A method of identifying target businesses with above-average potential to achieve a selected financial performance target, in accordance with the principles of one embodiment of this invention comprises identifying a plurality of model businesses which have already achieved the selected financial performance target; identifying financial statistics common to the identified model businesses; and screening target businesses for the financial statistics common to the identified businesses. The financial statistics preferably include: at least one of historic annual sales, annual sales growth rates, and time since found to exceed selected annual sales thresholds, gross margins, SG&D, R & D expense, EBIDTA, cash flow from operations, market capitalization.