Kathleen R. Allen, PhD, is an authority on entrepreneurship and small business technology and is the author of Entrepreneurship For Dummies, The Complete MBA For Dummies (with Peter Economy), eBusiness Technology Kit For Dummies (with Jon Weisner), Launching New Ventures (Cengage Learning), and Growing and Managing a Small Business (South-Western College Pub), as well as several other books. She has also written for popular business magazines and newspapers (Inc., Los Angeles Times, Los Angeles Business Journal, and The New York Times) and is called upon by The Wall Street Journal, CNN, CNBC, and a variety of other media for expert opinion in the field of entrepreneurship.
Peter Economy is a home-based business author, ghostwriter, publishing consultant, and the author or coauthor of more than 50 books, including Home-Based Business For Dummies with Paul and Sarah Edwards, Managing For Dummies and Consulting For Dummies with Bob Nelson, and Writing Children’s Books For Dummies with Lisa Rojany Buccieri (John Wiley & Sons, Inc.). Peter is also associate editor for the Apex Award-winning magazine Leader to Leader. Peter invites you to visit his website at www.petereconomy.com.
Paul and Sarah Edwards are award-winning authors of 17 books with more than two million books in print. Sarah, a licensed clinical social worker with a PhD in ecopsychology, and Paul, a licensed attorney, are recognized as pioneers in the working-from-home field. With the emergence of a global economy that challenges the environment and everyone’s personal, family, and community well-being, they are focusing their efforts on finding pathways to transition to a sustainable Elm Street economy in which home business plays a vital role. Paul and Sarah hosted the Working From Home show on HGTV and have been regular commentators on CNBC. They’re the coauthors of Home-Based Business For Dummies (John Wiley & Sons, Inc.).
Lita Epstein, who earned her MBA from Emory University’s Goizueta Business School, enjoys helping people develop good financial, investing, and tax planning skills. While getting her MBA, Lita worked as a teaching assistant for the financial accounting department and ran the accounting lab. After completing her MBA, she managed finances for a small nonprofit organization and for the facilities management section of a large medical clinic. She designs and teaches online courses on topics such as accounting and bookkeeping and starting your own business. She’s written more than 35 books, including Bookkeeping For Dummies, Reading Financial Reports For Dummies, Trading For Dummies, The Business Owner’s Guide to Reading and Understanding Financial Statements, and Financial Decision Making (Bridgepoint Education).
Alexander Hiam helps organizations (including nonprofits and government agencies) think through their branding and marketing strategies and their leadership development programs. He has served on the boards of directors of a variety of organizations and also as an instructor in the Isenberg School of Management at UMass Amherst. Alex earned his BA from Harvard and his MBA in marketing and strategic planning from the Haas School at UC Berkeley. He has led creative retreats for top consumer and industrial firms to facilitate innovative thinking about strategic plans, branding, naming, and product ideas. He also writes novels and believes that all good writing (including advertising) is, at heart, good storytelling. He is the author of Business Innovation For Dummies and early editions of Marketing For Dummies (John Wiley & Sons, Inc.).
Greg Holden started the small business Stylus Media, which is a group of editorial, design, and computer professionals who produce both print and electronic publications. The company’s name comes from the recording stylus, which reads the traces left on a disk by voices or instruments and translates those signals into electronic data that can be amplified and enjoyed by listeners. Greg has been a freelance writer since 1996, and is also a novelist. Over the years, he has been a regular contributor to CNET and to EcommerceBytes. He received a Master of Arts degree in English from the University of Illinois at Chicago, and he writes general-interest books, short stories, and poetry. He is the author of Starting an Online Business For Dummies (John Wiley & Sons, Inc.).
Peter Jaret has written for The New York Times, Newsweek, National Geographic, Health, Reader’s Digest, and dozens of other magazines. He is the coauthor, along with Steven D. Peterson and Barbara Findlay Schenck, of Business Plans Kits For Dummies (John Wiley & Sons, Inc.). He is also the author of other books, including In Self-Defense (Harcourt), Impact: From the Frontlines of Global Health (National Geographic), Nurse: A World of Care (Emory University), Active Living Every Day (Human Kinetics). He has developed written materials for the Electric Power Research Institute, Lucas Arts, The California Endowment, WebMD, BabyCenter, Stanford University, Collabria, Home Planet Technologies, and others. In 1992, he received the American Medical Association’s first-place award for medical reporting. In 1997 and again in 2007, he won James Beard Awards for food and nutrition writing. He holds degrees from Northwestern University and the University of Virginia.
