Innovating and motivating around the world
1193_ 4/9/12 - The monthly luncheon speaker at the Denver Association of Corporate Growth was George Godfrey, who is the President and Chief Executive Officer of Crestcom International, a leading international franchiser of management training programs. He joined Crestcom as its Chief Operating Officer in 2008, accepting his current position in March, 2009, when he also became President, CEO and Director of its parent, Crestcom Holdings, LLC. He had previously served as Senior Vice President of Sales for Phoenix American, a provider of insurance vehicle service contracts in Miami, Florida. Before joining that firm, George spent eleven years with General Electric, as a Regional Sales Manager and Senior Vice President. A graduate of the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, he served five years as an officer in the U.S. Army, where his final assignment was as Detachment Commander. Crestcom poses these questions (and has the answers). How are businesses learning to innovate and motivate in India and Germany? How are executives leading change in Asia? How are managers throughout Africa and the Middle East planning for tomorrow? And how are most admired firms in North and South America making a bottom-line difference through better negotiation and strategy?
In addition to our luncheon presentation, ACG Denver also awarded the annual David Sloan Scholarships as well as the ACG Cup. The Scholarship Program is named after one of our former board members, David Sloan. As a result of MS, David had to leave his job and his work on the ACG Denver Scholarship Program. David was recently featured in the Denver Post and has written a very inspiring book about his journey. Each attendee at the April luncheon received a copy of his book, 'One Day at a Time'...listen for more...
Related Links: Crestcom Home || ACG Denver || M&A || Rocky Mountain Corporate Growth Conference || One Day at a Time Book || Denver Post Article || Keywords: George Godfrey, Crestcom, ACG, Denver, Leadership, Training, Association for Corporate Growth, David Sloan, One Day at a Time, ACG Cup - bytes=3258726
LISTEN TO: George Godfrey, President/CEO, Crestcom International

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The dot bomb that became a worldwide winner
1181_ 3/19/12 - The Rocky Mountain Corporate Growth Conference in Denver was kicked off with a great breakfast and as always smothered in comfortable, natural, awesome networking. No one was at a loss for words. Then the program began with the open fireside chat with guest, Joe Assell, Co-founder, CEO, President of Golf TEC. Larry interviewed Joe - 17 years in business & 148 locations. If you want to play better golf, you have come to the right place. For more than 15 years, GolfTEC has been helping golfers of all skill levels play better and enjoy the game more. Larry asked Joe to share some of his many experiences. "When you start up with an idea that's never been done before and you have to innovate along the way, there are trial and error and we certainly had a roller coaster in our business. The hardest part was the late 90's when we were navigating through the dot com days and we were really a service business, a golf lesson business, but all the investors wanted us to be a dot com. We tried to be a dot com but it led us to be a dot bomb. We ran into some severe problems and it was almost the end of our business. Joe was dating his future wife at the time and Joe told us she believed in him so much and encouraged him to stay with it, stating that she made enough to support both of them. In the meantime like so many startups have stated, Joe cleaned the bathrooms, gave golf lessons, did the marketing and anything else that was needed. "But we persevered and found the right partners and then from there road a really significant up where we partnered with a private equity fund. We partnered with Golf Smith to collocate and open our GolfTEC in their centers and we started franchising. Those three things... in 2007-08 we opened a new GolfTEC every nine days, 77 improvement centers in a two year period, and really cemented GolfTEC as the market leader in the United States for golf instruction." It took Joe/GolfTEC three years to hit their first million dollars. "Then it took another six or seven to do a million in a month. Then last year we did a million in a day. It's been fun to watch it grow" said Joe. Now they are in Mexico, Canada and...listen for more...
Related Links: GolfTEC || ACG Denver || M&A || Rocky Mountain Corporate Growth Conference || Event Photos - Corporate Growth Conference 2012 || Keywords: Joe Assell, GolfTEC, Rocky Mountain Corporate Growth Conference, Denver, Golfer, ACG, Denver, Leading Resilient Growth, Association for Corporate Growth - bytes=2856649
LISTEN TO: Joe Assell, CEO/CoFounder, GolfTEC

