1 comments about Strategic Tools for Social Entrepreneurs: Enhancing the Performance of Your Enterprising Nonprofit.

1. Very helpful, Offers valuable tools for thinking strategically about value creation, income generation and growth. This book is a must have to keep up with the new changes and challenges arising in the non-profit sector.

3 comments about Accounts Payable and Sarbanes-Oxley: Strengthening Your Internal Controls.

1. To me, this book shows us how to strengthen our control in the account payable functions, like segregation of duties, setting of authorisation levels, etc......It helps me to focus the risk areas that I never have think of in terms of account payable function in my company.



2. As a financial professional from NY I was pleased to find Schaeffer's book covered the issues from top to bottom for the AP Department.
   She covers all the aspects of Sarbanes - Oxley and it's impact on the AP Department.
   I no longer wonder if I missed something or there could be something uncovered by the auditors that I should have addressed.



3. I really liked this book. When I first picked it up I was curious how the author would deal with such a narrow topic. Wrong - not only didn't she struggle to 'fill up' the pages, but one gets the impression she could have easily stretched the discussion out for a few more chapters.
   
   If you're concerned about internal controls impacting Accounts Payable, or if you're concerned about strengthening internal controls due to SOX requirements, then you owe it to yourself to pick up this book. Mary often consulted with those 'on the ground' and shares what she learned with the readers. Examples include: SOX subcertifications, problems with SAS 70 reports, real world invoicing and purchase card issues, real world vendor 'master file' issues, T&E processing, escheatment, 1099 reporting and more.
   
   If you're stuck in the mud of SOX and can't get out, this book isn't a spiffied up BMW about as useful as a tuxedo at a bull roast. Rather it's the neighborly pickup truck with a handshake, a chain and a smile.

5 comments about All About Dividend Investing: The Easy Way to Get Started (All About Series).

1. Don Schreiber makes a strong and persuasive argument for why any savvy investor needs to give attention to dividend investing. This book showed me exactly how I can be a savvier investor. Now I have a better grasp of the tax consequences and impact of inflation on my investments and how stocks with excellent dividends can shield me. This is an excellent primer for investors at every level.



2. This is a very good book, full of pratical advices. It is easy to read and understand. It's useful for planning a rational investment strategy. Recommended!



3. This recent entry in the "All About..." investment series covers a lot of territory, but many of its most useful points are made in the first few pages. Dividend paying stocks should be in your portfolio because their cash flow provides steady income with less price volatility in up and down markets. Dividends offer the possibility of positive returns during extended periods when there is little or no price appreciation in the equity markets. In fact, the authors believe that we are in for a "fairly long stretch" of disappointing returns based on their reading of bull and bear market cycle history. Retiring baby boomers looking to squeeze more income from their financial assets will want dividend producing stocks - another reason to own them ahead of their demographic buying wave. Recent tax law changes that include a low maximum 15% rate for most common stock dividends have also made these investments more attractive.
   
   Much of what follows will be of interest to the Do It Yourself portfolio builder. The authors provide advice on analyzing a company's financial ratios to determine the sustainability of a company's dividend and their ability to raise it in the future. Investors are advised how to diversify their portfolio and suitable criteria for screening their holdings. Managing the portfolio with an automatic stop-loss sell discipline to preserve capital in declining markets is a much discussed and infrequently used strategy. Here it gets close attention. My sense of this book is that readers will pick and choose ideas and pieces of their strategy rather than try to follow their methodology step by step. Chapter 11 on DRIPS, Folios, and Mutual Funds and the final Chapter 12 can be skipped.



4. If you're fairly new to investing and have gone beyond mutual funds and dipped your toes into a pool of stocks, you're probably like most new investors... you picked a few growth stocks because those are the stocks that are exciting and sexy. I always wondered what a "Value" stock was and why anyone except our elder citizens would want dividend stocks in boring industries like utilities.
   
   This book will help open that world to you and give you some basic tools to start with in picking valuable, dividend producing stocks. It has actually made it exciting for me to search, pick, and buy those boring stocks!
   
   I'm still young and new to investing, and I found this book, and a few other "All About" books, to be my favorite. They're technical enough without being too technical. And broad enough to give you a general view from which you can then dig deeper.



5. I have been a big fan of dividend investing for years. Generally its not exciting but its dependable. Its often the only money you get to see in a share for a long time.
   
   A plus is as the writer states is the market goes down the shares rarely drop that much as it reaches a point where people will buy it just for the dividend rate.
   
