Serve, don't sell: Making the most of Twitter

Serve, don't sell: Making the most of Twitter: Six easy steps to put Twitter to work for your business

Nine Ways Employers Screw Up Hiring

Nine Ways Employers Screw Up Hiring: Honesty tests, "Must know Excel," "Where do you see yourself in five years?" and all the other nonsense that bedevils the hiring process

Nine Ways To Build Customer Loyalty

Nine Ways To Build Customer Loyalty: Loyal customers spend more, provide free word of mouth promotion and visit more often.  Yet small businesses often focus on chasing new customers as a way to improve the bottom line.  Here are ten simple ways to increase loyalty and build profits.

Planning: "You become what you think about"

Planning: "You become what you think about": Are you planning for success or failure?

8 Simple Ways To Drive More Traffic to Your Website

8 Simple Ways To Drive More Traffic to Your Website: Website traffic isn’t one of those elusive goals that only the big companies can achieve. It’s entirely possible for a small business to generate impressive traffic, which can ultimately lead to bigger revenues. Following are some simple strategies to boost your visibility online.

Three New Answers to the Question: What is Leadership?

Three New Answers to the Question: What is Leadership?: What are the new requirements of leaders in an economy that's transforming before our eyes?

7 Ways To Financially Empower Your Kids

7 Ways To Financially Empower Your Kids: In the last 20 years, the American childhood experience has undergone dramatic changes. Thanks to technology, we see new opportunities for learning, developing and innovating. Take tablets, smartphones, video games and laptops for instance. Even the youngest of today's adults didn't have these types of gadgets until they were older.

How To Boost Your Confidence At Work

How To Boost Your Confidence At Work: All high achievers have two attributes in common. The one you hear about is their self-confidence--the inner sense they can overcome challenges more often than not. What is often forgotten (or ignored) is that most people who enjoy self-confidence were once plagued by fears born of imagined or actual inadequacies. The

The Four Cs Of Effective Client Communications

The Four Cs Of Effective Client Communications: In today’s fast-paced world, where news travels faster then ever before, people demand and expect information when they want it and how they want it. If you don’t provide it to them, either someone else will or they will find it themselves.

Gifts for horrible bosses

Gifts for horrible bosses: Monday is National Bosses Day. Other than a swift kick to the rear end, what do you give a horrible boss? Here are five gifts that will keep your boss's butt safe and you, hopefully, still gainfully employed.

Lessons I Learned from Interviewing Over A Thousand Financial Planners

Lessons I Learned from Interviewing Over A Thousand Financial Planners: Over the years, I’ve personally interviewed over a thousand financial planners as part of our recruiting process at Financial Finesse.

Six Tricks To Make Coupons Work For You

Six Tricks To Make Coupons Work For You:
You probably think that coupons save you money, and if you use them correctly, you're right. However, stores and manufacturers issue coupons to increase their total sales, which means that if you aren't careful, you can end up overspending when you shop with coupons. Coupons expose consumers to additional advertising,

What hit me? Your risk-management primer

What hit me? Your risk-management primer: Trouble comes in bunches. Better to be ready now than when the pressure's on.

What’s your B2B marketing mandate?

What’s your B2B marketing mandate?: Simplify your marketing into three critical customer phases for better results

How to Take a New Product from Just an Idea to a Business

How to Take a New Product from Just an Idea to a Business: Scott Hamlin, the founder of the innovative upcycling company Looptworks, shares his views on the importance of knowing who your customers will be, how you're going to distribute your product and what makes it meaningful and different.

Lessons in Startup Survival from the Downturn

Lessons in Startup Survival from the Downturn: Startups large and small have sprung from downturns. Here's how they've managed.

Interview Body Language Mistakes That Can Cost You The Job

Interview Body Language Mistakes That Can Cost You The Job: Your perfectly manicured résumé, flawless cover letter and brilliant responses to tough interview questions might make you a strong job candidate?but forget to smile, slouch in your chair or fail to make eye contact during the interview, and you could be out of the running.