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Winner of the Emerging Corporate Growth Award
1164_ 2/20/12 - For the past number of years we've covered an important conference here in Denver and we are looking forward again to the ACG Denver Corporate Growth Conference coming next month, March 13-14th. Larry corralled John Griffith, the founder and president of Alpine Waste and Recycling, recipient of the ACG Emerging Corporate Growth Award. Of course, it's great to be a winner but more than that, John tells us that they see it as a real validation for the investment in innovation and more than that the buy in of their employees in those innovations and their ability to implement those things. "So, in short, it's a real thrill for all of us at Alpine." Alpine was founded in 1999, a one-man, one-truck operation started with the premise of offering a better level of service than their competition. Since those early years they have grown to 60 collection vehicles, 108 employees, operating the second largest recycling facility in the state, they operate the only privately held landfill in the state and they also run a compost facility. They've had a lot of growth and breadth of services to offer their customers. Asked about his corporate strategy, John tells us that Alpine has never been hesitant to invest heavily in innovation and that's been the key to their growth. Investing $4.5 million...watch and listen for more interesting ideas...
Related Links: Alpine Waste & Recycling || ACG Denver || M&A || Rocky Mountain Corporate Growth Conference || CoBiz Article Alpine || Video on YouTube || Keywords: John Griffith, Alpine Waste & Recycling, ACG, Denver, Leading Resilient Growth Rocky Mountain Corporate Growth Conference, Association for Corporate Growth, Emerging Corporate Growth Award -
Video, Watch: John Griffith, Ceo/Founder, Alpine Waste & Recycling

Here’s what the US economy will look like in 2012
1144_ 1/16/12 - We're here at the ACG Denver opening luncheon for 2012 speaking with the returning keynote speaker Alan Beaulieu of ITR that's the Institute for Trend Research. When we interviewed Alan last year he told us that we would go through a mild recovery in 2011; slow job growth; housing market going nowhere in a hurry. We'll muddle along, but look a lot better than many other nations - so the dollar should be fine. Being right on is one thing, but Alan appreciated Larry's recall because, "as a forecaster, it's really nice when someone remembers - you don't get that a lot." Naturally Larry asked for some predictions and Alan is happy to do that, but he'll stay away from politics - see he really is a smart man. For the economy Alan tells us he thinks 2012 is actually going to be a little better than 2011. Businesses should continue to prosper, hiring will continue. It's not going to be great guns but it's still going to be moving forward. People who had really good revenues in 2011, good profits are going to have a little more so in 2012. More people will have their jobs, the housing market will begin to solidify even more so. Towards the end of the year a little rise will go on in housing starts. We've gone through the darkest part and now we're in a recovery that's going to last into 2013. Larry asked his signature challenge and opportunities question. Alan said, "Very interesting question. Challenges will come from overseas. Businesses that are tied to Europe, tied to China, I think, will be facing some pressures ...Inflationary problems from China and a lack of sales going into Europe. So others that are U.S. centric are really going to ignore a lot of that and firms that have their own cash flow and not dependent on outside financing from commercial banking are also going to find it's a better year. Because problems in Europe can bleed over into the U.S. commercial banking market and that would be a problem for heavily dependent firms, firms that need that equity outside of themselves. Opportunities will come...
Related Links: Institute for Trend Research || ITR Blog || ACG Denver || M&A Channel || Rocky Mountain Corporate Growth Conference || Event Photos || Keywords: Alan Beaulieu, Institute for Trend Research, ACG Denver, Association for Corporate Growth, Trends, Economic Recovery, M&A, Entrepreneurs, Europe, China, Canada, Latin America, > Bytes: 4765051
LISTEN to Alan Beaulieu, Institute for Trend Research

