March 30, 2007

PKF Texas - The Entrepreneur's Playbook: Misconceptions of Expanding Internationally Part 1

Note: Running most Fridays in FromGregsHead.com, is a continuing series of tips brought to you by Greg Price. These run Saturday mornings during the BusinessMaker’s Radio Show on KPRC 950AM. Audio files can be found on the Entrepreneur's Playbook page of the PKF Texas website.

Houston is a booming international marketplace. Even small and medium-sized businesses are willing to look to foreign markets for customers and business opportunities. Any business expansion has pitfalls. International expansions can be particularly tricky. This is the first in a series of some common tax and business surprises. 

If I earn the money outside the US, I do not have to pay US tax on my income.

Wrong. The US is unique among nations in that we tax our citizens and companies based upon their worldwide income. The US will tax your foreign-earned income sooner or later.   Either when it is earned, or when you bring it back home.

Tax systems around the world are pretty much the same, except that they have different tax rates – so I want to find the country with the lowest tax rate.

Maybe  – maybe not. Many other countries use a territorial tax system. Under this system profits will only be taxed to the extent that they are earned in the country where the corporation is located. The amount of your income that gets taxed is just as important as the rate of tax.

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Accountants Roundup

March 27, 2007

Lemonade Day

I heard a great story of helping our community and young people yesterday.  It's a project called Lemonade Day!

Michael Holthouse, President of Intuitive Homes (former founder of Paranet) commented on this the other day while at luncheon we hosted concerning Paul Frison and the HTC.   More to come on Frison and the HTC another day.

Back to Lemonade Day.  The Day will be May 6, 2007 and the purpose is to teach young students (4th, 5th and 6th graders) how to make money.  The concept of selling a product, costs of goods, marketing, profit etc.  Many young people in college today still have no concept on how to make money.  More importantly they lack the ability to understand the need for going through a business cycle before the first dollar of profit is made.
 
Companies can purchase packages of lemonade stands for the their employees and create a company-wide family event on Lemonade Day.  Visit their website www.lemonadeday.org for further information.
 
Capitalism is alive and well in our great country.

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March 26, 2007

Wrap-Up Part 2

Saturday Night
 
Well we are at the Hilton Americas in downtown Houston and the room looks absolutely wonderful.  This is by far the best dinner the Rice Business Plan has had and facilities including the AV work from V2 Studios is also a fine example of what can be with a great local TV studio.
 
I noted during the ballot turn in process that the judges were quite appropriately all over the board on their thoughts 1-7.  I saw some sheets that had the same groupings as mine, and some that were completely opposite.  In a ranking like this, the key is not to have too many high points.  Someone consistently ranked 2-3 might beat someone was 1 on some sheets and 6 or 7 on others.
 
The keynote speaker was  Barrett Boone from the Container Store.  Essentially his message was stay the course, don't give up, or give in to others who may approach you to buy you out, etc.  If you want to do it, and you have a passion stay with your ideas.  Appropriate for the audience that we had.
 
At my table were the two principals from BYU (which happened to be one of the finalists this evening).  Their product Precision Surveying is a company that has some minor revenues but is building fast.  I spoke to them about contacting one of the numerous bankers in the room about getting an SBA loan to take the company bigger.  In fact during their presentation they said they didn't need money, they were looking for a strategic partner to take them to the next level.
 
Also at the PKF table were:
 
Russ Capper of The Business Makers Radio Show
Laura Capper of CAP Resources
Joe Trahan and his wife of 1-Service
Deborah Mansfield of the HTC
Jagdip Ahluwalia,Executive Director of the Indo American Chamber of Commerce of Greater Houston
 
I hope all you had a great time as well.
 
Well the winners were announced and I have to tell you that it came down to SteriCoat from MIT and ResuRx from John Hopkins. And the winner of the first place $120,000 cash award is....................
 
