Cerini and Associates, LLP

Welcome to the spring/summer edition of the Bottom Line, the newsletter designed to provide insightful advice to area businesses. Today’s business is grappling with a significant level of issues including:

• Attracting, retaining, and motivating strong talent
• Competition from international marketplaces
• Increased difficulty in securing appropriate levels of financing
• Protecting confidential client information
• Grappling with an unknown regulatory environment
• Keeping up with the rapid pace of changing technology
• Developing stronger systems capabilities
• Increasing efficiencies to control pricing

How do you get a competitive edge? Surround yourself with the right tools, including forward thinking professionals such as C&A. In this issue of the Bottom Line, are articles on how you can use Google’s search engine to maximize your internet presence, establishing an effective internal control environment, and developing equity compensation plans.

Managing a successful business requires the wearing of many different hats. On a typical day, you may find yourself alternating between human resources, information technology, customer service, marketing, accounting, and you might even have to get your hands dirty and work the front lines. As your organization’s leader, you are always expected to have the answers and that means that you need to have a solid understanding of your business at every level. It is crucial to keep an open mind and always be prepared to learn something new. Doing so will help you to keep your business on the cutting edge, to outmaneuver your competitors, and to boost your bottom line.

Continuing to learn and educate yourself is one of the keys to success whether you are just starting a new business or have been in business for years.

In this issue of the bottom line we look into the growing need for cyber security, social media, and improved employee relations, three important areas that can help improve your bottom line.

 If you have been paying attention to consumer sentiment over the last 5 years, it is pretty clear that the Gordon Gekko attitude of “greed, for lack of a better word, is good” has shifted towards social responsibility in the business sector. All you need to do is look at Occupy Wall Street and the message it delivered, that corporate America needs to be part of the solution towards social change. Those businesses that have embraced and marketed their altruistic sides, finding ways to partner with the nonprofit sector, have done well. Believe me, in the world of social media, word gets out quick. Just look at how many companies joined the ALS bucket challenge to cash in some of the viral goodwill that it created.

So why should you embark on greater partnering with the nonprofit sector? There are many positives that can come from it: