CEO Weekly Outlook

Good afternoon, all. Today, we’re reading about effectively integrating data analysis into your company. While many fear data-driven predictions and tools needed to be successful, Harvard Business Review discusses the importance of leveraging analytics to drive growth.

Meanwhile, Forbes sorts through timing the expansion of your business into an adjacent field. Answering questions about variation between yourself and adjacent companies, how systems will change, the human psychology differences between fields, and doing a thought experiment should help you decide.

Business Insights

• The emotional impulses that poison healthy teams
• 4 things boards need to consider when building a succession plan
• Dispel your team’s fear of data
• Habits of mentally tough people
• What you need to know before accepting a position as a nonprofit board member
• For founders, preparation trumps passion
• 5 Strategies to grow effective leaders
• Women on board: directors must move to tap advantages
• Identify the marketing metrics that actually matter
• A way to know if your corporate goals are too aggressive
• How to avoid hiring the wrong person

Transaction Toolbox

• When is the right time to expand your business into an adjacent field?
• How to attract a merger or acquisition
• A missing link for many private equity funds: connectivity
• A refresher on the debt-to-equity ratio
• Breaking into private equity: how to succeed without an MBA
• Greater proportion of corporate cash held in banks
• The hows and whys behind spinoffs
• Portfolio companies strongly appreciate and benefit from value-added services
• Independent sponsors take on larger role in mid-market deals
• Mid-sized firms struggle overseas

Middle Market Move of the Week

The ethical food movement grows with this investment. Both Alliance Consumer Growth and Union Square Hospitality Group (USHG) have acquired a minority stake in Tender Greens.

Tender Greens is a farm-to-fork restaurant with locations throughout California. This move is interesting because it involves some unlikely players: Alliance Consumer Growth is a consumer-focused growth equity firm, and USHG is the company behind famous New York City restaurants like Shake Shack. The investment is a first of its kind for USHG, and even more interesting is that their CEO Danny Meyer is joining Tender Green’s Board of Directors. Read the full press release here.