Rick Powell

Businesses have three primary resources, money, time, and people. Business Owners and Leaders sometimes have challenges with one or more of these. We are here to help you find and keep good employees, improve communications, build trust at all levels, provide team alignment, and more. We can guide you through better cash flow, and help you grow intelligently. Basically, we want to help you take your business further! We have a full set of assessment tools available to help you better understand who you are hiring, who you have working for you, and who is best suited for different roles.

Stay Tuned, much more to come!

Now's the time to Rise Above Uncertain Times!! There is no better time than now to collaborate with fellow business owners and executives and to have a Coach to discuss thoughts and ideas on how to not just survive, but prosper in these times and to #RiseAbove it all. We will position both you and your company to propel yourself forward. Through no fault of our own, we are in challenging times! We can choose to feel sorry about our situations, or we can use our precious time to identify our strengths and weaknesses, take a TAB Business Builder's Blueprint Business Diagnostic so we can shore up our weak areas and make ourselves leaner and stronger! We can then have our business where we want it so when the fog lifts we are positioned to take more market share, grow rapidly, and win big! Let's talk about the advantages of getting on a TAB Board, identify your areas of need, and plug any gaps while the opportunity is here! Send me a message to set up a time to discuss possibilities. If you are a business owner, ask yourself the following questions: - Are you ready to take your business to an entirely new level? - Who’s in control – you or your business? - How are you at balancing your business and personal lives? - Do you need help seeing the opportunities available to you? - Do you feel like you’re fighting fires all alone? - Where do you turn to for the truth about your business? I own and operate The Alternative Board® (TAB) in SE Tennessee and North Georgia. TAB helps forward-thinking business owners increase profitability and improve their lives by leveraging local business advisory boards, private business coaching, and proprietary strategic services.

Senior Systems Analyst for Shaw’s Computer Integrated Manufacturing (CIM) Group. The CIM Group is a Shaw Enterprise wide set of talented associates whose demand among all Shaw divisions is extremely high. Team needed a process to assist in project prioritization to ensure we worked on the right things. • Led CIM in designing and implementing a set of processes to intelligently prioritize projects based on business division and enterprise priorities, B/E analysis, ROI, Competitive Advantage, Strategic Innovation, and/or Intellectual Property. • Evangelist and Project Manager for CIM’s Process Specification System. Oversaw implementation in multiple divisions. This system alone has projected annual savings of $2.5 million for the Carpet Division. Additionally, a projected $3 million for the Hardwood Division. • Led CIM Group in defining Systems Analyst role and in gathering and documenting requirements for proposed systems. • Led Backprint Automation System Implementation on all coating lines for Shaw. Managed vendor and plant resources to ensure successful implementation leading to manufacturing cost sheet reductions of $500,000 annually.

Business Consultant, IT Consultant, Technology Consultant, Virtual CIO for private businesses. Full P&L responsibility for my own business, bookkeeping, and accounting responsibilities. Provided consultation on POS systems to numerous types of small businesses, provided compliance services and worked on building from scratch complete real estate construction and scheduling applications, etc. Worked on complete software specification, design, development, implementation, and support as well as networking and server support for Microsoft Server products (Exchange, IIS, SQL Server, etc.). Managed both external consultants and internal technical staff.

Provided strategic guidance, technical expertise and leadership in the creation from scratch of business critical information systems to facilitate sales, CRM, task management, contract generation, amendment and change order generation, community setups and due diligence for evaluation of potential new communities. Designed and oversaw development of a complex web-based builder construction scheduling application integrating with many vendors. Key Contributions: • Designed, developed and led creation of web-based applications utilizing end-user specific platforms (Windows PC, Laptop, Tablet PC and Win Mobile device handhelds) to significantly reduce the need for paper and eliminate double entry of data for Sales, Construction, Warranty and Main Office personnel in a $65 million dollar residential construction company. • Successfully implemented a set of applications to automate these functions which dramatically reduced manual entry errors, and eliminated need for manual entry positions. Enabled CEO and President to negotiate joint land deals with partners in exchange for use of this sales and construction scheduling software. Savings of at least $2 million per year in labor alone. Helped each associate become more efficient spending more of their time on quality of sales and quality of construction. • Obtained trademark for software and investigated patent for software created. • Interviewed, hired and managed technical team members for software development and support. • Responsible for support of corporate network, servers, security and computer use policies.

Led Product Definition, Requirements Gathering and in charge of all departmental updates to CEO / President / COO / CFO on progress and plans for new medical software products. Key member of senior management team, leading design, development and testing activities for this company’s initial products. Traveled and presented as well as sales demos at Medical Conferences. Key Contributions: • Provided requirements, and management focus for development efforts for company that led to state of the art medical practice software and industry leading Electronic Health Record (EHR) functionality. This led to the company going public on the NYSE with several hundred million dollars in sales heading to be a $1 Billion company. • Hired and managed key industry experts including doctor and nursing staff to provide process expertise for definition and refinement of design of software for medical practices. • Helped establish and then managed Software Quality Assurance group of 8 – 10 engineers and Product Development group of 12 – 20 medical professionals. • Assisted in fund raising (stock sales) and partnership arrangements for the company. Flew with CEO and President around US to discuss partnering relationships. Participated in several early sales calls helping users to understand our products and vision.