Tapping Your Inner Entrepreneur - By Diane Sears
Excerpt From "Tapping Your Inner Entrepreneur"

Deciding Whether Entrepreneurship is Right for You
Why do women start businesses? What motivates anyone to dive into entrepreneurship with her heart and soul? How do you know whether business ownership is right for you?

The answers to these questions are as varied as the 10.6 million privately held businesses in the United States that are at least 50 percent woman-owned. These businesses generate $2.5 trillion in sales and employ 19.1 million people, according to the Center for Women's Business Research in Washington, D.C., founded as the National Foundation for Women Business Owners. And each owner has her own story.

Florida Trend:
The Magazine of Florida Business

Joining Forces
(Economic Yearbook – Central, April 2008)
Central Florida leaders are building on an established reputation for collaboration in 2008. Two of the region’s most powerful business groups – the Metro Orlando Economic Development Commission and the Central Florida Partnership, which launched in late 2007 as an umbrella organization that includes the Orlando Regional Chamber of Commerce – are collaborating with the Orlando/Orange County Convention and Visitors Bureau on economic development. The groups held their first conference in January, crafting plans to join forces on trade missions, research and possibly even the CVB’s branding campaign, “Say Yes to Orlando.”

Business Florida:
Your Florida Opportunity Guide

Florida Small Business:
The Guide for Entrepreneurs and Emerging Companies

10 Ways to Reach Customers
(Marketing, 2008 issue)
Today’s marketing is all about getting back to the basics – with a twist.

Your biggest challenge as a small business owner is to market yourself so customers will connect with you and your company on a personal level. If you succeed, they’ll not only buy from you, but they’ll recommend you to your next customers.

UF Today:
Alumni Magazine for the Gator Nation

One to Grow On
(Cover Story, Summer 2008)
When a reptile loses a limb, it regenerates another one. What if people could do that, too? That’s the idea behind the Regeneration Project, a think tank of top scientists who met for the first time in December 2007 in Gainesville, hosted by the University of Florida’s Evelyn F. and William L. McKnight Brain Institute.

AP Matters:
The Official Publication of International Accounts Payable Professionals

Counting on Change: 1099 Reporting
(Cover Story, December 2008/January 2009)

As he travels around the United States speaking with AP professionals about federal tax code issues, Sean Evans is fielding a growing number of questions these days about proposed legislation designed to help shrink the “tax gap” between what the Internal Revenue Service collects and what it’s owed.

First Monday:
The Community Source for Smart Business

Healthy competition
(Cover Story, October 2008)
Less than four miles from each other along Orange Avenue, at opposite ends of Orlando’s downtown core, the region’s two largest hospital systems compete every day for the title of “Best.”

Orlando Sentinel:
Daily Tribune Co. newspaper in Orlando, Florida

Central Florida Family Magazine

Internal Auditor:
International Magazine for The Institute of Internal Auditors

Auditwire Newsletter

Bioterrorism: An auditor's role in keeping hospitals secure
(May/June 2002)

Last year's Sept. 11 attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, combined with the anthrax deaths and bioterrorism scare that followed, put the United States on a heightened state of alert. For hospital auditors, the situation underscored a need for their facilities to be prepared for acts of terrorism that have moved from "what if" scenarios to very real possibilities.

Venture Woman Magazine