The Soul of Enterprise: Business in the Transformation Economy

Ron and Ed will be joined by Professor Antony Davies, associate professor of economics at Duquesne University. He is co-host of the podcast, Words & Numbers with Professor James Harrigan. He is co-inventor on a patent for generating supercomputing power from idle Internet-connected computers, and recipient of a NASA grant for developing statistical techniques for data mining using supercomputers. In other words, he is super smart.

Even though forty-five states permit marijuana, and one-third of Americans live in a location where recreational marijuana use is legal, it is still a controlled substance as a matter of federal law. Supreme Court justice Clarence Thomas recently wrote: “Once comprehensive, the Federal Government’s current approach is a half-in, half-out regime that simultaneously tolerates and forbids local use of marijuana. This contradictory and unstable state of affairs strains basic principles of federalism and conceals traps for the unwary.” Including accounting and tax traps. Ken Teasdale, audit partner at Armanino, will help us understand the many complex issues associated with this industry.

Should sustainability be our new standard for investing? According to Larry Fink of BlackRock (more than $7 trillion in assets) the answer is yes. The ESG movement is an investment trend focused on Environmental, Social, and Governance matters in assessing a company’s long-term value. American investors have put more than $20 billion into ESG funds in 2019. Will ESG save the world from climate change, increase social and racial justice, eliminate fossil fuels, etc.? This is a new variant of the prior ideas of Corporate Social Responsibility, Social Responsibility Investing, and the Stakeholder theory of corporations. Is ESG being used to alter the structure of the capital markets? Does it really offer superior returns? This is a complex issue and we can see it manifested in how corporate CEOs are more willing to be involved in politics. Join Ed and Ron to discuss these ideas and see if we should be worried, or just concerned?

Your market cares about how much value they will get from your product. Purchase decisions are driven almost entirely by the perceived value of the alternatives. This is just some of the wisdom from our Guest, Mark Stiving. While our conversation with Mark will focus on his new book Win, Keep, Grow: How to price and package to accelerate your subscription business.

This episode is dedicated to the possibility that we can understand project management quite differently when we view it through the lens of the subscription model. Rethinking this is challenging because it requires us (read ED!) to think differently than we (HE) have (has) in the past. If you think you are capable to engage in this type of thinking (or just want to hear Ed have an on-air mental breakdown), we invite you to join us in listening to this episode.

Ron and Ed welcome Turkish journalist and author, Mustafa Akyol. Like Rabbi Daniel Lapin and Father Robert Sirico, Mustafa ardently defends the free market in a religious context in his case, Islam. In addition to writing, he is also a public speaker who has given hundreds of lectures and talks on numerous platforms, including TED, where he spoke on “Faith vs. Tradition in Islam.” He has also been a commentator on public affairs programs, including the BBC’s “Hardtalk” and CNN’s “Fareed Zakaria GPS.”

Ron and Ed look forward to welcoming value pricing disciple turned evangelist, Mark Wickersham. Mark started his own accounting firm in 1996 and made dozens of stupid mistakes in the first 2 years. These mistakes had disastrous consequences on his profits and cash balances. But in November 1999 all that changed. With help from Steve Pipe, Michael Gerber, Paul Dunn, and our own Ron Baker he created the 7-step “Fastest Way To Double Your Profits” formula. We look forward to talking to Mark about his latest thinking on value pricing and beyond.

Ed and Ron are honored to welcome back Rabbi Daniel Lapin back to the show, for the fifth time—a record for the highest number of appearances on The Soul of Enterprise. We will have a far-ranging discussion on a number of topics, including envy, and income inequality. You don’t want to miss this episode!

In one of our most listened to shows, Episode #61, we discussed the 10 Factors of Price Sensitivity, in the context of Value Pricing 1.0. This episode Ed and Ron will discuss how to use these factors in the context of Value Pricing 2.0, the Subscription Business Model. They are still as relevant, only you view them at the macro level of the firm's strategy, branding, positioning, and value proposition, rather than at the micro of level of pricing each customer.

Listeners know that Ron is more a conservative and Ed, well, he's pretty dang libertarian, so who better to appear with them than the author of a book entitled The Conservatarian Manifesto. Charles C Cooke is a Senior Writer at National Review, a co-host of the Mad Dogs and Englishmen podcast. Charles is a graduate of the University of Oxford, at which he studied modern history and politics. His work has focused on Anglo-American history, British liberty, free speech, the Second Amendment, and American exceptionalism. Charles is a frequent guest on HBO’s Real Time with Bill Maher and has broadcast for the BBC, MSNBC, Fox News, and Fox Business. He immigrated to the United States in 2011 and became an American citizen in 2018