Divorce is a fact of life. And so many times everyone, from the ex-spouses to the children and from the in-laws to the outlaws is effected and the pain that is spread everywhere becomes part of their lives forevermore.

What if there was another option?

Is it possible for a family to get a divorce without it representing a terminal smashing of everyone’s sense of self worth and self esteem? Does it have to be an indictment of every decision they have ever made?

Wouldn’t it be wonderful if the entire process were handled with out battles for the children’s acceptance?

A member of the MTI community, Michael Mastracci, the sponsor of www.DivorceWithoutDishonor.com answered my call for articles to be published on the MTI blog with the following, “Please visit my site and kindly let me know if any of those topics would be a good fit for any of your platforms” and after visiting the web site it occurred to me that all of them would be perfect for those of us professionally interested in conflict resolution - along with our friends and associates.

So, instead of dragging them out one at a time I encourage each of you to visit www.DivorceWithoutDishonor.com and explore the many resources of value there.

A proxy is an agent who has been legally authorized to act on behalf of someone else. When shareholders are unable to attend corporate meetings they can still cast their votes by using a proxy, who votes on their behalf. The proxy needs to produce a power of attorney document.

Generally shareholders get a mail from the particular company, in which they hold shares, prior to any meeting containing several documents providing information about the company’s growth, performance, its management, information about changes in the share structure, notices about any mergers or acquisitions etc. The mail would contain all the matters that shareholders would require to vote during the meeting. Along with these documents, there would be a form to allow shareholders to vote by a proxy if they cannot attend the meetings in person.

Importance of Proxy Voting

Shareholders have to carefully study all the documents provided to them and cast their votes. It is the primary means by which a shareholder can influence a company’s operations, its corporate governance and other important issues. Therefore voting and making their choices clear is very essential for a shareholder. Hence, voting in person is not possible; proxy voting becomes essential for a shareholder. Usually a shareholder has the right to cast one vote per share he owns, so it is important that the shareholder casts his vote at least by a proxy. Proxy voting enables a shareholder to own shares of companies registered all over the world and influence the company’s decisions.

The Role of Institutional Investors

Thanks to the Internet, several large institutional investors post their decisions online explaining their stance and making small time investors aware of why they have made their choice. They put up proxy voting guidelines, helping proxy voters to know their views about the matters to be decided on at the meeting. These institutional investors can urge the company to alter or at times even withdraw some of the proposals making the institutional investor’s proxy voting guidelines fairly important.

Proxy Voting - Service Providers

The Internet has made it very easy for shareholders to cast their proxy votes online. Proxy service providers, such as EquiServe, Automatic Data Processing and other such companies deliver the documents in an automated electronic format and the shareholders just have to fill out the form and cast their votes. They have to log in using a personal number or a code number assigned to them and cast a vote for or against the corporate resolution that has been proposed.

Companies allow shareholders to nominate members to the board of directors. While it may be a refreshing change to get to nominate directors, the shareholders should have the prudence and the ability to elect an appropriate person who will guide the company to better, above-average growth and to ensure good corporate governance in the company. The wrong choice may make them elect someone with no experience causing a lot of harm to the company. Shareholders get to vote on such matters as election of directors, auditors, acquisitions and mergers.

The Role of Internet

Owing to the excellent choice of software available to enable the process of proxy voting to be simple and easy for a shareholder, within a matter of a few minutes a shareholder can cast his vote by a proxy through the Internet or by a simple phone call. The Internet has made it possible for an investor to own shares of companies across the globe and cast his vote after making an informed decision influencing the company’s decisions regarding corporate governance and other important issues.

David Gass is President of Business Credit Services, Inc., founder of http://www.SmallBusinessConsulting.com and co-developer of the Corporate Manager Software which manages the records of a Corporation or LLC. For a Free Trial of the software visit http://www.corporateforms.net

A small business loan is one of the most treasured commodities in the business world. It is still very hard to get despite the claims and promises of banks, credit unions, and other lending institutions that they want to help American small business to survive and grow. In fact it sometimes seems that banks and other lenders want to see small businesses fail and only support those that survive the battle for customers, revenues, and finances during their first two years.

Getting a small business loan is most difficult during these first two years, when most businesses face a myriad of challenges involved with not only opening their doors, but hiring and training staff and meeting the demands of customers, clients, suppliers and vendors. The main reason that the banks use for not granting many loans during this period is like the same reason that a student can’t get a job coming out of school. They don’t have the experience.

The other major reason behind that first reason is that the banks think that many small businesses are simply too great a risk to offer them a small business loan. On that front they do have a point. The majority of small businesses open and close their doors for good during that first year and from the banks’ perspective they don’t want to risk losing their investment during this period.

But after a small business survives those first two years of struggle the banks are much more accommodating. By then the business not only has experience and has proven its capacity to overcome adversity, it also has a track record of being in business. This will include having a financial statement or income tax return prepared twice as well as a record of how well they have been paying their bills to other businesses, suppliers and vendors.

The banks are able to access this information by doing a business credit check from any one of a number of business credit reporting agencies. They can also access a company’s payment record by reviewing their Paydex Score which is available from business reporting company, Dun and Bradstreet. Whenever there is an application for a small business loan, all lenders will review this information before even looking at the rest of the loan application.

If all the business credit checks and reports come back okay the banks and other lending institutions may look further into the business requesting a small business loan and this often includes a personal financial check on the owners or operators of the company. They may ask for business references to follow up with and they may even ask for a personal guarantee or collateral before granting a small business loan.

Agencies like the Small Business Administration can assist small businesses to obtain a small business loan since almost all of the monies provided to small businesses are guaranteed by them even before the bank loosens up its money strings.

David Gass is President of Business Credit Services, Inc. His company publishes a weekly e-newsletter on Starting and Growing a Small Business at http://www.smallbusinessconsulting.com You can sign up for their free newsletter by visiting http://www.smallbusinessconsulting.com