The cup of early morning black coffee tasted good. " At least we've crossed one hurdle", sighed Jason Aradvizer, who had a lot on his mind that first day of July. His totally relaxing and satisfying, if not spectacular, golfing vacation had ended just two days ago, but the matters at hand put it in the distant past. Jason was experiencing a typical set of first day on the job thoughts by wondering if he had done the right thing, even though he felt so positive about this new challenge. " What better way", he reminded himself, " to conclude a corporate and consulting career than to take on this assignment as a consultant to the Chief Financial Officer of Growthstar Inc., a publicly traded industrial products and services company on the verge of a new market expansion strategy. The opportunity to utilize my thirty something years of experience to reinvent a significant segment of the corporate finance function seems almost too good to be true but", as he mused to himself, " some poor soul has to do it!"

" The business landscape has changed", he thought to himself. " Boards of Directors are paying more attention to their large institutional shareholders, and making the enhancement of shareholder wealth a priority for the Chief Executive Officer (CEO). Many CEOs, in turn, are now realizing that increasing the company's stock price is not their challenge alone, and are pushing shareholder value creation down...