Stephen R. Covey Revisits The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People

Stephen R. Covey Revisits The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People: I caught up with Stephen R. Covey to have him reflect on his worldwide bestseller, The 7 Habits of Highly Successful People, over two decades later. First written in 1989, it has now sold over twenty million copies in 38 languages! Dr. Covey has been recognized as one of Time Magazine's 25 Most Influential Americans. He is the co-founder and vice chairman of FranklinCovey, the leading global professional services firm with offices in 123 countries. He is also the author of The 8th Habit and his forthcoming book is called "The 3rd Alternative: Solving Life's Most Difficult Problems." It will be released on October 4th. In this interview, he reviews and emphasizes many of the points made in his book and it is truly inspirational and timeless advice.

10 Tips To Improve Family Office Investing

10 Tips To Improve Family Office Investing: Wealthy individuals and family offices have, generally through hard work and sometimes just plain luck, been blessed with financial success. Yet contrary to popular belief, they often are not nearly as successful when it comes to investing their money. When I first began working with the wealthy (as opposed to my pension fund clients) I was surprised to find that they were so prone to make, shall we say, less-than-optimal investment decisions. I presumed that given their extensive capabilities and resources, these investors were relatively astute in investment matters. Not necessarily.

How to Estimate Startup Costs

How to Estimate Startup Costs: Get an idea of how much money you'll need by creating three quick lists and making a few educated guesses.

3 Bad Team-Building Exercises For Businesses

3 Bad Team-Building Exercises For Businesses: There may be no I in team but that doesn't mean that "I" will still want to participate.

Is Your Culture Too Nice?

Is Your Culture Too Nice?: Do you avoid conflict? If you do, you're not alone. Conflict avoidance is one of the most common characteristics of corporate cultures. At the same time it is one of the most pernicious and dangerous sources of unintentional complexity in organizational life.

Want a Simple Way to Double or Triple Your Own Productivity? Here's How.

Want a Simple Way to Double or Triple Your Own Productivity? Here's How.: Very few of us are as productive as we could be. We want to be focused with laser-like precision on critical tasks and make the best, most efficient use of our time.  Instead, we get distracted by coworkers, lost in our Inboxes, and too absorbed by unimportant aspects of a single project when we?d be better off turning our attention to other things.

A Business Plan Tool That Helps Size Up Your Odds of Success

A Business Plan Tool That Helps Size Up Your Odds of Success: Enloop pushes the emotional clouds out of the startup process to give entrepreneurs a clear view of their business plan.

5 Easy Ways To Fight The Urge To Splurge

5 Easy Ways To Fight The Urge To Splurge

Pivot or Persevere? The Key to Startup Success

Pivot or Persevere? The Key to Startup Success: Perseverance can be overrated as an entrepreneurial trait. Knowing when to change course to test out a new approach might be even more important.

How to Score on the Entrepreneur Likability Scale

How to Score on the Entrepreneur Likability Scale: You don?t have to be likeable to everyone to be a great entrepreneur, just to the people who count. Of course, we can all point to apparent exceptions, like Ted Turner or Larry Ellison, who are sometimes seen as lions, downright predators, or even jerks. Yet I?m told that even these guys are considered quite likable by an intimate group of business and personal associates.

Five Hidden Fees To Watch For On Vacation

Five Hidden Fees To Watch For On Vacation:
As summer vacations end and the kids go back to school, resorts, hotels and airlines gear up to promote fall deals. Known as a "shoulder" season that follows the busy summer months, fall can be a great time to take advantage of cooler temperatures and travel bargains. But before you

Should you trust your gut? Testing your decision-making instincts

Should you trust your gut? Testing your decision-making instincts: Do you know when you should trust your gut instinct when making a decision? Learn quick tests you can use to find out if you should trust your gut.

Top 10 Financial Tips For Starting A Family

Top 10 Financial Tips For Starting A Family

How to Network Your Way to World-Class Mentors and Teachers: The Thiel Fellowship Lecture, Part 3

How to Network Your Way to World-Class Mentors and Teachers: The Thiel Fellowship Lecture, Part 3: So we just learned now about giving advice. The next thing you can give, and always be giving, is connections. This is huge, huge, huge, huge.

How to Network Your Way to World-Class Mentors and Teachers: The Thiel Fellowship Lecture, Part 2

How to Network Your Way to World-Class Mentors and Teachers: The Thiel Fellowship Lecture, Part 2: There are two main things you have to give people you'd like to connect with and bring into your network. The first thing that all of us have to give is advice. Now, again, this might sound a little funny. You're looking to this person to get advice, so why would you give them advice?  What would you have to give?

