less than 5% over four years, beginning in tax year 2014.

SB 1165 addresses a very serious tax issue that is developing in Arizona between businesses subject to the transaction privilege tax (sales) and Arizona cities. Arizona is one of only a few states in the country that allows for an independent municipal sales tax structure.

Unlike other states, our system requires businesses to maintain two sets of books for the payment of sales tax—one for the state and another for municipal tax obligations. In addition to multiple points of contact for the payment of sales tax, Arizona businesses are also faced with the potential administrative burden of audits from the state as well as municipal auditors.

SB1165 would prohibit cities from contracting with a for-profit company for the collection of sales taxes. Additionally, cities would be prohibited from employing or contracting with sales tax auditors on a contingent-fee basis.

nwabophx.org

Immediate Past President (Past President Chair) Loretta Love Huff Emerald Harvest Consulting, LLC Executive Director NAWBO Office Deanna Anderson Organized Management Solutions, LLC Membership & Meeting Assistant NAWBO Office Megan Williams Membership & Events Administrator

Membership Services Lynda Bishop Summit Alliance Solutions, LLC

Awards Chair Becky Winterscheidt Snell & Wilmer

Media Relations Ilisa Keith Keith Block Communications, Inc.

Communications Chair Dorothy Wolden Creative Intuition

Mentor Program Barbara Baderman Life-Long Learning Solutions

Community Alliances/ Diversity Chair Ania Kubicki Angles Public Relations

Neighborhood NAWBOs Connie Zimmerlich ClickChick Photography

Community Service Director Choo Tay Media88, Inc. Corporate & Economic Development Chair Amy Bruske Kolbe Corp Honorary Advisory Council Kim Marie Branch-Pettit LeTip International Marketing Services Director Joan Risdon Smart Image Media

Programs/ NAWBO University Colleen O’Shaughnessy MetLife Public Policy Chair Ginger Lamb Arizona Capitol Times Red Affair Chair Erin Finn Finn Property & Development Women’s Enterprise Foundation (ex-officio) Adell Heinemann Juve Facial Rejuvenation

The Women’s Enterprise Foundation WEF is a 501(c)3 charitable organization that supports and inspires emerging women business owners within the greater Phoenix area who have a demonstrated business development need or who would benefit from specialized educational training and development opportunities.

To learn more or to make a donation visit www.WEFPHX.org

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NWABO NEWS

Business Financial Healthcheck Yes No

When we receive work we know we can complete it and be paid on our terms We invoice as soon as we complete work Our credit procedures alert us to overdue accounts We monitor and enforce our credit terms - taking deposits from “doubtful” payers Our pricing reflects true costs and appropriate margins We complete work efficiently We realize mistakes before they reach the customer We learn from our mistakes We continually monitor budgets We regularly review the viability of outsourcing work We are effective in negotiating materials and supplies contracts We forecast cash flow monthly and act on these projections Our bank is our partner, knows our business and its financial needs Employee overtime is strictly controlled The least expensive most capable employee always do the work Our standard operating procedures are written down and everyone follows them

If you have more “YES” than “NO” answers then give yourself a pat on the back. You’re business is in good financial health. If you have more “NO” than “YES” answers then it’s time to evaluate the financial picture of your business to get back on track .

SAVE THE DATE

NAWBO Annual Awards Gala

JUNE 8th 2011 @ 7pm Check our website for more details! www.NAWBOPHX.org

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NWABO NEWS

Keep Cost Under Control… Try Outsourcing

By Lisa Bhella, Secretary for NAWBO Phoenix

Lisa Bhella

Your business is growing and that’s a good thing. Now you need help. You’ve considered hiring someone but maybe your should look at outsourcing as an option. Outsourcing can be the ideal way to manage your overhead and keep cost under control while you grow. The following is a helpful checklist when searching for the perfect outsourcing fit.

• F ind a contractor by referral if possible. Ask for testimonials.

• Look beyond basic capabilities. Does the contractor have the bandwidth for your project? Are there potential conflicts of interest, such as ties with your competitors? How will the contractor deal with ambiguous instructions? What about interacting with your employees and other contractors?

• Understand the cost structure—many contractors will work on an hourly basis. Are introductory rates available? Evaluate the expected costs in the context of the value a contractor will bring to your business.

• Dip your toe in the water with a smaller project first. Agree upon clear project guidelines and sign a scope-of-work document. Watch for scope creep—consider a monthly cap on work hours. Agree on invoicing terms and pay invoices promptly.

• Be clear about your expectations for working hours, meetings and travel requirements. Might any business hours be problematic for you or the contractor?