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The focus is on networking, content and thought leadership
1175_ 3/9/12 - We're checking in at the ACG Denver's Sponsor Appreciation Dinner, a very special and lovely event as always. We managed to get ACG President, Todd Roebken, Managing Director of Jones Lang LaSalle and Norm Thiele, Managing Director/Founder, Emerging Global, to talk to us about the upcoming Rocky Mountain Corporate Growth Conference, being held next week, March 13th and 14th here at the Inverness Hotel and Conference Center. This conference is the largest of its kind in the Rocky Mountain region. The conference focus is on networking, content and thought leadership for the mid market business community across all industries. Norm said they spoke with Carly Fiorina the keynote speaker, "Who is the former CEO of Hewlett Packard and former senatorial candidate from California. Norm said he picked up a couple of things from the conversation, one she is a super nice lady but more importantly she's a very astute business woman, obviously." Her unparalleled record of hard work and success includes more than two decades at AT&T and Lucent Technologies, where she led the largest-of-its-time IPO of Lucent and became President of its largest business. In 1998, she was first named as Fortune magazine's most powerful female American executive and continued to top this list throughout her tenure at HP. Carly has led profound change and transition within her companies, and she will share her insights on how she was able to lead organizations that could capitalize on opportunities and always stay adaptable. Listen for the details...
Related Links: Rocky Mountain Corporate Growth Conference || Jones Lang LaSalle || EMERGENT Global || ACG Denver || M&A || Keywords: ACG Rocky Mountain Capital Growth Conference, Carly Fiorina, Todd Roebken, Norm Thiele, Hewlett Packard, AT&T, Lucent Technologies, IPO
LISTEN to Todd Roebken & Norm Thiele, ACG Denver

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CEO Environment, Leadership in a Turbulent Economy
1189_ 4/2/12 - The Corporate Growth Conference in has been very exciting. Here we are talking with Bob Prince who just got off stage from the "CEO Roundtable - Leadership in a Turbulent Economy". We asked Bob for an overview of what his company does. Last February Bob came to Hyperion as it's new CEO and spent the last year changing the company, changing the direction, new leadership throughout the company. And, so today we changed the name to Gen4 Energy. What the company does, we're bring commercial, out of the Los Alamos Laboratory, a new type, more safe, nuclear power plant than has existed. It's really little, about the size of a Mini Cooper. It's a sealed unit and lasts for ten years for 24/7 power. We take it out sealed, we hook it up and you operate it for ten years. Ten years later, we'll come and get it and give you a new one. Larry said, "One of the things you referred to in your experiences along the line were the values established by your people." Bob said, "I think good companies just make money. Great companies make money and do a lot more. I think everybody wants to work for a great company. How do you do that, I think setting up a set of values and then adhering to them and driving them down into your procedures, your methods of operation, your performance appraisals and living those values makes the difference. We developed them over time and there came to be six values. The first was safety (handling radioactive material - they needed to),. The second one was people. You've got to believe in people and the key is what does that mean, how do you implement that and how do you drive that into your business? And how do you show that you value people, because they'll see right through it - if it's just a plaque to put on the wall, they will see that. 3.) Integrity is the next. Bob thinks that is the number one characteristic of a company or a leader.... Next is quality. You do it right because it's right and you want to be the best quality. If you're handling nuclear waste..."listen for more...
Related Links: Gen4 Energy || ACG Denver || M&A || Rocky Mountain Corporate Growth Conference || Event Photos - Corporate Growth Conference 2012 || Keywords: Bob Prince, Gen4 Energy, Hyperion Power Module, ACG, Denver, Leading Resilient Growth, Association for Corporate Growth, Los Alamos Laboratory, - bytes=6225400
LISTEN TO: Bob Prince, President/CEO, Gen4 Energy

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Rocky Mountain Corporate Growth Conference - 3/12-14/2012
1160/RR_ 2/6/12 - ACG Denver 2012 Rocky Mountain Corporate Growth Conference is right around the corner - March 13 and 14th. Keynote Speaker - Carly Fiorina.
Her unparalleled record of hard work and success includes more than two decades at AT&T and Lucent Technologies, where she led the largest-of-its-time IPO of Lucent and became President of its largest business. In 1998, she was first named as Fortune magazine's most powerful female American executive and continued to top this list throughout her tenure at HP. Carly has led profound change and transition within her companies, and she will share her insights on how she was able to lead organizations that could capitalize on opportunities and always stay adaptable.

