What is risk assessment? Financial risk assessment is crucial for any business. One thing that is constant in any business is the implementation of strategies and planning. Every new problem faced by a business requires management to modify the strategy, while every new growth step needs execution of a new plan. Every strategy or plan is implemented with the confidence that it will take the business forward.

Which of these 5 key trends in the alternative healthcare industry can either be a boon or a bust to your business model? This article raises some important questions you should ask when you are thinking of growing your company.

1. Are you prepared for the new sin tax that will penalize bad health habits? Personal accountability will have an impact on rising healthcare costs as more healthcare providers support the notion that people with unhealthy habits should bear responsibility for their actions.

Whilst there has been a long standing agreement that business intelligence is defined from the top of a business down with policies being defined by managers, executives and key decision makers and then cascaded down throughout the business, there has been a swing in recent years to suggest that a bottom ups approach can work equally well. Many current experts are saying that small changes to a business outlook can result in a longer-lasting benefit to the business strategy as well as providing morale and financial benefits.

Which of these five sleeper trends in the alternative healthcare industry can either be a boon or a bust to your business model? This article raises some important questions you should ask when you are thinking of growing your company.

1. What do you think of the Methuselah Lifespan Effect? More of us have the possibility to add 20 years to our lifetime.

While growing and developing a business is never likely to be considered easy by anyone, sometimes the greater challenges come when the business has been developed and reaches a stage where it needs to progress to a higher level to continue growing profitably. It is very easy for an organization to rely on keenness, motivation and fresh naivety to pull it through the initial stages of development but the ability to transform and progress requires different skills and many firms realize they require some additional support to move the company to where they want it to be.

Heed these tips and watch your company's cash flow grow

When Cash is King, it really is King! What do you do when a bluebird opportunity can be pursued only if you have, say, $50,000 to $500,000 (fill in the number and the zeros). Or, a crisis occurs that can be minimized or even solved for $50,000 to $500,000 (again you fill in the zeros).

"Just when you thought Sarbanes Oxley concerns had been sufficiently addressed so that non-public companies could take the issue off their dashboard, things have changed, " says Gary W. Patterson, Enterprise Risk Management expert and speaker. He forewarns that Enterprise Risk Management (also referred to as ERM) will soon become a business issue for almost every business on the planet, including family-owned businesses, private companies, and nonprofits.

What may be even more alarming to Americans than the $4-a-gallon gas (and rising) sticker shock is the way our congressional leaders will attempt to handle the energy crisis, which is exactly what it is at this point.

While I am not suspicious by nature, I am realistic when it comes to politics. I'm willing to bet that Congress will sidestep this hot issue which will get even hotter as prices continue to soar (Europeans are now paying $9 a gallon, and Americans will follow suit) by finding a way to raise the cost of energy that is not as apparent as raising taxes on gas and oil products.

The green movement has created a plethora of buzzwords. One of the more popular phrases is "carbon tax." And for good reason. Businesses, traditional and emerging, will soon be affected by a carbon tax depending on where they fall in the supply chain.

Wikipedia defines a carbon tax as a direct tax on carbon dioxide emissions, which is generated as a byproduct of combustion of fossil fuels, among other processes.

The green movement has created new marketplace opportunities with the emergence of intelligent green software. Industries, traditional and emerging, will soon be affected by the adoption or disregard of such technology as they move into some version of energy peak load or variable electrical pricing (where the current price is determined by the power load on the grid).