Remember the Alamo!Yes, and now, get ready for Alamo Pictures.I was sitting on a plane recently. I was switching through the channels looking for a video to watch. The choice was okay, if you like middle of the road story lines with every predictable plot line going.I switched to the documentaries. Soon I settled into some real films about real people with some real stories to boot.

“To live is to change, and to change often is to become more perfect.”Thus said the late Cardinal Newman who I’m told will be canonized next month at the Vatican. What the good cardinal said is something not just for the spiritual life, however, but something just as true in business too.Allow me to explain.A year after the death of Cardinal Newman, in 1891, a young man, not yet 30 years old, moved from Philadelphia to Chicago. He wanted to start a business but had only $32 to his name

To run your own business means you need to be leader.What is a truism, however, is that to be a leader you need someone to follow you. In your case that’s the team you’ve created and built.What is also common wisdom is that you are only as good as your team.  I would go further and say that you and your team are only ever going to be as successful in so far as you understand who they are, what makes them tick, and the mix of personalities within the team you have created.

July 2019 will be remembered as the month the United States Federal Reserve showed its determination to fight the sluggish inflation numbers still hanging around an otherwise buoyant US economy.The Fed warned Congress that depressed prices could lead, by an inevitably, to an “unhealthy dynamic” of lower interest rates. This could mean that if a downturn in the economy was to come – and there are few signs it will – but if it did come then it leaves little room for ways to boost the economy as it tries to fight its way out of such an unhappy position – one not known for the last few years.

If you have been reading these columns you’ll know how just now how good things are in the United States. The economy has taken off, and if it keeps going at this rate it will head out into space! So I was thinking about what it is that makes America great? Or, more particularly,  have been looking at the history of that great nation and what has made it great.As far as I can see it’s the people who live in those 50 States

It’s official: the United States of America is now experiencing the longest economic expansion in its history. Last Friday’s US report on jobs brought still more great news about the economy there. This is not just good news; this is great news. There are two things involved in any figures around economic growth. Namely, how much the U.S. economy produces from one year to the next and, then, as a result, how much more income Americans have relative to the previous year.

As you might expect, I enjoy cowboy movies. The open range, theplains, the cattle drives, the cowboys, and the saloons … and, ofcourse, the gold!So I was sitting watching The Magnificent Seven. It is a classic film butnot many know it is based on a Japanese film: The Seven Samurai.So here are my magnificent seven Mount Bonnell Advisors thoughts on Austin:

The most important thing in your company is internal culture. A certain continuity and peace within a company is the thing that makes it grow. Over my years in business I have seen how this internal culture if nurtured will make your company and everyone in it succeed. I have also seen how one person operating against that culture, however, subtle they act and no matter how good they are at their job can destroy everything you have created.  

Argo. Have you seen it?Hardly new, the film was released in 2012 and deservedly won an Oscar.