   Having made this one observation, a few times in his book, you will find that if you know something about shares then there is little new or orginal here.
   
   By the way the negative about dividend investing is what this writer does not tell you is if the company has a bad year and cuts its dividend, then the price can drop dramatically. So you still can get burnt badly.

3 comments about The Compensation Committee Handbook.

1. Written for compensation committee members and those who work with them, this text covers: information on the committee's responsibilities; ways to organize a committee; legal position of the committee; selection and training of members; a broad framework for accounting, tax, and securities rules; and the basics of compensation programs. It examines current issues on executive employment agreements, option repricing, reload stock options, pooling-of-interests accounting, and new accounting rules. It provides guidance, especially for small- to medium-sized companies. Includes detailed information on rules and regulations, comparison charts to monitor the progress against compensation strategies, an enormous glossary, and information and training resources geared to committee needs. This is a unique and exceptionally valuable reference for compensation subjects that require committee action. It has exceptional technical depth and clarity. As a compensation consultant myself, I highly recommend this book. James Reda has done an outstanding job!



2. The Compensation Committee Handbook provides an excellent starting reference for concise summaries of a number of issues relating to executive compensation. Explanations are clear and succinct, and the footnotes cite relevant authority for further research and reading.



3. Boards of Directors, and especially compensation committees within the board, are in a period of transition. They are required to be more independent from the company and its management than ever before, and the mega-compensation packages of CEOs is now getting more negative publicity, regulatory scrutiny, and public pushback. This valuable handbook can provide compensation committee members with helpful information on what to do and how to proceed in discharging their responsibilities.
   
   The book has 15 chapters divided into three parts.
   
   Part One describes what the compensation committee is and does. It also covers how the board should go about selecting and training the members of the compensation committee. CEO succession and evaluation is covered in a very helpful way as is the issue of director compensation (since they have so much more to do nowadays).
   
   Part Two covers the legal and regulatory issues boards and committees face. It covers issues of corporate governance (from the board's point of view), disclosure of executive and director compensation, securities issues, tax rules and issues, accounting rules and issues, and ERISA and labor law, rules, and issues.
   
   Part Three deals with the practical applications of these rules, regulations, and duties. It covers executive employment, severance, and change-in-control arrangements, incentive compensation, equity based compensation, executive pension-benefit, welfare-benefit, and perquisites. There is also a chapter dealing with option grants, the repricing of stock options, and if the company should "go dark", which is different than going private.
   
   While not the most lively material, the authors do a great job of keeping it from becoming too dry or dusty. And if you need to know this material, you will love this book's organization and wealth of helpful information.
   
   Reviewed by Craig Matteson, Ann Arbor, MI

5 comments about Enterprise Dashboards: Design and Best Practices for IT.

1. This is a book aimed at the experienced business intelligence developer or the C level executive. It provides a sound methodological framework for using enterprise dashboards as a fundamental performance management tool. This is a 'must read' for anyone contemplating dashboard deployment in their organization.



2. I thought it was ok at best. Maybe I just know more than I thought :) But I didn't really get a lot out of this one.



3. If this is the only book on dashboards you read, you won't know that it doesn't contain much help or good "best practices". There was little I found to help me in my investigation of good dashboard design. In particular, I was annoyed that nearly all graphics are fuzzy and not crisp, and none are in color. Also, the author never mentions that dashboard meters that look like analog speedometers are space-wasting, and are NOT a best practice--like Wayne Eckerson does in his book, "Performance Dashboards". The table (not matrix--the incorrect term the author uses) provided for assessing dashboards was very superficial--not something I found useful at all. The book even contained a sentence fragment in a topic sentence--something I found unforgiveable in a hardbound book in this price range.



4. Shadan Malik aims to acquaint businesses with the concept of "dashboards" and the process of implementing them, from collecting information and assessing the audience to storyboarding and project planning. Other dashboard-related books discuss the value of these information platforms, but don't explain how to create them. One warning: The book is crammed with charts and images, which may turn off readers who don't absorb information graphically, though it will please those who do. Some screenshots are so poorly reproduced that you may think you suddenly need a new eyeglass prescription. We recommend this book to executives, department heads, managers and other businesspeople who wish to implement a dashboard and need some practical guidance.



5. This is a great guide and handbook for helping business leaders decide on the information they want to see in their dashboards, and for helping IT professionals provide that information to them.

2 comments about Exiting Your Business, Protecting Your Wealth: A Strategic Guide for Owners and Their Advisors.

