From Lawrence Heim, Elm Sustainability Partners

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From Event Manager Blog

The way people visit and experience trade shows today has changed dramatically from just a year ago. Click here to read more

By Tom Reilly, author of Value-Added Selling

A commodity is a product differentiated only by its price. If the only thing that differentiates you from the competition is price, you have more than a pricing problem. You have a failure-to-differentiate problem.

From Harvard Business Review

Rather than merely reacting to the journeys that consumers themselves devise, companies are shaping their paths, leading rather than following. Click here to read more

A Press Release from Advance Components

Carrollton, TX – April 6, 2016 - Advance Components, a master stocking distributor of specialty fasteners, welcomes McCormick Associates as Advance’s manufactures’ representative for sales in New York, New Jersey and Eastern Pennsylvania.

From Fast Company Magazine

Best practices don’t make you the best. They make you the average of everyone else who follows them. Click here to read more

From World Economic Forum

Today’s college graduates tend to be highly trained and employable, but researchers say they often lack a key skill needed for post-college life: how to identify and ask their own questions. Click here to read more

From Brown, Smith, Wallace

The Association of Certified Fraud Examiners (ACFE) recently released its 2016 Report to the Nations on Occupational Fraud and Abuse. A key statistic is unchanged from the last report, issued in 2014: the typical organization loses 5% of revenue annually due to fraud. The association also reports that a lack of internal controls is the main organizational weakness of occupational fraud victims. Click here to read more

From Inc. Magazine

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From Entrepreneur Magazine

Many modern businesses have at least some remote workers. Working remotely increases productivity, reduces stress and is more cost-effective than working from an office. Click here to read more

From MarketWatch.com

The Institute for Supply Management said its manufacturing index rose to 51.8% last month from 49.5% in February. Click here for more information

From Inc. Magazine.

Check out these quotes from 21 successful executives who credit simple daily habits for helping them get ahead in business and life.

By Tom Reilly

"The real price of everything, what everything really costs to the man who wants to acquire it, is the toil and trouble of acquiring it." Adam Smith, The Wealth of Nations

By Bruce Merrifield

Global companies have formal, “enterprise accounts” programs. Distributors typically do not. Deploying a team of specialists (to augment the Rep) on the biggest, 1-5%, profit-potential accounts will yield, however, big profit gains, especially in down economies.

Profit-Ranking, Math-Facts

A cumulative, customer-profitability ranking report for distributors reveals stats like the top 40% generate about 150% of the financial statement’s profit total. More sensationally, the top 20% customers yield 140%; top 10, 95%; and, – in one case – the #1 account scored 25% of the peak internal profits.

Protecting the #1 Profit Account?

In the case above, the CEO decided to try an experiment to defend against competitive intrusions. He personally followed his company’s product and paperwork flow through the customer’s internal systems visiting with customer employees along the way. He knew he would find fixable inefficiencies, because:

From World Economic Forum

The changing nature of work in the decades ahead means that leaders to prepare their people to coexist and collaborate with machines. The skills needed today are very different than they were five years ago. Click here to read more

The loss a data breach could cost you has only gone up in recent years, leading many to reevaluate their cybersecurity strategies and adjust their insurance policies.

In a video recently published in the St. Louis Business Journal, Bill Goddard, Principal in the Insurance Advisory Services practice for Brown Smith Wallace, describes some important precautions to take to ensure your business is protected.

From Elm Sustainability Partners

Our previous article highlights the absence of any new information or guidance on US conflict minerals filings, the deadline for which is looming (May 31). The lack of information is creating confusion for some companiesand we have had a number of calls in the past weeks to clarify where things stand relative to Form SD and Conflict Minerals Reports requirements. Click here for a summary of the major points

From Brown Smith Wallace

The Protecting Americans from Tax Hikes Act of 2015 (PATH Act) made permanent many popular but previously temporary tax breaks for individuals and businesses. The PATH Act also enhanced many incentives. Click here for more information