This excerpt from "101 Ways to Turn Your Business Green" contains several starting points for greening your business. Learn how to run a more eco-friendly company with these 5 easy and cost-effective tips.

The sustainable or green action item with the highest potential for gaining CFO acceptance is conservation. Why? Because conservation is about savings and paybacks, which CFOs can relate to their calculations of cash flows and paybacks. It makes sense to start in your office when it comes to conservation. Think in terms of financial payback when considering and implementing your eco-friendly office.

The prospect of learning about environmental regulation is about as exciting as a root canal. But the pain can be lessened if you change before you are compelled to change. Proactive compliance with the Clean Air Act saves money and boosts your image.

Little things can make a big difference when it comes to protecting the environment. In fact, environmentally friendly practices may even generate some green — the kind that goes right to the bottom line. The secret to corporate prosperity and community support might be in your garbage can. Your trash says as much about your business as any brochure.

For most small-business owners any real estate project will be a one-time or rare event. Consider tapping into experts who do the work every day.

Eric Morgan, president of Morgan + Co., never thought his New Orleans-based media company would be unable to operate due to a catastrophe. Then Katrina hit. Learn lessons in emergency planning from his experience in this article.

Crises aren't limited to major dramas such as the Tylenol product-tampering scare or the Exxon Valdez oil spill. Growing businesses can be shot down by mishandling any number of things: lawsuits, negative media coverage, discrimination and harassment claims, on-the-job accidents, natural disasters, technology glitches, government probes, employee threats or damaging rumors — even the unexpected death of the owner or CEO. Entrepreneurs can be especially vulnerable to the havoc caused by business disasters.

The laundry list of crises affecting the American Economy is long. But now is the time to bolster your sales and marketing plans and get ready for disaster business planning. Waiting for the next crisis to hit means you will have waited too long to revise your business plan.

Having a crisis plan in place will provide a framework for decision-making and guidelines for action in the future, whether the crisis is related to terrorism, acts of nature, viral epidemics, employee accidents, or errors that affect our customers, to name just a few possible crisis scenarios.

Showing proof of loss if your vital records are destroyed in the disaster will be challenging. The solution is to draw up a vital records protection plan. Such a plan is designed to protect from loss or destruction those records (both digital and paper) that are essential to the organization's operation.

Understanding the need for basic liability, automobile, property and workers compensation insurance is a given. But understanding blurs when owners consider the countless enhancements to these basic forms.

Finding the right business insurance policies can be complex and intimidating. Making a mistake could cost you some major money, so do your research, find a good agent and protect yourself and your company.

This year, whether you are building a new business or growing an existing one, you probably have had quite a shock when renewing your business insurance coverage. Questions like “Why did my rates double?” have been heard in management offices across America, and rate increases of 25 percent or more are not uncommon. How can you better manage your insurance needs?

How many times has your business suffered because you trusted the wrong person? If you're like most people, you've been lied to thousands of times. These 7 cues will tip you off to whether someone is being less than honest with you.

EVERY BUSINESS collects mounds of data as a result of everyday business activities. Receipts, payments, orders and other information accumulate in the computer systems in your back offices, often growing exponentially as the years go by. Dashboards provide summarized data from business information systems so that owners, managers and employees can get a quick reading of key performance indicators for their organization's activities.

There are endless ways to create a greener workplace from using recycled products to installing doubled-paned windows for better insulation. The best way to start is by taking small steps. Here are a few ideas you can work with. These 10 eco-friendly solutions can help get your business in order.

Going green is a trillion dollar industry propelled by the energy independence and global warming solutions your customers, colleagues, investors and competitors desire now. The scale and growing pace of the "green collar economy" creates opportunities for your business to grow revenues, enhance your brand and save money.

Trailblazing is the very essence of entrepreneurship. So it's no surprise that more companies are exploring growth opportunities through business-to-business (B2B) e-procurement. Stop the paper chase; save time and money through B2B online purchasing.

Poor quality could send your customers to your competitor. Busy entrepreneurs may think they don't have time for complex and expensive processes, but quality improvements can be cheap and simple. Your survival depends in part on tuning in to your market and collecting data about your best practices.

ISO 9000 is one of the most widely recognized standards issued by the International Organization for Standardization (ISO). This article outlines what to expect and how to get started with this process.

More organizations are becoming ISO-certified than ever before, and many are limiting their business relationships to similarly certified companies. Learn how your company could benefit from ISO certification.

Business paradigms come and go. In the '80s, total quality management (TQM) was the beloved prototype, preaching customer satisfaction, continuous improvement and employee participation. Yet TQM waned in the '90s, displaced by new paradigms such as re-engineering and six sigma. TQM may no longer be the flavor of the month, but it can still boost your productivity and profits.

If you think there's nothing you can do to keep from being fooled — that you have to accept some "shrinkage" in your business — you're set to lose the battle with fraud. Entrepreneurs who survive soon learn the plain truth: Honesty matters. People will be honest and deal honestly with you, but only if you create a "you won't get away with it" environment with no-nonsense procedures that minimize temptation. Most companies suffer from fraud - yours doesn't have to. Take these steps to protect your reputation and your bottom line.

Businesses can support the seemingly contradictory concepts of work schedule and location flexibility and clients' high customer service and responsiveness expectations with smart business solutions. Choosing those solutions requires a careful look at your current systems, the wish lists of current employees and a vision for how — and where — they want to work in the future. Here are three scenarios to help you start thinking about remote working conditions that are still secure, efficient and cost-effective.

All businesses are required to provide a safe working environment for employees, but worker safety should be paramount anyway. Employers spend billions each year on job-related injuries. Protecting your bottom line means protecting your employees.

Don't be caught unaware of the risk of fire. Learn the basic rules for fire prevention, fire extinguishing, and emergency planning with this brief fact sheet from OSHA.

A file cabinet supplied by your business to the home office of one of your employees falls, fracturing the worker's foot. Another home-office employee slips on the kitchen floor during a coffee break, injuring her back. Is your company liable for the resulting workers' compensation claims? Telecommuting and its possible effect on workers' compensation issues.

Keep your workplace a safe and healthy one with this tip sheet from OSHA, which covers employer rights and responsibilities, employee rights, and the OSH Act.

Get an overview of requirements under the Occupational Safety and Health Act, and keep your workplace a safe place.