archiveChief Development Officer Insider

When watching a finished feature film, it’s easy to get carried away by the incredible storytelling and cinematography — and forget about the extensive preparation that went into getting the movie off the ground. The truth is that before production can even begin, lengthy contract negotiations are required to ensure...

This widely accepted maxim has a certain truth to it. Most of us are more likely to leave a role if we don’t trust our manager, if they don’t support us, or if they don’t treat us fairly. Employee retention is critical for an organization’s success. Retaining skilled employees is...

With inflation soaring and across-the-board price hikes dominating the headlines, many companies are cracking down on perks to save money. Tech giant Google recently told senior managers to limit employee travel and social events in a bid to reduce costs and shore up its position ahead of a potential economic...

Tax planning is a crucial consideration for business owners. With the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act setting to expire in a few short years, now is a good time to rethink how it can impact you once tax season rolls around. One of the biggest benefits of TCJA is its...

The odds of any foreign firm becoming an insider in China are long. There are two reasons for this. First, foreign firms are not competing in China with hundreds of multi-billion-dollar Chinese enterprises but instead are competing against a multi-trillion-dollar monolith (which my co-author and I label “Enterprise China” in...

Everyone has heard of famous entrepreneurs such as Gates of Microsoft, Musk of Tesla and of course Zuckerburg of Meta. But what about intrapreneurs? An entrepreneur is defined as a person who organizes and manages any enterprise, especially a business, usually with considerable initiative and risk. While an intrapreneur is...

Ryan Hurley is the founder and CEO of Hurley Development, a commercial real estate and development firm in Vancouver, WA. He started this company in 2008, during the financial crisis, after working in the real estate industry for about seven years at Hinton Development.  A rugged season that signaled the...

When my student Brooke returned from her first week as an intern at a prestigious New York City ad agency, she said, “I was the only one on my team who rattled off one good idea after another. My creative director said we could utilize all my ideas. The other...

Pricing is your most powerful lever to quickly increase profit, and in the long run as well.  Assuming you have a 10% gross margin, if you could raise your prices by 1%, your profit would increase by 10%.  Not only does pricing have great leverage, but price changes can be...

One of the biggest highlights of the last decade has been the gigantic adoption of online banking globally. This widespread adoption has also given birth to countless FinTech startups, 75% of which actually fail in a short span, as per a few studies. FinTech, being one of the fastest-growing sectors,...