ResuRx from John Hopkins. 
Talk about your upsets, ResuRx didn't even win their flight but they came through the WildCard round and won!  Just like in pro sports, the Wild Card can win and sometimes does!
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March 26, 2007

Rice Business Plan Competition Wrap-Up

Due to some technical difficulties with my pocket PC over the weekend, I was unable to post about the rest of the Rice Business Plan Competition.  So here are the entries I would have posted over the weekend.
Saturday Afternoon Update
 
Well the finals have begun and we have 7, that's right count em...7 plans to listen to between 12 noon and 4 PM today.  I know at the end I will be worn out and I know the students will be as well.
 
The order of presentations this afternoon will be:
 
EyeLight                           UCLA
Feed Resource Recovery    Babson College
ImagineOptix                     UNC Chapel Hill
NANOTaxi                         Texas at Austin
Precision Surveying            BYU
SteriCoat                           MIT
ResuRx                             Johns Hopkins
 
The Shell Auditorium was packed with judges and those students and advisors who were not in the finals. We were treated to an array of very, very good presentations.  As people come in and out the AV setups were a bit distracting but everyone showed great poise and adapted quickly as they went forward.
 
My initial observations as the day went out are:
 
All of the finalists were very, very good.  We have come a long way from our first RBPC seven years ago.  Several judges were with me during that first event and we commented how much better the plans, companies and students are today!
 
Many of the presentations lacked discussions around two key themes:
"What's your secret sauce?" Or why you as I like to say.........Sometimes it just wasn't clear.
"What's your offer for the financial assistance."  Recognizing that everything is negotiable, the judges didn't get much insight into pre-money valuation feedback, deal make up etc.  Of course as judges we can do that, but the students didn't comment on that much.
 
One final note, and this is a very important feedback item to this year's teams and future teams.  When you come to the Rice Business Plan Competition and your idea involves bio-life science, medical devices, or science in general, you better know your facts cold and present them as open and appropriately as possible.  Through out the weekend and again on Saturday, I saw teams that tried to "duck" the science area, and some of the judges nailed you for incorrect, or better incomplete statements about your idea, the state of it, etc.
You might talk your way around an academic presentation, but these are real world VCs, scientists, etc.  You won't BS your way around them.
 
I must say if I was a young person today with a great idea in the bio-life science area, I would want to get the feedback that our judging panel can provide.  What a great place to give feedback to our future leaders.
 
Tonight is the dinner. Stay Tuned.
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March 26, 2007

Myspace for Accountants?

After learning about Microsoft’s “Myspace” for accountants at Convergence, and then seeing articles about it popping up in the last week all over the web, I decided to check it out for myself. 

http://community.microsoftdynamicslive.com/

While it is a “community,” it’s more of a message board type environment. The networking function is coming soon and could be like Myspace, but the rest of the site really isn’t.

Microsoft may have miss-labeled it as a “Myspace for financial professionals,” when in reality only a portion of the site could potentially resemble Myspace. By labeling it as a “Myspace” they conjure up certain expectations that the current site does not fulfill. (A quick note of full disclosure, I am not a Myspace user, but my kids and many of the young professionals at my firm do use it, so I’m aware of how it’s used and its functionality.)

This seems to be an example of corporate America trying to piggy back on a trend that grew from a cult following to mainstream in a short time. Is Microsoft trying to hard to be trendy and trying to force something that really should be an evolvement? My advice is to take the concept to the next level by improving it and then don’t label it something it’s not.

I think the community for financial professionals can work and has its place if people actually decide to use it. Now that the actual site has been created and is live, maybe Microsoft should step back and let it take on a life of its own. Make the content user driven. Will Microsoft let this happen? Time will tell.

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March 24, 2007

Yesterday's Results

Day 1 is now complete and here are the results from the Rice Business Plan Competition.
The two teams from my flight are Optimal Vision for Wildcard and EyeLight for Final Round.
 
Those were the same two teams I placed in those categories as well.  Our judging group was in agreement.

Wildcard Teams

CLS Pharmaceuticals, Inc.

