Having business acumen means understanding how your business operates. If you are interested in moving up in an organization, you need to understand what your organization’s competitive advantage is, what drives performance, and how you compete against other organizations. This knowledge helps you exercise good judgment when making business decisions. In this course, leadership expert Mike Figliuolo explains the most common business topics and terms you need to be familiar with—business models, financials, strategy, sales and marketing, R&D, P&L, EBITDA, and other key concepts. He leads you through a series of questions that will help you understand your business better, such as:

What business are you in?
What’s your market and who is your competition?
What problem does your business solve?
How are your products and services created?
What are your pricing and growth strategies?
How do you measure performance?

With the answers in hand, you can be assured your have the knowledge to make the best decisions for your business.

• Introduction
• 1. Business Acumen Basics
• 2. Your Business Model
• 3. Your Financials
• 4. Your Strategy
• 5. Your Operation
• Conclusion

Mike Figliuolo is the founder and managing director of thoughtLEADERS, LLC, a professional services training firm specializing in leadership development. He is a nationally recognized speaker and blogger on the topics of leadership, communications, decision-making, problem solving, and other critical business skills. An honor graduate from West Point, Mike served in the US Army as a combat arms officer. Before founding his own company, he was an assistant professor at Duke University, a consultant at McKinsey & Company, and an executive at Capital One and Scotts Miracle-Gro. He is the author of One Piece of Paper: The Simple Approach to Powerful, Personal Leadership (www.onepieceofpaper.com), Lead Inside the Box: How Smart Leaders Guide Their Teams to Exceptional Results (www.leadinsidethebox.com), and The Elegant Pitch: Create a Compelling Recommendation, Build Broad Support, and Get it Approved (www.elegantpitch.com). Mike’s blog and the programs he teaches can be found at www.thoughtleadersllc.com.