One of our Partners is Benchmark Industries.  Their objective is to make affordable industrialized housing.  These are not trailers.  These are apartment or condominiums that can be as tall as three stories and are especially well suited for Seniors, migrant workers and lower income housing.  All these types of homes are needed and the need continues to grow in spite of or perhaps because of our current economy.  Although, the need for senior housing with memory care and onsite care management is expected to grow well past 2020.

The Chairman and CEO of Benchmark Industries is Dan Riedel an Alumni of Michigan State University (MSU).  Recently he was asked to speak to the subject of Leadership.  It occurred to us that many would benefit from Dan’s thoughts.  We’d love to have your input as well.  He has given us permission to share a small portion of the speech he recently gave at the MSU 2012 Leadership Awards.

Here are Dan’s thoughts on Leadership Qualities.

2012 Student Leadership Awards

Michigan State University

Remarks by: Dan Riedel

Leadership Qualities

This following list of leadership qualities is general, and in no particular order. However, each item is important, and lacking one or more of these can make the difference between a poor leader and a great one:

• Passion; love what you do, and never waver from its pursuit.
• Organization; no one will follow a disorganized leader
• Communication; communicate and sell your ideas to motivate
• Courage; willingness to try and fail
• Integrity; keep your word at all costs
• Ownership and Responsibility; freely admit when you are wrong
• Listen; listen, learn and always gain a consensus
• People Skills and Like-ability
• Be a Good Example
• Never, Never, Never, Never Give Up

]]> http://c4worldwide.com/text-blog/leadership-qualities/feed 0 http://c4worldwide.com/rest/brochures http://c4worldwide.com/rest/brochures#comments Fri, 06 Apr 2012 03:17:36 +0000 Katy Rawson-Castro http://c4worldwide.com/?p=1586 R.E.S.T. Brochures

Revolution Education Solution Technologies (R.E.S.T.)
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This is the public information that is available. We have more to share but prefer to do so under the protection of a Non-Circumvent – Non-Disclosure. If you would like to receive additional information, please click here to send us an email to request our Non-Circumvent – Non-Disclosure.

Additional Documents Available:

• Executive Summary
• Complete Business Plan
• Market Segment Information
• Case Study 1
• Case Study 2

R.E.S.T. Statistics Video

MR. JIM DISMORE

Chairman of the Board / President & CEO

Former Chairman / CEO – Ultimate Support Systems, Inc., Fort Collins, Colorado
Founder and Chairman – Kingdom Way Companies, Inc., Fort Collins, Colorado
Co-Founder – Business the Kingdom Way, LLC, Fort Collins, Colorado

Jim has over five decades of experience in retailing and manufacturing. His career began with the Newberry, Britt and J.C. Penney chains. He was recruited by Sam Walton when Wal-Mart had only 3 stores. Jim was one of the original officers and spent twelve years working directly with Mr. Walton. He was senior vice-president when he left the company in 1976.

After a series of CEO and senior management positions with several major retail chains and manufacturing companies, Jim became President and CEO of Ultimate Support Systems in 1989, a manufacturer of top quality music stands, bike repair stands and an innovative medical walker. In 1994, he became chairman and majority stock holder.

After his departure from Wal-Mart, Jim felt God’s calling to incorporate kingdom work into his career path. It was not until he arrived at Ultimate Support that he was finally free to express, without restriction, his long-term convictions about incorporating one’s spiritual beliefs with business operations.

After a history of 29 years in the music/bike/medical stand business, the divisions of Ultimate Support were sold in 2007 and 2008. The sale of the company has allowed Jim to devote full time to the Kingdom Way Companies’ non-profit ministry formed in 2001 as well as to develop a Christian business advisory company, Business the Kingdom Way, in 2007.

Jim has been mentoring and advising company and spiritual leaders for over 20 years out of his desire to advance the kingdom of God in the workplace. He has served on the director and advisory boards of over 30 companies ranging in size from small start-ups to those with thousands of employees. In addition to serving on these boards, as well as his advisory commitments with numerous and varied companies, both globally and across the United States, Jim is currently serving on the International Board of Directors for Fellowship of Companies for Christ International.

MR. FRANK CLARK

EVP / CFO

Frank Clark brings over twenty-five years of experience as Chief Financial Officer for multi-site international manufacturing, construction and service companies to his next senior role. Most recently he has been consulting to a number of companies ranging from billion dollar manufacturing and distribution to homebuilding and commercial real estate development. In one project, Mr. Clark worked with a manufacturing and distribution company that experienced significant inventory shrinkages over a two year period. He investigated the causes, made corrections to the accounting systems and analyzed the product costs. Pricing changes were then made that resulted in a monthly profit, the first ever.