Elevate Learning

Omega Sensors

Optimal Vision Corporation

ResuRx

Spectrum Diagnostics

Final Round Teams

EyeLight

Feed Resource Recovery

ImagineOptix

NANOTaxi

Precision Surveying Solutions

SteriCoat
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March 23, 2007

More from the Judging Room

EyeLight from UCLA was the next presenter to Flight 5.
EyeLight is developing a new minimally invasive surgical procedure for the treatment of glaucoma, a disease that affects 65 million people worldwide.
 
Impressive presentation one of the best so far. I loved the fact that the inventor was in the room.
Although he could not comment, his research was presented in the overview and I like the idea that he was present.
 
It seems several clinical studies have already been done with this new product.
 
 
Innovis Technologies LLC from the University of Arizona.
Innovis harnesses cutting-edge molecular technologies to produce revolutionary diagnostic kits that protect the world from microbial contamination.
 
With all the issues of possible food contaminations, lettuce issues, etc.  I love the idea of this product. The team was well prepared, on point and made a highly effective presentation. I hope I don't need it in the future, but I can see a need for it. 
 
 
Nanovate from the University of Waterloo
Nanovate is a biomedical company based in Waterloo, Canada.  They commercialize and market enhanced biomedical devices for clinical deployment.  Specifically their product deals with radiation techniques.  I liked the presentation but I wasn't sure about the ability of the product to produce the results that they outlined.
 
 
Optimal Vision Corporation from the University of Illinois at Chicago
They hope to introduce a non-surgical procedure for correcting presbyopia.  They hope to eliminate the need for reading glasses and invasive surgical procedures.  I need lots of help in this area.
 
The presentation was good, but then the team was not able to distinguish between the various forms of procedures today.
 
Good luck to all!
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March 23, 2007

Live from the Rice Business Plan Competition

Hello from Rice University!

The 2007 Rice Business Plan Competition is underway and the first two presentations were very good.

The weather is cooperating so all of our out of town visitors have a flavor for the weather...Sorry about the pollen guys.

Flight 5 Update 1

Cateko Diagnostics from Rice University with some technology from UTMB went first.

Heather Borden, Robert Norsworth and Mike Lowe lead off our flight with the presentation on Cateko. Cateko will offer two medical tests that diagnose a woman's risk of preterm labor.  One test prior to pregnancy and another near delivery.

I liked the presentation and I understood the concepts.  Unfortunately, the team didn't get to finish their presentation.  I am guessing that they had 2-3 minutes left to go.  Everyone can see the benefit of extend term pregnancy and the impact to the child and the insurance/hospitals, not to mention good mom and dad.

Good presentation guys and good luck.

Next up, Certo Labs from the University of Toronto.  Certo is a scientific instrumentation company aiming to commercialize a novel lab instrument known as the Automated Sample Extractor to be used by the Pharmaceutical and Food Industries. 

The two presenters were very personable young men and I really enjoyed their passion and humor.  Their product and its potential value was not as clear as I would have liked to see.  The young men have done a great job of getting larger and well established companies in their sector to back their sweat equity.   I think their plans needs a bit more work before making a run at a competition of this type.

Good presentation and good luck to you as well.

I have to break now....UCLA with EyeLight is up next.

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March 23, 2007

PKF Texas - The Entrepreneur's Playbook: Search Engine Optimization Part 2

Note: Running most Fridays in FromGregsHead.com, is a continuing series of tips brought to you by Greg Price. These run Saturday mornings during the BusinessMaker’s Radio Show on KPRC 950AM. Audio files can be found on the Entrepreneur's Playbook page of the PKF Texas website.

This is the second of a two part tip brought to you by Susan Ward of Cypress Technologies and PKF Texas.

In our last segment we covered the first two rules for effective search engine optimization or SEO. Here are the final three rules to keep in mind:

  • Give each page an appropriate title that includes the key word or phrase at least once. Many sites use the business’ name as the title of each page. This is limiting because when conducting a broad search people don’t necessarily look for a specific company.
  • Put the keywords or phrase you've chosen in the page title tag, meta keywords, and meta description. The meta description is an HTML tag to describe the webpage’s contents. Make sure the meta description is as appealing as possible, because some search engines use this description in the results pages.
  • Be sure your chosen keyword or phrase is repeated throughout the content of the page. Don’t overdo it, or your page may be rejected as spam, but repeat it enough times the search engine's software will consider the phrase relevant.

