Business Central

Cover Story

STILL A START-UP

By Gail Ivers, St. Cloud Area Chamber of Commerce // Photos by Joel Butkowski, Butkowski Digital Imaging

Central McGowan may be a 70-year-old company, but owner Joe Francis sees so many growth opportunities, it could be a start-up.

Metrics Matter

By James A. Ringwald, BerganKDV // Photos by

As a business owner you can overload on data. Tracking a few key financial metrics can mean the difference between success and failure.

Measure This, Not That

By Dawn Zimmerman, Marco // Photos by

Not all analytics are created equal.

Dawn Zimmerman is the chief marketing officer at Marco, an integrated business technology services provider based in St. Cloud

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Developing Strategic Agility

Strategic leadership is the ability to express your organization’s vision and guide employees toward it. Strategic agility, a component of leadership, is characterized by an entire organization regularly contributing its insights to renew and reinvent its value proposition. When leaders consistently practice habits rooted in strategic agility, they empower their teams and organizations to do the same.

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Become a Better Negotiator

An important, and sometimes overlooked, leadership skill is the ability to navigate difficult conversations and achieve outcomes that are perceived as a win-win – even when both sides have to give something up. With practice conflict resolution skills can become a valuable addition to your professional toolkit.

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Memorable Travel Photos

It was a bad year for travel, but a great year for travel photos. A walk through the Travel Photographer of the Year awards will reignite your desire to hit the road…assuming it needs reigniting.

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Ditch the Slide-deck

If your goal is to conduct meetings in a culture of collaboration, while using the time to make decisions, spark team creativity, or engage your audience, then you need to think beyond PowerPoint.

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Pioneers

Women are making in-roads into traditional male careers, but there is still plenty of room for change.
By Alicia Chapman
Following are the sources used in this story, which first appeared in the May-June 2021 issue of Business Central Magazine.
https://www.statista.com/statistics/195324/gender-distribution-of-full-time-law-enforcement-employees-in-the-us/

https://hepinc.com/newsroom/female-athletic-directors-show-growth-since-1990-still-lag-at-d-i-programs/

https://www.ncaa.org/static/champion/where-are-the-women/

https://www.catalyst.org/research/women-in-the-automotive-industry/

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Closing the Gap

Recent research suggests that when women entrepreneurs set goals with a female friend, their success rate improves. By Anna Nelson and Lynn MacDonald
Following are the sources used in this story, which first appeared in the May-June 2021 issue of Business Central Magazine.
References
Kelley, D.J., Brush, C.G., Corbett, A.C., and M. Majbouri (2020). 2019/2020 Global Entrepreneurship Monitor. Babson College. https://www.babson.edu/media/babson/assets/blank-center/GEM-2019-2020-US-Report.pdf

Bureau of Labor Statistics. Department of Labor. A-3: Employment status of the civilian noninstitutionalized population by sex and age, seasonally adjusted. Updated on March 5, 2021. https://www.bls.gov/web/empsit/cpseea03.htm

Dutta, N. & Mallick, S. (2018). Enabling women entrepreneurs: Exploring factors that mitigate the negative impact of fertility rates on female entrepreneurship. KYKLOS, 71(3), 402-432.

Field, E., Jayachandran, S., Pande, R., & Rigol, N. (2016). Friendship at work: Can peer effects catalyze female entrepreneurship? American Economic Journal: Economic Policy, 8(2), 125-153.

Rogers, Katie. 2.5 million women left the work force during the pandemic. Harris sees a national emergency. New York Times. February 18, 2021. https://www.nytimes.com/2021/02/18/us/politics/women-pandemic-harris.html

Rosenthal, S. S. & Strange, W. C. (2012). Female entrepreneurship, agglomeration, and the new spatial mismatch. The Review of Economics and Statistics, 94(3), 764-788.

The state of women entrepreneurs. https://www.score.org/blog/state-women-entrepreneurs

Warnecke, Tonia (2013). Entrepreneurship and Gender: An Institutional Perspective. Journal of Economic Issues, XLVII(2), 455-463.

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Top Ten

Entrepreneurship among women is a growing trend. To find the best and worst states for female entrepreneurs, AdvisorSmith studied the average number of employees, the average payroll, and the percentage of the female labor force that owned businesses with at least $100K in revenue and at least one employee. Minnesota came in #6 for the best states for female-owned businesses.

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