Jeanette Maw McMurtry, MBA, first became obsessed with marketing when she stumbled upon a marketing textbook just before graduating with her college degree in journalism. Having realized her passions lie in creativity and analytics, she pursued jobs in marketing upon graduation and eventually landed at DDB Worldwide and Ketchum, where she learned the science and art of advertising and public relations. After career positions at American Express, Intermountain Health Care, and a few high-tech start-ups, she became a CMO for a direct marketing agency in Denver, Colorado, where she became entrenched in database marketing and personalization. She then started her own consulting firm and emerged as a leading authority on psychology-based marketing, helping brands trigger the unconscious mind in order to achieve “unthinkable” ROI. She is the author of Marketing For Dummies, 5th Edition (John Wiley & Sons, Inc.).
Joyce Mazero is partner and co-chair of the Global Supply Network at Gardere Wynne Sewell LLP. With a legal career spanning more than 35 years, Joyce has established an international reputation as a strong and strategic lawyer and a trusted business advisor in the franchising, supply chain, food service, restaurant, and retail industries. At Gardere she leads the team and its interdisciplinary group of professionals, all of whom advise national and multinational franchised and independent businesses on building and expanding chains across the globe. She is the coauthor of Franchise Management For Dummies (John Wiley & Sons, Inc.).
Jim Muehlhausen, JD, like most entrepreneurs, has an eclectic background, ranging from CPA to franchisee, attorney, business owner, consultant, franchisor, public speaker, university professor, and book author. While still attending the Indiana University School of Law, he became the youngest franchisee in Meineke Discount Muffler history (1987–1991). After successfully selling that business, Jim founded an automotive aftermarket manufacturing concern. During his nine-year tenure with that business, the company achieved recognition from Michael Porter of the Harvard Business School and Inc. magazine in the IC 100 Fastest Growing Businesses. In 2009, he founded the Business Model Institute, which is devoted to the innovation and study of business models. Jim writes several articles for the Institute each year as well as contributing to publications such as Inc., The Small Business Report, Entrepreneur, BusinessWeek, and various business journals. He is the author of Business Models For Dummies (John Wiley & Sons, Inc.).
Bob Nelson, PhD, is president of Nelson Motivation Inc., a management training and consulting company that specializes in helping organizations improve their management practices, programs, and systems. He has sold more than 3.5 million books on management and motivation, which have been translated in more than 35 languages, including 1001 Ways to Reward Employees (Workman Publishing Co.), The 1001 Rewards & Recognition Fieldbook (Workman Publishing Co.), 1001 Ways to Take Initiative at Work (Workman Publishing Co.), Keeping Up in a Down Economy (Nelson Motivation), Ubuntu: An Inspiring Story of an African Prinicple of Teamwork and Collaboration (Crown Business), and (with Peter Economy) The Management Bible, Managing For Dummies, and Consulting For Dummies (John Wiley & Sons, Inc.). He holds an MBA in organizational behavior from UC Berkeley and received his PhD in management with Dr. Peter F. Drucker at the Drucker Graduate Management School of Claremont Graduate University. For more information about available products or services offered by Nelson Motivation Inc., including registration for Dr. Nelson’s free Tip of the Week, visit www.nelson-motivation.com.
Steven D. Peterson is founder and CEO of Strategic Play, a management training company specializing in software tools designed to enhance business strategy, business planning, and general management skills. He’s the creator of the Protean Strategist, a business simulation that reproduces a dynamic business environment where participant teams run companies and compete against each other in a fast-changing marketplace. He is the coauthor, along with Peter Jaret and Barbara Findlay Schenck, of Business Plans Kits For Dummies. He is also the coauthor, along with Paul Tiffany, of Business Plans For Dummies, which was nominated as one of the best business books of the year by the Financial Times. He holds advanced degrees in mathematics and physics and received his doctorate from Cornell University.
Jim Schell hasn’t always been a grizzled veteran of the small-business wars, contrary to what some people may think. Growing up in Des Moines, Iowa, and earning a BA in Economics at the University of Colorado, Jim served in the U.S. Air Force in Klamath Falls, Oregon. Jim’s entrepreneurial genes eventually surfaced when he and three Minneapolis friends started The Kings Court, at the time the nation’s first racquetball club. Two years later, Jim bought General Sports, Inc., a struggling sporting-goods retailer and wholesaler. After another two years, he started National Screenprint, and, finally, he partnered with an ex-employee in Fitness and Weight Training Corp. Each of the start-ups was bootstrapped, and each was privately held. For a period of exhausting years, Jim involved himself in the management of all four businesses at the same time. His third business, National Screenprint, ultimately grew to $25 million in sales and 200 employees. Relocating to San Diego, Jim began a long-simmering writing career, authoring four books (The Brass Tacks Entrepreneur [Owlet], Small Business Management Guide [Henry Holt & Co.], The Small Business Answer Book [John Wiley & Sons], and Understanding Your Financial Statements [Visuality]) and numerous columns for business and trade magazines. Citing culture shock, Jim and his wife, Mary — a sales trainer and longtime business partner — relocated to Bend, Oregon, where he continued his writing career. He is the coauthor of Small Business For Dummies.