• If sensitive information is exchanged, implement a confidentiality agreement. Understand any software license restrictions. Plan for contract termination—if things are not working out, be sure you can get out!

Get creative to keep your marketing train moving One way to improve the financial picture of your business is to find creative ways to continue to market and trim costs at the same time. In lean times many businesses cut their marketing budgets completely. Bad idea. Here are a few cost saving tips to keep your marketing moving.

• Word-of-mouth marketing works. Use your associates to get referrals.

• Create an e-newsletter. It’s much cheaper to market to previously acquired customers than creating new direct-marketing collateral.

• Use YouTube. YouTube is a great free way for you to get the word out on your business.

• Be a thought leader. Communicate on online forums and message boards. You’ll interact with potential clients and customers — for free.

• Start a blog. You can advertise, review your offerings and give free tips as often as you’d like without worrying about running up your budget.

• Use email. Email marketing campaigns will let you interact with specific customers about new products that might interest them.

• Get to know your neighbor businesses. They might be up for splitting local advertising and promotion costs, such as sidewalk sales and mailing lists.

• Get your clients to advertise for you. Ask them to write a testimonial on your Web site or tell their colleagues about your products or services.

• Be a guest speaker. Speak at a community meeting or teach a business course to reach new potential customers.

• Join trade associations. You’ll get industry-specific information, advice, sales opportunities and other member benefits.

• Piggyback your advertising. Include advertising material in mailings such as invoices and sneak announcements or coupons into newsletters and other promotional fliers.

nwabophx.org

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NWABO NEWS

NAWBO PHOENIX Corporate Partners

One of our missions at NAWBO Phoenix is to give back to the communities where we live and work.

It's something we know that our membership and board values. Here is a list of the community service projects we are thrilled to have been a part of.

Build a Home Project - Habit for Humanity • Clothing Drive - Save A Family Foundation Food Drive - St Vincent De Paul • Fundraising Breakfast - St Vincent De Paul Serve breakfast at St Vincent De Paul • My sister My Friend Toys Drive

Presidential Corporate Partners National Bank of Arizona Salt River Project State Farm Insurance Strategic Corporate Partner Media88 Executive Corporate Partners Hynes Benefits Consulting Kolbe Corp Southwest Gas Snell & Wilmer, LLP University of Phoenix Business Corporate Partners Anderson Security Agency, Ltd. Arizona Public Service Benefits By Design Border States Electric Bank of Arizona Estate Plan Store Fresh N Clean Paychex Price Kong, CPA The Car Source Wells Fargo Strategic Media Partners Creative Intuition NetworkingPhoenix.com Executive Media Partner AZ Capitol Times InBusiness Magazine CITY Sun Times KFNX News-Talk Radio 1100 KFNN 1510am Newsradio

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NWABO NEWS

Build a Home Project - Habit for Humanity

My sister My Friend Toys Drive

Food Drive and Service Day - St. Vincent De Paul

Get social with NAWBO Phoenix It’s a great way to stay informed about NAWBO Phoenix and expand your online network.

And once you’ve connected, don’t forget to spread the word to everyone you know about how great it is to be a NAWBO Phoenix member.

In Business Magazine is read by those vested in business Valleywide

To get your Marketshare . . . Advertise with www.inbusinessmag.com • info@inbusinessmag.com • (480) 588-9505

