Ch 12 - Section 2

Paulette was closing the door on her bakery for the night when her accountant called.

"I was reviewing your accounts and wanted to alert you that you currently don't have enough cash to pay the quarterly loan payment that will be due in three weeks.  I don't want to alarm you, I think you need a plan so you can keep your loan current and still have money to cover other expenses.

Pauline responded, "I appreciate your call. I try to make my loan payments on time but sometimes it's hard to have enough cash at the right time.  I delivered two large orders for restaurant customers but I haven't yet been paid.  They're big customers but they;re slow payers.  I hate to be too pushy about payment because I don't want them to take their business elsewhere."

Her accountant responded, "I know it's hard to always meet your cash needs and I know your bank appreciates how timely you have been in the past on your payments.  Let's meet to talk about ways you might make sure you are building up a good cash balance in advance of your next loan payment."

**please comment by discussing why Paulette's accountant would be concerned about\ the loan payment if Paulette was currently not behind in her payments?  How should Paulette deal with important customers who do not pay their bills on time?***

Leadership Challenge

I chose to name my leadership project the "Leadership Challenge".  I wanted to encourage leadership activities at our school by all 7-12th grade students.  I will describe the process in more depth later, however a bulletin board was set up in a prominent place with the instructions.  (see pictures attached).

This challenge started by coming up with a way to market my idea using the five practices of exemplary leadership.  Under "Model the Way", I made sure to reward students that demonstrate key values by putting their name on a lottery ticket and I kept one with the reason why they were chosen and their name was put on the bulletin board.  The way that I attempted to "Inspire a Shared Vision" was to first involve my first hour class that included freshman, a sophomore, and a senior.  I asked them what motivates them to want to be a leader and what leadership activities should be honored.  Those students felt that the one item that would motivate students the most was cash.  They helped me tremendously with the project.  "Challenge the Process" was initiated every Friday from the first of February until the end of school.  A drawing was held every Friday at the end of the day from the tickets that were given out that week.  The winner received $10 cash.  I "Enabled Others to Act" by informing the teachers about the challenge.  After talking with my first hour class for several weeks in January, I then had a meeting during a teachers inservice because I needed them to recognize when a student was "caught" being a leader.  This part was crucial because if they did not nominate a student by earning them a ticket, the weekly drawings could not have happened.  They were given some example activities that my class had stated were "leadership" activities.  Lastly, "Encourage the Heart" was the bulletin board that was created and very visible above the drinking fountain on first floor.  On the bulletin board, were the instructions, the tickets of those nominated each week, and some quotes and pictures dealing with leadership.

As a follow-up to this activity, I plan to announce the weekly winners at the academic awards banquet in a week and have them come up front and receive a certificate, but also compile the total number of tickets used during this process and maybe even a breakdown by class.  I hope that this leadership challenge or something very similar will continue next year!  Thanks for challenging me to becoming a better leader!  Thank you to Partnerships for Innovation for offering the grant so I can reward the winning students.

Intro to Business - Ch 12

Budgets:  The most important step in financial planning is developing a budget.  You can compare the use of a budget to the use of a road map when you are traveling to an unfamiliar place.  A budget identifies to you and your business where you are going.  As the owner, you can better see how the business is running by comparing the business' financial performance to the budget and make corrections if necessary.

A business budget has the same goals as a personal or family budget.  You want to determine the sources and amounts of income, identify the types of expenses and predict their costs, to determine how income will be spread out to cover those expenses, and to reward investors if there is a profit.

Please comment on this blog:  what do you think are the most important personal and family budget categories for most people?  How might they differ from a business budget?