Wesco International made a stock-and-cash offer worth about $4.1 billion for Anixter International, but Anixter's board voted to accept a slightly lower all-cash offer from private equity firm Clayton, Dublier & Rice. Shareholders will vote Feb. 4 on the proposal.

Cardinal Health CEO Mike Kaufmann has promoted gender equity, instructing male leaders to treat women and men similarly and requiring managers to seek out a diverse pool of candidates for hiring and promoting. "Every single day, as a leader or a manager, ... you have to have this on your mind because if you don't, things just tend to revert back to the mean," Kaufmann says.

Amazon's continued investment in logistics and next-day deliveries could cut into the freight trucking industry's already thin profit margins, writes Brian Aoaeh. Other trends likely to affect the industry include business process automation and autonomous trucks, Aoaeh writes.

A new year is the perfect opportunity to come up with new strategies and take advantage of the latest business-to-business trends, writes Christine Warner. Among the things to consider: streamlining campaigns, outsourcing content creation and rethinking the funnel.

Leaders can build accountability by spelling out what's expected from employees in terms of results and behaviors, monitoring progress daily and applying positive and negative consequences based on outcomes, says S. Chris Edmonds in this blog post and video. "Without consequences, clear agreements and monitoring do not ensure either results or respect," he says.

Use next month as an opportunity to evaluate the business, stop what's not working and shift everyone's focus to delivering outcomes, writes Adam Bryant. "A simplification month is a smart approach to focus everyone's attention on one of the greatest challenges for companies of any size: complexity," he writes.

The October kickoff meeting was so popular that the NAW Institute and Texas A&M are holding a second kickoff meeting Jan. 23, so more companies can participate in our groundbreaking Digitizing the Sales Process Consortium. Distributors: This is your opportunity to contribute to this fundamental research on how distributors will determine which portions of the sales process will be digitized. Learn more here; if you're interested, you have to register soon, because only four seats are available.

Don't miss the NAW 2020 Executive Summit: INNOVATE TO DOMINATE, Jan. 28-30! This year's forward-looking program and networking with distributors who are your peers will really shake up your thinking, provide you with fresh ideas and critical thinking, and give you a rare chance to benchmark your business. You'll walk away with valuable insights that you'll translate into ideas to help you run your business more effectively and profitably. Register today.

Enjoy premier travel perks and savings when signing up for Hertz Gold Plus Rewards with your NAW discount code CDP# 55709. Skip the counter to go directly to your reserved car, pay no additional drive fee in the US and more.* Visit Hertz's website to sign up for free. *Terms and conditions apply.