Grow Fast Grow Right Enterprises, LLC Announces
Historic Annual Conference on the Role and Purpose of
Diversity for America’s Growing Companies

(AANEWSWIRE)MEMPHIS, TENNESSEE – On May 3, 2006, Grow Fast Grow Right Enterprises, LLC, will partner with Inc. Magazine, Profiles International and Dickstein Shapiro Morin & Oshinsky to offer a one-day intensive conference on the role and importance of diversity for America’s growing companies at the FedEx Institute of Technology, University of Memphis (Memphis, Tennessee). Because of the focus on business challenges like worker productivity, product marketing, sales, and information technology, managers of growing companies often overlook another important contributor to the bottom line: maintaining a culturally diverse business environment. However, an entrepreneur or company leader that fails to build and maintain a diverse employee and supplier base ignores the strong correlation between ensuring that her company reflects the world around her and long-term business success.

Though this is Grow Fast Grow Right’s first annual conference on diversity, the event promises to be historic in its impact. Attendees will hear from a prestigious roster of speakers and presenters, including Conference Keynote Speaker, Stedman Graham, and Closing Speaker, Dr. Benjamin L. Hooks, and Grow Fast Grow Right Co-Founder Andrew J. Sherman.

Stedman Graham is the chairman and CEO of S. Graham & Associates, a management and marketing consulting company that creates customized training and leadership development programs for corporate and educational markets. He is a distinguished author, entrepreneur and community leader.

Graham’s programs empower young people and adults to overcome the many obstacles and pressures they face by helping them to remove the labels that have been given to them based on race, background, class or environment. "To maximize competitive advantage," says Graham, "we must integrate differences and uniqueness. Yet, the real power is in the hands of the individual to supersede circumstances by re-evaluating his or her worth, recognizing the possibilities, and learning how to create opportunities and capitalize on them."

This conference on diversity as a business multiplier is also a rare opportunity to hear Dr. Benjamin L. Hooks, an inspiring speaker and living legend who served for more than 15 years as the Executive Director of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP). As the NAACP’s Executive Director, Dr. Hooks oversaw the organization’s positions on affirmative action, federal aid to cities, foreign relations with repressive governments and domestic policy decisions of every sort.

Dr. Hooks is both an ordained minister and a practicing attorney whose considerable life experience helped to deepen his resolve to do something about racism, bigotry and improving the image of blacks and other minorities in the media and society, "It is a sad commentary on our times," he once observed, "that blatant appeals to race still can divide us when so many urgent problems beset our nation".

Andrew J. Sherman is a partner in the Washington, DC law firm of Dickstein Shapiro Morin & Oshinsky, LLP and is an authority on the legal and strategic aspects of business growth. Sherman is also the Co-Founder and Chief Educational Officer of Grow Fast Grow Right Enterprises, LLC.

"Diversity is a vital leadership responsibility and business imperative", says Sherman. "Managers are justifiably concerned about the legal ramifications of failing to embrace a top-down commitment to workforce diversity but they should be equally concerned about an inferior or non-existent diversity policy’s impact on sales and operations. Diversity is a business driver and is directly connected to management’s ability to successfully deploy its capital resources."

According to Sherman, the author of 14 books and an adjunct professor in MBA programs at the University of Maryland and Georgetown University, firms can manage and speed growth by adhering to business fundamentals and 12 Grow Fast Grow Right Value Drivers. Companies with successful diversity policies multiply Value Driver benefits.

Sherman’s insights are echoed in the results of a survey of Fortune 500 CEOs, conducted by the research firm Diversity Best Practices:

80% see a strong correlation between an organization’s commitment to diversity and that organization’s long-term success
92% of CEOs ensure that the organization’s board of directors is diverse
90% of CEOs view diversity as a competitive advantage in improving employee retention
85% of CEOs think diversity programs help them become "employers of choice"
100% of survey respondents cite the need for training and education to help their companies achieve their diversity goals
Even if a workplace is a haven of diversity, The Role and Importance of Diversity for America’s Growing Companies will help managers take a fresh look at programs that are working and obtain ideas and insight that can fix programs that aren’t. In addition to a substantial amount of information on diversity as a business multiplier, attendees will have the opportunity to share their successes with each other. They’ll also learn why every organization will eventually have to transform to reflect the women and minorities that will make up 75% of the new workforce. "Diversity is about all of us," says Grow Fast Grow Right’s Sherman. "Diversity is not about finding ways to assimilate specific groups into your corporate culture, but about creating a culture where everyone can thrive."

The cost to attend this conference is $595 and seating is extremely limited. To purchase your ticket electronically, read information on mail or fax registration or learn more about Grow Fast Grow Right Enterprises, LLC’s other events, visit the Website at: http://www.growfastgrowright.com. You can also contact Jason H. Gerbsman, General Manager, Grow Fast Grow Right Enterprises, LLC at 1 (866) GRO-RITE or jason@growfastgrowright.com. You can fax information requests to +1 (301) 564-0380.

Participating Conference Sponsors and Partners include:

Media Partner: Inc. Magazine

Activity Sponsors:

American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME): Networking Breakfast & Registration
Dickstein Shapiro Morin & Oshinsky, LLP: Lunch & Post Meal Networking
Profiles International, Inc.: Archived Webcast of the Event
Strategic Partners:

American Society of Mechanical Engineers
The Association of Small Business Development Centers (ASBDC)
Financial Executives International (FEI)
The Mid-South Minority Business Council (MMBC)
The Minority Corporate Counsel Association (MCCA)
TEC International
National Association of Women Business Owners (NAWBO)
National Black MBA Association
National Society of Hispanic MBA’s
The Indus Entrepreneurs (TIE)
The US Pan Asian American Chamber of Commerce (USPAACC)
United States Hispanic Chamber of Commerce
Women's Business Enterprise National Council (WBENC)

About Grow Fast Grow Right Enterprises, LLC

Grow Fast Grow Right: The Executive’s Edge for Breakthrough Results™ supports corporate policy makers, founders, lawyers, accountants, managers and human resource professionals in companies of all sizes. Grow Fast Grow Right gives decision makers the insights, tools and strategies that are needed to grow their companies.

Andrew J. Sherman, Esq. (email: shermana@dsmo.com) is a recognized thought leader and authority on the legal and strategic aspects of business growth and has advised over 500 companies on the development of growth strategies. He served as chairman of the professional advisory board of the National Commission on Entrepreneurship and has been interviewed by CNN, CNBC and Bloomberg, as well as The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post, Inc., Fortune, and Investor’s Business Daily.

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