Applying these basics of SEO will give your website a better chance of showing up on those first couple pages of returned results. 

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SmartPros Accounting

March 21, 2007

It's Not What You Know, It's Who You Know

Where do you find your technology/web developers or designers? Do you seek out referrals or hire a recruiter?

A recent survey conducted by the American Marketing Association and Triple Dog Dare Media in Austin, found that over 52% of respondents relied on referrals or word of mouth and another 8% hire family members, friends or neighbors. 

Those responses bring to mind the old adage, “It’s not what you know, it’s who you know.”

Have you found with our increasing connectivity that it’s easier to network and seek out referrals for finding both employees and clients? If not, what roadblocks have you found? 

Have you hired employees or had potential clients who found you via word of mouth?

There doesn’t seem to be one standard answer to these questions, but I’d like to hear your thoughts on what’s worked best for you and your company.

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March 20, 2007

Judging for the Rice Business Plan Competition

I am once again a judge for the Rice Business Plan Competition. This year the competition is being held March 22-24. It’s a three-day event is intended to simulate the real-world process of entrepreneurs soliciting start-up funds from early-stage investors and venture capital firms. 

The competition is hosted by the Rice Alliance for Technology and Entrepreneurship and Jesse H. Jones Graduate School of Management at Rice University. Thirty-six teams from top MBA programs from across the country and Canada have been selected to compete.

This year I’m a judge for flight 5. Below are the teams that will compete my flight:

Certo Labs, Inc. – University of Toronto
EyeLight – UCLA
Optimal Vision – University of Illinois
Nano Vate – University of Waterloo
Cateko – UTMB
Innovis Technologies – University of Arizona

Like last year I’ll be live blogging from the competition. So stay tuned for my thoughts and observations from inside the judging room!

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March 16, 2007

PKF Texas - The Entrepreneur's Playbook: Search Engine Optimization Part 1

Note: Running most Fridays in FromGregsHead.com, is a continuing series of tips brought to you by Greg Price. These run Saturday mornings during the BusinessMaker’s Radio Show on KPRC 950AM. Audio files can be found on the Entrepreneur's Playbook page of the PKF Texas website.

This is the first of a two part tip brought to you by Susan Ward of Cypress Technologies and PKF Texas.

In the age of Web 2.0, many people talk about Search Engine Optimization, or SEO, but there are those who are still unsure of what this means for their website.

SEO is the process of choosing targeted keywords and phrases to ensure a webpage is well placed when returned in search engine results. The goal of effective SEO is to have your pages listed on the first or second page of results. Most people won’t look much further than that for information.

To do this, there are five basic rules to keep in mind:

 First, remember that each page of your site is a separate entity. You need to apply the basics of effective SEO to each individual page.

Second, Choose appropriate key words or phrases for each page. The specific phrasing matters. There are online tools such inventory.overture.com, where you can enter search terms and view the most popular phrasing of that term.

Tune in next week to hear the last three rules of SEO.

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March 12, 2007

Message from the Office - TPRA Awards

My colleague, Jen Lemanski, in the Practice Growth department, sent me an email this morning about the Texas Public Relations Association (TPRA) awards banquet Saturday night, at which we won a Bronze Best of Texas Award.  Since I am at Convergence, I couldn't attend the banquet.  She and Raissa Evans, the Marketing Manager, attended on my behalf.  Here’s what she had to say:

Greg,
Hope you’re having a good time at Convergence.  San Diego would be great right now!  The awards ceremony went well.  In our category (website) we were up against Half Price Books, Shell Oil, The Woodlands, the City of McKinney and the Greater Houston Convention and Visitors Bureau.  The order was as follows:

Silver – Half Price Books –  www.deletecensorship.org
Bronze – PKF Texas – www.fromgregshead.com
Bronze – The Woodlands –  www.thewoodlands.com
Merit – Greater Houston Convention & Visitors Bureau – www.visithoustontexas.com
Merit – Shell Oil Company – www.shell.com/us/energizeyourfuture/
Merit – City of McKinney – www.mckinneytexas.org

They don’t award a gold level, so we were the 2nd tier!