inbusinessmag.com

I n B u s i n e s s Ma g a z i n e

63

INDE X Gamboa, Javier, 14

Maynard, Michael K., 26

Sloan, Susan, 32

Garcia-Likens, Patty, 32

Mwaniki-Lyman, Lora, 20

Smith, Julie David, 24

Ambrose, Tom, 12

Guber, Peter, 41

Olvera, Natalie, 66

Spiers, James, 14

Amuchastegui, Domingo, 20

Higgins, Andrew, 14

Paige, Lynn, 32

Thomas, Sue, 32

Benner, Mike, 24

Johnson, Rick, 26

Paine, Debbie, 66

Toney, Mike, 26, 40

Brim, Brian, 41

Klapp, Suzanne, 12

Rand, Tom, 32

Vetter, Rudy, 16

Burrus, Daniel, 41

Kressaty, Kim, 14

Rees, Dan, 32

Wheeler, Chuck, 32

Cabrera, Ángel, 11

Lewien, Cody, 14

Reich, Elizabeth, 43

Wilkins, Wayne, 16

Camacho, Chris, 32

Lindo, Leslie, 32

Rutigliano, Tony, 41

Williams, Susan, 26

Condit, Richard, 32

Lopez, Steven, 32

Scherer, John, 26

Wong, Jason, 66

Crothamel, Chuck, 14

Luntz, Frank I., 41

Sears, Jason, 16

Zenda, Stan, 32

Croucher, Matt, 32

Mackey, Hank A., 12

Shaw, Curtis, 32

Zukie, John, 14

D’Shay, Joanna, 66

Major-Martinez, Sindi, 26

Shelley, David, 24

de la Melena, Gonzalo, 50

Mann, John David, 41

Sigg, Joe, 20

Flake, Jeff, 20

Martin, Pamela, 43

Siner, Ann, 42

Center for Advancing

LindaLandAZ.com, 10

Sherri May & Co., 32

Make-A-Wish Foundation of Arizona, 43

Shortell, 21

Maricopa Workforce

Sindel Technologies, LLC, 26

Index By Name

Index by Company

Business Through IT, 24

3P Motor Controls, 32

Center for Services Leadership, 44

APS, 66

Central Phoenix Women, 47

A.T. Still University, 63

Chandler Chamber of Commerce, 47

Mayo Clinic, 67

Abengoa Solar, 32

City of Surprise, 32

Mesa Chamber of Commerce, 45, 47

Ahwatukee Foothills

Clean Air Cab, 32

Moira Sushi, 52

Stockyards, The, 52

Connections, 17, 32

Sonoran SBAP, 32 Southwest Valley Chamber of Commerce, 49

Cloud Integration & Optimization, 25

My Sister’s Attic, 42

Sundt, 33

AirSprint Private Aviation, 7

Conquest Training Systems, Inc., 26, 40

My Sister’s Closet, 42

Suntech Power Holdings Co., 32

Alerus Bank & Trust, 39

Copper State Bolt & Nut Co., 32

National Association of

Surprise Regional

American Wind Energy Association, 32

Cox Business, 3

Arizona Biodiesel, 32

Crown Castle International, 16

Arizona Business Advancing

Dixon Golf, 32

Chamber of Commerce, 46

Sustainability, 32 Arizona Commerce Authority, 16, 32 Arizona Farm Bureau, 20 Arizona Foundation for Legal Services & Education, 40 Arizona Hispanic Chamber of Commerce, 46, 50 Arizona Small Business

Asian American Professionals, 66 National Association of Women Business Owners, 47, 55, 59, 61

Chamber of Commerce, 49 Sushi Roku, 52 Target Commercial Interiors, 6

Dunn Edwards Paints, 32

National Bank of Arizona, 4

Tatum, 26

Economic and Business

National Federation of

Telesphere, 14

Research Center, 20

Independent Business, 18

Tempe Chamber of Commerce, 49

Economic Club of Phoenix, 47

Noctis Ink, LLC, 14

Texas AgriLife Research, 20

Electricity Journal, The, 32

North Phoenix

Thunderbird School of

Eller College of Management, 37 Empowered Clothing Co., 14 Executive Forums, LLC, 26

Chamber of Commerce, 47 North Scottsdale Chamber of Commerce, 48

Global Management, 11 Tuscan Oven, 14 United States Department of Energy, 32

FarSight Group, Inc., 14

Ownermatch International, 16

VCi Green Fund, 32

Arizona State Credit Union, 13

FastFrame, 12

Peoria Chamber of Commerce, 48

Vermillion Photo, 54

Arizona State University, 16

First Credit Union, 23

Perfect Power Solar, 32

W. P. Carey School of

Arizona TechCelerator, 32

Freeport McMoran Copper & Gold, Inc., 20

Phoenix Art Museum, 5

Arizona Technology Council, 14, 45, 46

Gestamp Solar Steel, 32

Phoenix Film Festival, 65

Waste Management, 15

Arts & Business Council of

Glendale Chamber of Commerce, 47

Predicative Group Inc., 26

Well Suited, 42

Grand Canyon University, 39

Pure Sushi Bar, 52

Wells Fargo, 19

Greater Phoenix

Quarles & Brady LLP, 16

West Valley Women, 49

RA Sushi, 52

Women of Scottsdale, 49

Association, 46, 51, 54

Greater Phoenix, 66 AuthorityLabs, 24 Beyond Green, 32

Chamber of Commerce, 50

Beyond the Horizon, 32

Greater Phoenix Economic Council, 16, 32

Reliable Background Screening, 19

Big Brothers Big Sisters of

H. A. Mackey & Associates, 12

REV Biodiesel, 32

Healthcare Solutions Centers, 25

RevolutionCom, 21

Blue Cross Blue Shield of Arizona, 68

Hewitt Associates, 40

Rio Solar Ltda., 32

Bridging the Gap Consulting, 66

Holmes Murphy, 21

SCF Arizona, 2

Buchalter Nemer, 23

Homeward Bound, 43

SRP, 32

BVA Inc., 24

HR Choice, 26

Schumacher European, 9

Cassidy Turley / BRE Commercial, 10

IKEA Business, 53

Scottsdale Area

Central Arizona, 12

Intel Corp., 66

64

A p r i l 2011

Chamber of Commerce, 48

Business, 14, 32, 44

in business mag dot com inbusinessmag.com

Roundtable

A Candid Forum

Board Work and Betterment Business on Board serves business and nonprofits

by RaeAnne Marsh

Altruistic interest in giving back to the community motivates many businesspeople to devote time to serving on a local organization’s board of directors. The payback is a sense of satisfaction — and an expanded circle of networking.