1. 
   I liked this book a lot. It has an Introduction and 15 chapters divided into the following three parts or sections:
   
   I. Preparing for your exit
   II. Knowing your options
   III. Planning your exit
   
   I thought the book was well written, well outlined, and full of good content. It was written by an attorney who advises clients on how to clean up their businesses so they can be sold or handed down to the owner's offspring.
   
   Creating a successful business is an uphill battle for many. And what the definition of a successful business is depends on who you ask. A small business that provides a job for its owner/operator whereby that person earns $150,000 a year in taxable income very well might be considered successful. But what would happen if that person died? Would the business still bring the subsequent owner $150,000? Maybe, maybe not!
   
   What this book covers is the arsenal of issues that one must consider if they have a small business they want to either retire from and sell out profitably, or pass down to their offspring or other relatives. A business that is really an alterego of its owner is not worth all that much. And such businesses are hard to sell for a nice sum. In those instances, when the centerpiece of the company moves on, then so does the revenue stream. Not a good thing when you want to sell a business.
   
   Another book I read that kind of touched on the issues in this book was "Instant Systems" (ISBN: 9780071466707). The point is that if you don't systematize your business, then you won't have anything to sell. And "Exiting Your Business" is about selling your business or passing it on to relatives.
   
   This book not only includes exiting strategies regarding the sale of the business to another company, the company's employees, or some rich individual. But also covers estate planning and tax planning issues, too. It's really a well though-out and extensive book on its subject. 5 stars!
   
   PS. Take a look at the Search Inside feature that Amazon provides for this book. There you can examine the Table of Contents and see for yourself what exactly is covered.



2. If you own a business, you need to read this book. Even if you aren't thinking of selling or exiting any time soon, this insightful book will help you think about your business as an investment, instead of as a job. You will know what the final "play" looks like...so you can make the decisions NOW to get there. Far from being a stuffy legal treatise, it is a practical how-to manual that lays out the options and provides real life scenarios that make them come to life. I highly recommend this book!
   
   Marcia Bench, Purposeful Entrepreneur Success Coach (and former business lawyer)

No comments about Accounts Payable Best Practices (Wiley Best Practices).

No comments about Managerial Accounting: Information for Decisions (with CD-ROM).

5 comments about A Manager's Guide to Creative Cost Cutting.

1. The book is eduactional in the sense that the ideas mentioned are all valid points and easily comprehensible. The one fault this book has starts in the first chapter when it states "Make sure you avoid these YGBK's". My question to you is what is that. I have thoroughly looked for the meaning of this acronym and have come up empty. If anyone could provide some light please do.



2. Young obviously was teasing us with the YGBK acronym -- daring us to read on and figure it out. Later in the book, in one of his YGBK descriptions, he ends it with the statement "you gotta be kidding."



3. Unfortunately not what I was expecting from the book - These are acceptable ideas, not really new, just packaged all together - You won't get on a lean journey and revamp your business with this book...probably good for a smaller enterprise...Still, since the price is low, it doesn't hurt flipping the pages and give a 3 stars...



4. Anyone who is well-versed in running a business will know what his or her costs are and where those costs can be reduced if need be. This is a wonderful book that lists 181 ways to reduce operating costs. People who are planning to start a business might not know where wasteful costs can be cut, and they will greatly benefit from reading this book.
   
   I have a feeling this book was written for owners and managers of existing businesses with costs already in place that need to be cut. I read this book as an entrepreneur about ready to start a business and what I learned from it was ways to strategize operations so spending is NEVER wasteful.
   
   Great book, and a must read for any entrepreneur who wants to build a great company.



5. 
   In the current highly competitive operating environment, companies are often required to cut costs whilst maintaining an acceptable level of service and quality. This calls for smart ways to cut costs. This book provides some guidance to achieve this.
   
   With the various economic shocks that the world is subjected to, one typical target for cost cutting is reducing the workforce. This short-sighted approach to cost cutting not only causes a lot of human suffering but seldom achieves the intended objective of reducing costs in the long-run. David Young proposes a creative approach that focuses on uncovering hidden costs and reducing or eliminating them. The techniques to overcome the 21 common cost-reduction prohibitors appear to be workable and can be overcome. David Young gives some practical examples that enhance understanding of the cost cutting concepts that the author is proposing.
   
   I found the book to be terrific and it helped me in my on-going cost-cutting efforts making them more creative and innovative. It enabled me uncover areas that costs were hidden, helping me to realise substantial cost savings.
   
   The book is required reading for all managers tasked with the responsibility to cut costs and build profits in any department.

No comments about Accounting for Hospitality Managers.