Jen

Once again, I would like to say thank you to everyone who reads and comments on the blog, our guest columnists, and everyone who works behind the scenes to make everything run smoothly.  The blog wouldn’t win any of these awards if it wasn’t for all of you, so congratulations! 

I am off to my next session.
 
Before that I am going to meet with Dennis Smith, one of my fellow NAV partners from Dallas.
He has a prospect that its interested in NAV and I am going to answer any questions the prospect has about the product.
 
BTW.....the weather is sunny, 75 and beautiful.  And if I didn't tell you sunny and beautiful.

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March 12, 2007

Convergence Monday Morning

I just spent the past two hours with 8,500 of my best friends as we witnessed the keynote kick off from Doug Burgum and Satya Nadella.
 
Burgum's presentation was OK but I felt he could have had some more energy to get the event kicked off. He did share some interesting bits of news.
 
For example he stated that in the last 50 years the human race has created more information than has been recorded since the beginning of time by man, combined.
I don't know who does these studies, but that's a pretty big number.

I was glad to hear Burgum also say that the human mind can only take so much new information at one time. 
One of the things that Microsoft needs to work on is training and and rollout.  I keep telling them that our customers want more and better training and yet they keep rolling out new products. Small disconnect, but I will keep working on them.
 
During the second part of the keynote we heard from Microsoft Vice President, Satya Nadella.
I like Satya's style, he clearly understand's the user's needs and what they are requesting.

Although it was a light humor moment, a couple of demo's didn't quite go well and I felt bad for the people doing the presentation. They seemed stressed.
 
Satya announced some other things that we learned about on Saturday
 
  • A new Dynamics Client for use with SharePoint.
  • A new methodology and competency process for partners and customers of Dynamics to provide for more reliable implementations.
  • The announcement of Dynamics 5.0 which will be available on March 21.
 
I will have more details on these items when I return to the office.
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March 10, 2007

Convergence Day 1 Afternoon

This afternoon I had a chance to see 3 sessions which featured Nav 5.0.  It was very helpful in gaining a better appreciation of the upcoming changes.

Several of the folks from Denmark were here as well.  It seems that Nav 5.0 will be out within a couple of two weeks.

Several additional informational sites will be made known so folks can see what's coming.

Final meeting of the day for me was the US Partner Board for Nav.  In this meeting we were able to review some product enhancements suggested by the partner group.  The NAV development team from Denmark was present and lots of great new ideas were discussed on both parts.

When I return to Houston, I will get word to our client base about some of these features.

Tomorrow is an off day with a reception later in the evening.

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March 10, 2007

Convergence 2007 Has Started

Day 1 AM
 
Hello from beautiful San Diego.
 
Well I am now convinced that there is no other place to have Convergence than San Diego.
The facilities here are first class, sufficient room to conduct business and the weather is fantastic.
 
The San Diego Convention Center is much, much better than our location last year (that city in Texas with a "D").
 
The morning kicked up with a brief breakfast discussion with our Navision Automotive Alliance.
PKF Texas is a part of this outstanding group led by Nancy Love and Pat Sepaski and others.
 
Next was the Opening Keynote session delivered by Tami Reller Sr. VP for Marketing at Microsoft Business Solutions. Tami shared some information with the partner group that was outstanding.  She also asked that we not share some of the details until the press releases go out on Monday. So I will honor her request and wait until Monday morning.
 
But stay tuned as I will have other things to say.
 
I am off to hear the worldwide General Manager for Navision.
 
Bye for now.
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March 9, 2007

PKF Texas - The Entrepreneur's Playbook: Let Your Potential Clients Communicate with You

Note: Running most Fridays in FromGregsHead.com, is a continuing series of tips brought to you by Greg Price. These run Saturday mornings during the BusinessMaker’s Radio Show on KPRC 950AM. Audio files can be found on the Entrepreneur's Playbook page of the PKF Texas website.