But additional advantages may be realized, and that’s what drives attendance in the Arts & Business Council of Greater Phoenix’s Business on Board class. The course itself offers a positive return on investment. Joanna D’Shay, corporate giving consultant for APS, says, “There’s nothing worse than placing someone on a board and they don’t have the tools or have any idea of what they’re supposed to be doing. They’re representing the company, so it’s in our best interest [to train them].”

APS encourages its employees to be involved in the community. “We have a strong volunteer culture,” says D’Shay, noting it encompasses “individuals from a call center employee to VPs and the CEO.” The Business on Board course gives them a broader scope of what it is to give, how nonprofits operate, the individual’s responsibility and how that ties back to the company. Some components are a valuable refresher, she notes, even for “sophisticated individuals who sit on high-profile boards.”

The Arts & Business Council, and its previous incarnation as Business Volunteers

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for the Arts, matches interested business professionals with nonprofit organizations needing their expertise. Debbie Paine, executive director of the Arts & Business Council, says ABC began offering the Business on Board program because it kept seeing the same issues come up year after year. “We deduced it was a board issue — board members didn’t understand their responsibilities in relation to the overall functioning of the organization.” Through the program, volunteers become educated about finance and how to read a financial statement, legal responsibilities, diversity issues and networking, and their fundraising responsibility.

“The nonprofit gets an educated and qualified board member, knowing what it means to serve on a board and familiar with board dynamics,” says D’Shay. And for the individual, “it’s less stressful for them being on a board.” It carries into the workday as well, she explains. A call center employee, for instance, who learns the person calling in is involved in a community organization, “can have a genuine conversation about our giving culture and philosophy. And, at the end of the day, good customer service is about people relating to people.”

Jason Wong, director of business development with international consulting

firm Bridging the Gap Consulting, took the course because of his involvement in the nonprofit National Association of Asian American Professionals — of which he founded the Phoenix chapter in 2006. “The benefit in business was unexpected,” he says.

Similarities he’s found between nonprofit and for-profit organizations include issues of learning the strengths of people he works with and how to leverage those strengths.

“We had a new board member with a sales background, so we made him membership director. But that wasn’t his passion; he was looking for something different for his volunteer time.” Taking the lesson learned back to his company enabled Wong to recognize what might have otherwise been a missed opportunity. “One partner used to be a realtor.

We gave her the responsibility of prospecting for business. But real estate [for her] had been more of a family business; she wanted to use her language skills.”

Natalie Olvera, a group leader at one of Intel’s chip processing plants, took the Business On Board course because she was interested in expanding her volunteer work to serve on a board of directors. Among the material covered is the aspect of internal controls — the importance of keeping on track to support the mission of the organization. “At work, we jump into the problem. And we make progress, but we don’t set up a system to track if what we’re doing is fixing the problem that we intended to fix in the first place.”

The most valuable benefit of the program, says Olvera, was learning to step back and evaluate new threats and opportunities — in both the business and the nonprofit worlds.

“You need to change your strategies to react to [changes in the economy]. You could be missing opportunities or be blind-sided by a big-time threat.”

APS aps.com Arts & Business Council of Greater Phoenix artsbusinessphoenix.org Bridging the Gap Consulting bridgethegapconsultinginc.com Intel Corp. intel.com

inbusinessmag.com

Deciding to take an active role in my own healthcare, I wanted an expert team I could count on. I enrolled in the Executive Health Program.

My answer was Mayo Clinic.

Michelle King Robson, Phoenix, AZ founder, chairperson and CEO, EmpowHER.com

Michelle was empowered by the Mayo Clinic Executive Health Program, which performs comprehensive physical examinations in a compressed time period, and not just for busy executives. Mayo Clinic combines diagnostic expertise with internationally recognized care and service. The Executive Health program is available at Mayo Clinic in Phoenix/Scottsdale, AZ; Rochester, MN; and Jacksonville, FL. To schedule an appointment, visit mayoclinic.org/executive-health or call (866) 518-4237.

To invest in my dreams. To give it everything I have. To inspire people every day.

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