A great article was written by our very own, Matthew Meehan (CEO, Shield Advisory Group) being featured in #Forbes today!

 Check it out and let us know your thoughts. 

Three Team-Building Tips For New Business Owners

The Truth (Ahem!) Behind the First Assembly Line

“If I Have Seen Further, it is by Standing Upon the Shoulders of Giants” Sir Isaac Newton

The notion of organized systems is ages old with brilliant examples across history.

Adam Smith discussed the division of labor in the manufacture of pins at length in his book The Wealth of Nations published in 1776, apparently a banner year for Americans.

The Venetian Arsenal, a complex of former shipyards and armories clustered together in the city of Venice, dating back to circa 1104, operated similar to a production line. Ships moved down a canal and were fitted by the various shops they passed. At the peak of its efficiency in the early 16th century, the Arsenal employed some 16,000 people producing one ship each day, and could fit out, arm, and provision a newly built galley with standardized parts on an assembly-line basis. Although the Arsenal...

As much as you enjoy coming home to that stack of cardboard boxes after a long day at work or whether you prefer to do your shopping alla keyboard, resist the urge. Buy local. 

Supporting your local ‘Mom & Pop’ shops creates local jobs, infuses community tax coffers with dearly needed sales tax revenue and creates a sense of community critical to our social wellbeing.

Businesses may find less expensive alternatives to goods and services outside their neighborhoods. Resist this extra-locale acquisition. Over time, imports eventually become the predominant source of supply causing local businesses to suffer financially and close. This inevitably has a negative impact on the economy. Lower prices do not necessarily equate to a benefit for the ultimate consumers. Imports tend to increase the reliance of an economy on other nations. This leads to a drop in political power amongst nations. While global free trade is an ideal to be sought, sourcing as...

Spanish Proverb

People have a huge impact on your life. “You are the average of the five people you spend the most time with,” says American entrepreneur and motivational speaker Jim Rohn.

You should think about the people you are associating with the same way you think about what you eat and how you’re exercising. Here are a few examples on just how poignant this one reality can be.

The “PayPal Mafia” is a group of former PayPal employees and founders who have since founded and developed additional successful technology companies such as Tesla, Inc., LinkedIn, Palantir Technologies, SpaceX, Affirm, Slide, Kiva, YouTube, Yelp, and Yammer. Most of these so-called members attended Stanford University or University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign at some point in their studies.

Why do we denigrate a smoothly run southern Mediterranean conglomerate with tight hierarchical...

Sunk Cost Fallacy Theory and Knowing When to Leave the Casino.

Anyone miss the blackened fingers from reading your daily newspaper to get your news in the morning?

Any urbanites out there reminiscing about folding the paper into columns so you could read the newspaper while strap hanging on a roller-coaster-like subway ride?

When did we stop getting our daily dose of news from tree pulp?

Excite was launched in 1995, think of it as another Yahoo. A person could get news, weather, a search engine, email address, instant messaging, stock quotes and a customizable user homepage. Excite was the 4th most visited website in the world. Excite even negotiated a deal with AOL, where AOL agreed to make Excite its exclusive search and directory service. DOJ Antitrust Unit is still preparing the briefs on that one. If you remember AOL and how big it was at the time, this deal was a massive win for Excite. In ’99 Excite was acquired by @Home network. This merger of two internet tech...

Franchising is a form of business by which the owner (franchisor) of a product, service or method obtains distribution through affiliated dealers (franchisees). This type of license grants a franchisee access to a franchisor's proprietary business knowledge, processes, and trademarks, thus allowing the franchisee to sell a product or service under the franchisor's business name. In exchange for acquiring a franchise, the franchisee pays the franchisor an initial start-up fee, management and/or annual licensing fees.

The franchise business model has an interesting history in the United States. The concept dates to the mid-19th century, when two companies - the McCormick Harvesting Machine Company (we were an agrarian economy in those days) and the I.M. Singer Company - developed organizational, marketing and distribution systems recognized as the forerunners to franchising. These then novel business structures allowed McCormick...

“Consistency is found in that work whose whole and detail are suitable to the occasion. It arises from circumstance, custom and nature.” – Roman author, architect, civil engineer, and wanna-be-accountant Vitruvius

No field is this one sentiment more critical than in accountancy. Bookkeeping and accounting standards are designed to ensure consistent presentation of financial statements, making it easier for people to read and comprehend the information contained in the statements.

Generally Accepted Accounting Principles were eventually established primarily as a response to the Stock Market Crash of ‘29 and the subsequent Great Depression, which were believed to be at least partially caused by less than forthright financial reporting practices by some publicly-traded companies. The federal government began working with professional accounting groups to establish standards and practices for consistent and accurate financial reporting. Generally Accepted...

In this video, we will talk about how we're eliminating all credit card processing fees across the boards for all merchants.

In this video, My partner Steve Perrotta and I will talk about everything you need to know about PPP Loan Forgiveness.