How to Network Your Way to World-Class Mentors and Teachers: The Thiel Fellowship Lecture, Part 1

How to Network Your Way to World-Class Mentors and Teachers: The Thiel Fellowship Lecture, Part 1: In 2010, PayPal cofounder and first outside Facebook investor Peter Thiel made waves when he announced the Thiel Fellowship, a program to pay twenty people under the age of twenty $100,000 each to leave formal schooling and learn in the real world, not in the classroom.

Credit Card Alternatives if You Have Bad Credit

Credit Card Alternatives if You Have Bad Credit:
Although it's harder to get credit than it was a few years ago, it's still possible to get a credit card if you've stumbled financially. Here are three alternatives if you've been turned down for traditional credit cards: Subprime Credit Cards These cards are marketed to people with

7 Lessons To Learn From A Market Downturn

7 Lessons To Learn From A Market Downturn: You can never really understand investing until you weather a market downturn. The valuable lessons learned can help you through the bad times and can be applied to your portfolio when the economy recovers. Listed below are some common investor experiences during tough economic times and the lessons each investor can come away with after surviving the events. (To learn more, read "Market Problems? Blame Investors.")

5 creative ways for a small business to save

5 creative ways for a small business to save: You can't control the economy, but you can control what you spend on your company.

10 Ways a Bad Credit Score Can Hurt You

10 Ways a Bad Credit Score Can Hurt You

Want a Home-Based Job? Expert Tips To Help

Want a Home-Based Job? Expert Tips To Help: There’s a certain appeal to working from home, particularly if you’re starting a second career, or kicking off a “working in retirement” sideline.

How to Hold Effective Talent Conversations

How to Hold Effective Talent Conversations: By Roland Smith and Michael Campbell

Planning For A Second Career

Planning For A Second Career: The most successful career switchers take years to learn new skills, network and prepare financially. Here's how to plan for a second career.

Two Quick Financial Moves Small Business Should Make in this Slow Economy

Two Quick Financial Moves Small Business Should Make in this Slow Economy: As a small business owner, it?s hard not to notice the headlines of high government debt, low-interest rates, and of course, the slow-moving economy.  So what moves can put you in a better position to prosper in these times as well as over the next five years? Following are a few quick and easy ones you can knock-down right away.

How To Pick A Financial Advisor

How To Pick A Financial Advisor: The trick is to find good help that creates added value.

WOW Your Way to Better Results!

WOW Your Way to Better Results!: How many times have you had this happen within the past year?

Ten Tips For Getting A Fair Price On A Home

Ten Tips For Getting A Fair Price On A Home: Real estate prices have fallen from their peak, but there are ways to save even more when making the big purchase.

Small Business: What To Do Before The Hurricane Hits The Fan

Small Business: What To Do Before The Hurricane Hits The Fan: Five steps small business owners should take before disaster blows in.

The 48-Hour Startup

The 48-Hour Startup: Garage48, a series of weekend workshops for entrepreneurs, helps ambitious techies launch a venture by Sunday night

Top 5 Mistakes Job Hunters Make

Top 5 Mistakes Job Hunters Make:
The job search game has changed quite a bit over the past decade; applications are now processed online, and social media accounts are becoming just as valuable in reviewing applicants as the actual resume. Before you presume that the old rules don't apply, however, check out these classic errors that could

3 Surprising Facts About Self-Control

3 Surprising Facts About Self-Control: Many of the goals we have the most trouble reaching have one thing in common: the need to resist temptation.  Trying to ignore the powerful allure of the forbidden cigarette, doughnut, or latest budget-blowing buying impulse requires willpower.  You might expect very successful people, who presumably have boatloads of willpower, to be particularly good at not giving in.  But if anything, they seem to be even more susceptible to temptation than the rest of us.   Quick ? name a famous or powerful person that doesn?t have a well-known weakness for something.   I?ll wait.

How Compelling Is Your Leadership Product

How Compelling Is Your Leadership Product: What is a leader? A mentor once told me a leader is someone who can find others who will follow him (or her).

How To Have Fewer, Better Meetings

How To Have Fewer, Better Meetings: Meetings can be the bane of corporate life. Senior leaders and managers typically spend more than half their time in meetings. In one survey, a whopping 85 percent of executives said they were dissatisfied with the efficiency and effectiveness of meetings at their companies.