Another project was a turnaround for a commercial real estate developer where a sustainable business model was developed and implemented resulting cash outflow changes made so they were less than a conservative cash inflow. Prior to consulting he helped grow a start up to $250 million in revenue in 20 months.

During this period best practices were implemented increasing margins by 10% which increased the value of the business by $82 million.

During Mr. Clark’s career he has accomplished more than thirty five acquisitions; the largest had $125 million in revenue. On that acquisition, he was the primary negotiator and led a 30-man due diligence team. The discovery resulted in sufficient knowledge about the business and shortcomings that upon closing operating changes were immediately made that resulted in 80% of the acquisition debt being paid within 12 months. He has accomplished an IPO ($16mm with senior debt of $40mm and was responsible for analyst and shareholder relations. With one employer, he developed the strategy of adopting an ESOP to create an exit transaction for the owners and motivate the existing employees.

Mr. Clark has significant experience in manufacturing, construction and franchise retail. The breadth of his experience makes him all the more capable of grasping new industries while applying lessons learned from other industries and businesses.

Mr. Clark holds a BS from Drake University and has a CPA from Iowa and Wisconsin.

Wow!  How was 2011 for you?  On a scale of 1 to 10, 10 being the best, I’d give this past year a 4.  Very disappointing year.

Most of us have no idea how our thoughts and then our words impact us on so many levels.  Few of us really examine their motives, their decisions or even their comments.  Here’s some thoughts that might help us all stay focused on accomplishing what we want in 2012.

1.  Recognize that your thoughts do become things. – Have you ever heard someone say, “I can’t do that?” You should know that he was right, he can’t.  However, the person that said, “Oh, I can do that!” That person is also right.  Often times we and no one else predict what we’ll accomplish without giving it a lot of thought.

2. Have you ever wanted something so bad that you just pursued it like a dog looking for a bone? – Most of us fail to even display passion for any of our ideas.  Merely saying, “I hope . . . ” and then moving on is not the answer.  Can you ever remember a time when no matter what, you were going to find out, get, achieve, accomplish or reach something?  A goal, objective, milestone or best personal achievement?  Your passion took over.  You did it.

3. 2012 will be, for most of us, what ever it is that we want it to be. – Will it still be tough to find jobs, keep our homes, make ends meet or on a larger scale, find someone that can actually lead (globally), the answer is YES.  Those things will still be tough, difficult and very hard (in some cases).  A coach I had once said, “It doesn’t matter how many times you get knocked down, it only matters if you get back up.” A business friend once said, “When we lose everything, we find it all.” That one took me sometime to figure out until many, many years ago when our nation faced one of its many downturns in the oil business and I lost it all.

Make sure that you don’t fulfill your own negative attitude or opinion or goals.  Set your own limits if you will but make sure that you agree.  Don’t set unrealistic expectations.  Start small if you must but keep setting bigger and bigger goals for yourselves.  “Whatever the mind of man or woman can conceive, it can achieve!”

What do you think?

It’s easy to relate to the first number.  Most of us, if not all of us have had one dollar at some time in our life.  Many have had one hundred and even one thousand.

Few have ever had one hundred thousand or a million dollars.  With each increment, does what you do change?

In America and around the world, we need more jobs, affordable housing and the solution to many other pressing issues.  Will your contribution help?

One might say that to give even a penny or 1 percent of one’s fortune is not much, but to the person who only has a dollar, it’s a lot.  Its effect can be measured.  With just the one penny, you can get something more and in many cases much more than just having ninety-nine cents.

Again, we can apply this logic to any amount shown at the top of this blog.  However, most would agree that IF they had more, they could do so much more.  The real question is would you?

We talk with and know people that have much more.  We’ve spoken with individuals that have $5,000,000, $50,000,000 and so much more.  What we’re finding is that they are fearful of losing what they have worked so hard to achieve, the creation of their wealth.

In years past we’ve seen companies and individuals take great risks.  At each decision was the idea or notion that more could be made.  If the amount put forward was lost, completely, it could be replaced in a short period of time.

The great businessman at the turn of the century, Andrew Carnegie (1835 – 1919) once boasted that if his fortune were taken away today, in a year he’d have it back because he knew how to make money.

Can we say the same today?

What are you prepared to do with the money you have?  Will you help another?

We are the small businesses of America.  The dreamers are the butcher, the baker, the candlestick maker, the mechanic, the florist, the barber and more.  Each new business began with a dream, an idea and a thought that they could start their own business.  These are the 99.7% of all businesses in America.

ADP is the world’s largest processor of payroll checks for businesses.  According to a study that they did in 2006, they found that 82.9% of U.S. employment was in businesses with less than 500 employees (the classic definition of a small business).

I don’t agree with Occupy Wall Street or the Occupy SEC rally that’s on the 17^th in Washington, D.C.