This tip is brought to you by Susan Ward of Cypress Technologies and PKF Texas.

We often think about what we want to communicate to our potential customers, but how often do we focus on the communication from our potential customers?

If a potential customer has sought out your company, more often than not they are a pre-sold customer and have already made the decision to use your company.

When you provide a phone number or email address on your website, in an ad, or other printed material, be prepared to receive communication from and respond promptly to potential customers. If you do not, you may lose that customer to a competitor.

Small businesses may face the challenge of having a person available to answer every phone call or email in a timely manner. This can be easily overcome by an automated response thanking the customer for their communication and providing a timeline as to when they can expect to receive a response from you. 

When you lack the bandwidth due to being a small business, creativity is the key to the development of your future customer base.

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March 7, 2007

2 Point 6 Billion

Chris Devonshire-Ellis, who wrote a guest blog for us a couple of weeks ago, has a blog of his own, www.2point6billion.com. The blog is “specifically dedicated to comment and dialogue on matters of China & India trade, development, investment opportunities, politics, and the impact these two huge emerging markets are having on the international business community.”

The link to his blog will remain in the links section so you can access it on a regular basis.

Chris has a lot of great information that many of you may be interested in. From time to time I’ll highlight entries of particular interest. If you see something you’d like me to comment on, let me know! 

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David Maister's Passion, People and Principles

2 Point 6 Billion

March 5, 2007

Call for Nominations - Best CFO of the Year

Received this email from John Beddow (publisher of the Houston Business Journal) today:

"In this age, a company relies heavily on the skills and talents of their Chief Financial Officer (CFO) to steer their company in the right direction. Have you been impressed by the outstanding work of a CFO you have been associated with?http://houston.bizjournals.com/houston/nomination/746.

The Houston Business Journal is seeking nominations for these financial stewards with its first Best CFOs of the Year Awards presented by Marsh and co-sponsored by PKF of Texas, Accenture, FEI and the Houston CPA Society.

We are looking for CFOs with exemplary professional and personal skills who have caught the attention of clients and co-workers alike, as well as those who have fostered diversity and others who have made a significant contribution to the community.

Nominations must be made by using the link to Best CFOs of the Year. Click here for the nine categories, as well as details on the criteria, and to make your nomination:

The closing date for nominations, which should include a brief but concise summary of the reasons for the nomination, is Friday, March 9th.

The awards will be presented at a luncheon on Friday, May 18th during the three-day Houston Business Journal Celebrate! Enterprise event presented by Sterling Bank.

It is easy to make a nomination, so don't miss this opportunity to bring recognition to deserving CFOs. For questions regarding nominations, contact Judy Rider at 713-688-8811.

I look forward to seeing you on Friday, May 18th.

Sincerely,
John Beddow"

This looks to be a great inaugural program.  PKF Texas is a sponsor of the Best CFO of the Year Award, so watch this space for more information before the event on May 18th.

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March 2, 2007

PKF Texas - The Entrepreneur's Playbook: Advisory Boards

Note: Running most Fridays in FromGregsHead.com, is a continuing series of tips brought to you by Greg Price. These run Saturday mornings during the BusinessMaker’s Radio Show on KPRC 950AM. Audio files can be found on the Entrepreneur's Playbook page of the PKF Texas website.

This tip is brought to you by Susan Ward of Cypress Technologies and PKF Texas.

Do you have an advisory board for your business? 

Some think advisory boards are only for large, or public companies. There are many advantages for companies of all sizes to have a board.

Your advisory board will serve as a sounding board, a source of ideas and expertise – to give you honest advice. Approach retired executives, or influential people in your community to serve on your board.

The board should meet on a regular basis, usually quarterly. Also, be prepared to be completely open with your board. They cannot function and advise properly if information is held back.

An advisory board that meets regularly gets to know you and your business. They can provide the management expertise to avoid common business mistakes and set your business up for success.

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