Published July, 2015 A standard workweek is typically thought of as 40 hours, though many employees spend much more time than that at work. Employees who work more than 40 hours a week must be paid overtime under the Fair Labor Standards Act unless they meet certain exemption criteria. In very general terms, aside from jobs that are classified as exempt...
Managing the strategic financial direction of an organization is at the heart of the CFO role. CFOs are charged with making informed decisions regarding how to distribute an organization's assets in order to maximize value to customers and, therefore, generate profit. To that end, it is critical that CFOs stay informed about new and emerging business principles and management systems across all...
Value Based Economics I distinctly remember the day that I learned in one of my many business classes in college that the purpose of any business is to “maximize shareholder wealth”. The professor taught that the end goal of any company is to make more money for the owners. I operated under this premise for many years as I ventured into...
The only constant in business in change. Unexpected changes to business environments sometimes happen because of the unintended consequences of decisions that are made internally. Other times, changes result from things that occur outside of the business’ control, such as regulatory changes, actions by competitors, or other changes in market conditions. Unfortunately, unexpected downturns sometimes prompt business leaders to make...
Revenue – expenses = net income. It doesn’t take a math whiz to understand that reducing expenses increases net income, at least in the short term. But cutting the wrong expenses can have disastrous effects on long-term results. Either formally or informally, every decision to incur an expense is the result of a cost-benefit analysis. Each time you are presented...
The Industrial Revolution fueled economic growth, introduced free enterprise, and provided more opportunity to Americans as the need for more workers in factories skyrocketed. Unfortunately, however, typical workdays during this era involved employees performing repetitive tasks for long hours. Workers generally were not required, or sometimes even allowed, to make decisions about the work they were doing day to day. With...