Leadership responsibility: If you own a biz, you're the head of the org. Good or bad, your company will LOOK and ACT like you do.

Debt is so ingrained into our culture that most Americans can't even envision a car without a payment ... a house without a mortgage ... a student without a loan ... and credit without a card. We've been sold debt with such repetition and with such fervor that most folks can't conceive of what it would be like to have NO payments.

Work is a surefire money-making scheme.

How you handle or mishandle your money tells us who you are and, more important, it tells YOU who you are. Your priorities, passions, goals, and fears are shown clearly in the flow of your money. Your value system, or lack of one causes money to flow around you, passed you, or to you. When money is in your possession, what you do with it screams loudly who you are.

A budget is telling your money where to go instead of wondering where it went.

Instead of just purchasing an ad campaign, target test and measure. Give an ad a small try. If the response is enough to pay for the ad, make it larger. With a franchise, ask the most successful franchisees what they did. Ask the bottom five guys what they did and avoid it.

Surround yourself with people who add the fuel of advice and encouragement to your fire.