I do believe in the power of journalism and it’s possible to inform anyone and everyone regarding social injustice.  The Occupy movement brought attention to the fact that 1% are haves and the 99% are the have-nots.  But, is this true?  I don’t think so.

First, the 99% consists of many more classifications than ONE.  How about the poverty line?  How about lower, middle and upper middle class?  These classifications have existed at least since the 1950’s and probably before.

Back in the ‘90’s we had the young upwardly mobile professional (Yuppie).  They weren’t rich . . . yet.  But they let the world know they were going to try hard to be exactly that, rich.

The 99.9% need help too.  People see their way out of poverty by starting their own business.  They see a way forward and up by starting their own business.  The problem has always been money.

Yesterday, the House passed HR 2930, The Entrepreneur Access to Capital Act.  This bill deserves your support.  This will help localize investment capital without running afoul of the SEC.  This is a chance for the community to help business get going.

Get involved.  Here’s how:

• Sign the Legalize Local Investment! petition
• ask your Senators to support The Entrepreneur Access to Capital Act

YOU can make a difference for U.S.  We are the 99.7%

Note: C4 WorldWide, Inc. is a qualified small business in the United States of America.

Michael Herron is an accomplished Money Manager and CEO with extensive experience in investment management, financial services, options trading, sales, and general management. He has successfully launched numerous new companies and branch operations. Herron is a team builder, leader and motivator with ability to recruit and retain top talent. He is an experienced entrepreneur building and developing multi-faceted financial institutions from both an organic level to multi-billion dollar institutions.

With over two decades of professional investment experience, Herron has worked in various capacities including portfolio management with an emphasis in options and commodity trading, as well as serving as an institutional financial consultant to nationally recognized broker-dealers, banks and registered investment advisory firms. His former employers include The Vanguard Group, Fidelity Investments, Merrill Lynch and MF Global, Inc. Most recently, Herron was the President of Investments for Invest-U, LLC, a single-family family office, running $300MM in global equities and futures-commodity leveraged option position strategies. 2011 YTD ROI: + 17% (2/11-7/11).

In 2000, Herron founded Viper Trading which went on to become one of the nation’s largest online brokerage companies specializing in direct access Level II stock and futures trading. After the successful sale of Viper Trading in May 2003, Michael became American National Trading Corporation’s (“ANTC”) National Brokerage Director, responsible for developing and leading ANTC’s Managed Futures, Currency Trading and Introducing Broker Services Divisions. Mr. Herron’s efforts helped grow ANTC into one of the Top 50 Largest Futures Brokers in the world ranked by Futures Magazine.

Herron holds a B.A. in Economics from Rowan University of New Jersey & holds the NASD/NFA Series 3, 7, 30, 63 & 66 registrations and is a Chartered Alternative Analyst (CAIA) Level 1.

Michael resides in Manhattan Beach, California with his wife and three children.

Specialties

Derivative trading, negotiations, start-up business consulting, managed futures platform solutions, trading strategist, institutional business development.

Mr. Baker’s career focus has been on the application of technology. He was part of the early management team at Compaq Computer and as Vice President of new products manufacturing and he developed its rapid response worldwide deployment systems and manufacturing to become the fastest growing company of its time. Since then he has worked on highly secure computer installations and satellite communications.

The year was 1981 – 1982 and our Team had a brilliant idea (we thought).  Let’s clone the Apple Computer (on the left above).  After all, IBM was allowing clones of its very successful machine, etc.  We ordered our first batch of computers (500).  When they arrived six weeks later, they all worked and the software we licensed ran perfectly.

We were off . . .

Well, not exactly.  After making contact with the first retailer we received a call from Apple’s law firm.  The notification (very politely) were that a Cease and Desist order was on its way to us.  After spending a lot of money, we shut the operation down immediately and closed the company.

My point for bringing this up is that Steve Jobs was famous for sticking to his guns.  In his head he had a plan.  It wasn’t always known to the rest of us but nevertheless he had a plan.  None of us understood why he wouldn’t allow, as IBM had done, the cloning of the Apple computer.

Over the years, the decision to be that independent has paid off for Apple and its share holders.

The world and indeed we as individuals will miss his vision and most of all his steadfast leadership.

Our condolences go out to the Jobs family and the 45,000 plus Apple employees around the world.

Footnote:

With the introduction of the iPhone 3 our family and my office has made the change to all apple products.  At my desk is an iPad with a keyboard, a 27″ iMac with a second 24″ wall mounted monitor and then a keyboard, magic trackpad and mouse for the iMac and an iPhone with its own keyboard. My MacPro laptop goes with me when I travel (my wife doesn’t like it when its missing).  I call all of this fabulous technology, the command center.