When Mentors Matter More Than Money

When Mentors Matter More Than Money: More public and private entities are supporting formal mentorship programs that pair startups with seasoned entrepreneurs

The Five Effective Habits of Innovation Leaders: A New Perspective

The Five Effective Habits of Innovation Leaders: A New Perspective: Last week when Forbes published the list of 100 most innovative companies, an appraisal of innovative leaders came in the pack. Professors Dyer, Gregersen and Christiansen, all eminent in the field of innovation, researched those companies to find out what made their leaders tick - or more to the point what made them tick in innovative ways. What does the analysis reveal?

Why Failure May Be Your Key to Marketing Success

Why Failure May Be Your Key to Marketing Success: Master motivator Zig Ziglar once said, ?Failure is a detour, not a dead-end street.?

Tech Startup Secrets of Bill Campbell, Coach of Silicon Valley

Tech Startup Secrets of Bill Campbell, Coach of Silicon Valley:
Few people are as important to the signature companies of Silicon Valley, from Apple to Google, as Bill Campbell. The former Apple and Intuit executive has long spent his time essentially serving as the coach for the most promising tech startups in the Valley (and beyond). He doesn't often speak publicly, so I wanted to hear what he had to say in a rare onstage interview at online publishing network AlwaysOn's Silicon Valley Innovation Summit today. Here are some of the highlights of the interview with Michael Moe, CEO of GSV Asset Management, including some interesting tidbits about the genesis of Google+, what he thinks of some of the Valley's leading figures, and what Campbell considers his best investment (and it's not a tech company).

Eight Ways To Improve Your Credit Score

Eight Ways To Improve Your Credit Score: A few simple steps can put you on the path to creditworthiness--or prevent you from falling off.

10 Toughest Interview Questions: Answered

10 Toughest Interview Questions: Answered: Here, the 10 toughest (but most telling) interview questions, and best of all?how to answer them.

10 Steps To Happiness At Work

10 Steps To Happiness At Work:
Here's a pop quiz for anyone who's miserable at work. Which action has the biggest chance of improving your happiness? (A) Getting a promotion, (B) seeing your professional nemesis move to the Mongolia office, (C) focusing on the positive aspects of your job and trying to ignore the negative or

A Simple Way To Increase Your Nest Egg

A Simple Way To Increase Your Nest Egg: Many workers have the option to remove their money from potentially high-cost workplace retirement plans before retirement.

How To Know When It Is Time To Leave Your Job

How To Know When It Is Time To Leave Your Job: By Caroline Ghosn

Eight Steps For Addressing the IT Management Crisis

Eight Steps For Addressing the IT Management Crisis: On Monday, I presented the argument that IT is facing accelerating challenges that are going to cause a crisis. (See ?The Coming Crisis of IT Management?.) The problem is that the informal way that IT has been managed cannot keep up with the pace of change, increased complexity, and loss of control now facing most IT departments. The IT monopoly is over. CIOs and IT managers are not trained in more sophisticated techniques that treat IT like a business and can adapt to the loss of control. When they are, they lack the tools to implement them. Getting more management resources is going to be a tough sell. The worst part of this is that fighting the battle to keep things from slipping into chaos leaves no time for technologists to exhibit the leadership in applying new technology to help implement strategy.

Bad Waiter Advice Doesn't Have To Ruin Your Business Meal

Bad Waiter Advice Doesn't Have To Ruin Your Business Meal: In these dog days of summer, when business is a bit slower, air conditioning is welcome, and summer?s bounty makes the specials on the menu still more enticing, many of us are meeting up with clients and colleagues we haven?t seen in some time to have the kind of relaxed, no-agenda dinner that allows creativity to flow.

Amazon's 4 Keys to Spectacular Revenue Growth

Amazon's 4 Keys to Spectacular Revenue Growth: Revenue growth is a beautiful thing.

Premature Aging Signs You Shouldn't Overlook

Premature Aging Signs You Shouldn't Overlook:
Sonja Morgan, cast member of Bravo reality series The Real Housewives of New York City, has always considered herself relatively healthy. She takes care of herself, does yoga and eats well. But at age 47, she saw the signs of age creeping up: Dry skin, cravings for salty snacks, irritability