Winner of the Outstanding Corporate Growth Award
1165_ 2/20/12 - Today we're talking about Leading Resilient Growth. We are here with a winner whose being honored at the upcoming Rocky Mountain Corporate Growth Conference. Schomp Automotive is receiving the Outstanding Corporate Growth Award at the conference, that is over $100M in annual sales. We here with Aaron Wallace, Owner of Schomp Automotive. We asked Aaron to tell us about their business. Aaron replied, "We are a family business, in the automotive industry - sales, service and parts. In May it will be our 71st year in business and we are fourth generation Colorado business, my great-grandfather, grandfather, mother and me and my siblings. Schomp is a Honda, BMW and Mini dealership. They also have nine lines of motorcycles - and that's who we are. When asked about corporate growth strategies for the next year, Aaron told us that they are focusing on the changes their customers have experienced in their lives. The customers behavior is different, they don't have as much time, they're busy and in between things. And people have more information, they're shopping online, when they come to the dealership we have to adjust to the changes the customer has made. Change is difficult." Larry asked, "With the turbulent economy we've experienced the past number of years, how do you prosper in times of uncertainty?" He said, "During the good times or bad times you have to know what you're doing is right. In the good times you can't do a bad job or make stupid decisions just because they're good times. You have to run during the good times knowing that..." Watch and listen for more...
Related Links: Schomp Automotive || ACG Denver || M&A || Rocky Mountain Corporate Growth Conference || CoBiz Article Schomp || Keywords: Aaron Wallace, Schomp Automotive, ACG, Denver, Leading Resilient Growth, Rocky Mountain Corporate Growth Conference, Association for Corporate Growth, Outstanding Corporate Growth Award,
Video Watch: Aaron Wallace, Owner, Schomp Automotive

The greatest challenge, close those deals, and it looks good
1162_ 2/13/12 - We are here at ACG Denver that's the Association for Corporate Growth and this month we're talking with Mike Gordon of Gordon Composites / Polystrand. Think economic recovery and you will understand that this audience is happy and excited to hear Mike today. Continuing in his father's entrepreneurial path, Mike, a second generation owner, is opening a new plant right here in Denver and his son will be running that plant. But wait until you hear, they are expanding a brand new thermo plastic composite business to a plant they're building in Centennial. One hundred and twenty-five thousand square feet with all new technology is coming to Denver. It is what they call a 'zero waste' plant. There is no waste - any production waste can be recycled and put into other products. Mike's son will be the vice president of operations at the new plant in Denver; he went to CU and also CSU - two degrees - so he's ready for his next assignment here. Currently he is running this part of the business in Montrose and will be expanding to his own plant here. Larry asked Mike what he thought the greatest challenges were for this year. Keeping his eye on the ball, Mike said, "The big challenge for us in this business is getting that plant going. It's a large expansion for our business, it's actually doubling the size of our business (square footage). We have a great demand for our new product. I think the greatest challenge is to close those deals and make sure that demand is there so we can meet our commitments that were made to build this plant. It looks very promising. We're opening that plant and it should be operating by August 1, 2012.
Related Links: Polystrand.com || Reinforced Plastics || ACG Denver || M&A Channel || Rocky Mountain Corporate Growth Conference || Keywords: Mike Gordon, Polystrand, Gordon Composites, Thermo Plastic Composite, Zero Waste Plant, ACG Rocky Mountain Capital Growth Conference - bytes=2812345
LISTEN TO: Mike Gordon, Gordon Composites/Polystrand

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