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Drive anywhere outside of a major metropolitan area, and you will find roads and bridges in need of serious repair. Talk to business owners, and they will tell you how the difficulty of moving goods from where they are produced to where they are sold hurts their margins. It is time to improve the aging infrastructure of the United States. Regardless of how policymakers decide to finance such a project, the multi-year infrastructure investment will boost economic growth, create jobs and provide a significant opportunity for middle market businesses.

The cloud is one of the largest drivers of emerging technology solutions, and for many organizations, it has become one of their most valuable information technology (IT) tools. It enhances data storage capabilities, security and agility to both scale up as well as scale down, while also reducing costs, in part due to its inherent flexibility and the number of potential options. Forward-thinking organizations should be analyzing and making decisions about using the cloud by prioritizing capability, performance, total cost and availability against other solutions.

In May 2014, FASB issued Accounting Standards Update (ASU) 2014-09, Revenue from Contracts with Customers (Topic 606), changing the way revenue is recognized. As of January 25, 2017, the FASB has issued ASUs to revise and clarify the guidance on the original Topic 606. In accordance with the core principle of Topic 606, there are five key steps to consider. Virtually all entities will be affected to some extent by the new guidance.

Since the issuance of the original ASU 2014-09, Revenue from Contracts with Customers, there has been several changes to that guidance, and additional limited changes are in process. The degree to which a particular entity’s revenue will be affected depends on its own facts and circumstances.

Owner-managed and family-owned businesses are often faced with the quandary of how to effectively motivate their teams to build and maintain value for the enterprise. Incentivizing employees for the long haul can be confusing territory, and owners should know that options are available in the gray area between cash bonuses and equity ownership. Offering creative packages that link employees to the growth of the company can have an immediate, positive impact on a company's cultural and financial future.

The combination of improving economic data, stronger corporate earnings, and, particularly, potential policies from the Trump administration has created a heady brew for domestic equity markets. Even stocks abroad are posting robust returns. While President Trump’s plans for infrastructure spending, tax cuts, deregulation, and generally growth-focused policies are a key factor in the current U.S. stock rally, these policies are also a main source of uncertainty, and therefore risk, for investors.

Last year, the Western world experienced the twin surprises of the UK’s vote to leave the European Union and Donald Trump’s victory in the U.S. presidential election. Elsewhere, geopolitics will play out in 2017 through numerous elections, the possibility of succession in several countries, continued economic polarization, and more. Multinational organizations must be aware of, and prepare for, such political and economic risks in both developed and developing markets.

The social and political volatility witnessed last year is rooted in trends and phenomena that have been building up for more than a decade. It has altered the political agenda in advanced economies and emerging markets alike. Companies need to think hard about the structural shifts that may confront them in five specific areas: security of company property, ease of doing business, viability of strategic investments, strength of corporate reputation, and cohesiveness of their workforce.

Political events in 2016 gave rise to increasing nationalism and populism globally. Combined with a global slowdown in economic and trade growth, international integration may already have plateaued and could begin to reverse over the coming decade. Multinational organizations should prepare for potentially significant implications by carefully considering the political threats in the countries in which they operate.

The potential economic and development gains from gender equality are vast and well-documented—and yet they are currently being bypassed. This joint report with the United Nations Foundation explores the market potential of advancing gender equality. By investing in companies offering products and services that promote gender equality, investors can earn the “return on equality,” seizing profitable, under-tapped market opportunities. In fact, narrowing the global gender gap could add U.S. $12 trillion in annual gross domestic product.