Barbara Findlay Schenck has spent her career helping business owners start, grow, market, and brand their companies. She’s worked internationally in community development, served as a college administrator and instructor in Hawaii, and cofounded an advertising agency in Oregon. She writes marketing advice columns for MSN and participates in programs that help businesses adapt to their ever-changing media and consumer markets. She is the author of Small Business Marketing Kit For Dummies and Selling Your Business For Dummies and is the coauthor of Branding For Dummies and Business Plans Kit For Dummies (John Wiley & Sons, Inc.). For more information on her background, books, and business advice, visit her website at www.bizstrong.com.
Michael H. Seid is founder and managing director of Michael H. Seid & Associates (MSA), the nation’s leading consulting firm specializing in franchising and other methods of distribution. During his 25+ years in franchising, Michael has been a senior operations and financial executive or consultant for companies within the franchise, retail, hospitality, restaurant, and service industries. He has also been a franchisee. Michael is the past chairman of the International Franchise Association (IFA) Supplier Forum, a former member of the IFA’s executive committee, and the first supplier ever directly elected to the IFA’s board of directors. Michael is a CFE (Certified Franchise Executive) and a nonpracticing CPA. Michael is a noted author of numerous articles on franchising, an oft-quoted expert in the field, and a frequent lecturer on the subject of franchising. For more information on the services offered by MSA, including speaking or consulting services, visit MSA’s website at www.msaworldwide.com. He is the coauthor of Franchise Management For Dummies.
John A. Tracy, CPA, is Professor of Accounting, Emeritus, at the University of Colorado in Boulder. Before his 35-year tenure at Boulder, he was on the business faculty for four years at the University of California at Berkeley. He served as staff accountant at Ernst & Young and is the author of several books on accounting and finance, including Accounting For Dummies, Accounting Workbook For Dummies, The Fast Forward MBA in Finance, and How to Read a Financial Report, and is coauthor with his son, Tage, of How to Manage Profit and Cash Flow as well as Small Business Financial Management Kit For Dummies. He received his B.S.C. degree from Creighton University and earned his MBA and PhD degrees from the University of Wisconsin. He is a CPA (inactive) in Colorado.
Tage C. Tracy, CPA, is the principal owner of TMK & Associates, an accounting, financial, and strategic business planning consulting firm focused on supporting small- to medium-sized businesses since 1993. Tage received his baccalaureate in accounting in 1985 from the University of Colorado at Boulder with honors. Tage began his career with Coopers & Lybrand (now merged into PricewaterhouseCoopers). More recently, Tage coauthored Small Business Financial Management Kit For Dummies and How to Manage Profit and Cash Flow with his father, John Tracy.
Eric Tyson, MBA, has been a personal financial writer, lecturer, and counselor for the past 25+ years. As his own boss, Eric has worked with and taught people from a myriad of income levels and backgrounds, so he knows the small-business ownership concerns and questions of real folks just like you. After toiling away for too many years as a management consultant to behemoth financial-service firms, Eric decided to take his knowledge of the industry and commit himself to making personal financial management accessible to everyone. Despite being handicapped by a joint BS in Economics and Biology from Yale and an MBA from Stanford, Eric remains a master at “keeping it simple.” An accomplished freelance personal-finance writer, Eric is the author or coauthor of numerous For Dummies national bestsellers on personal finance, investing, for seniors, and home buying, including Small Business For Dummies and Small Business Taxes For Dummies, and is a syndicated columnist. His book Personal Finance For Dummies won the Benjamin Franklin Award for Best Business Book. His website is www.erictyson.com.
Publisher’s Acknowledgments
Senior Acquisitions Editor: Tracy Boggier
Compilation Editor: Georgette Beatty
Project Manager: Linda Brandon
Copy Editor: Chad R. Sievers
Technical Editor: James Floyd Kelly
Production Editor: Magesh Elangovan
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