Startup [electronic resource] : An Insider's Guide to Launching and Running a Business /
Ready, Kevin.author.
“If I was going to start a new business today I would be sure to study and pay close attention to Kevin Ready’s new book, Startup. His wisdom, experience, and his self-effacing and honest writing make this a real gem for aspiring entrepreneurs and business people of all kinds.” —Bob Beaudine, author of The Power of WHO Startup: An Insider's Guide to Launching and Running a Business is for people who are excellent at something—product or web development, writing code, marketing or selling anything—but who are now toiling for others. Yet they have long had a dream: to take that special skill set and use it, on their own terms, in a startup business. This pattern is romanticized by the media in the form of the “tech entrepreneur”—the guy brainstorming with buddies in a garage who ends up selling his startup for millions. But what is the reality behind stories like that one? For that matter, what mental processes, frames of reference, hard knocks, and lessons learned make up the “back story” behind any startup success? This book not only reveals the actual experience of entrepreneurship, but it provides readers with a set of universal entrepreneurial skills and tools they can use to build a business. Author Kevin Ready has made this journey, and more than once. He earned his MBA—Master of Bruise Acquisition—through numerous encounters with “situations,” problems, black holes, bad employees, sea monsters, not enough money, and other karate chops to the organizational body. Startup illustrates in detail the lessons he learned the hard way—so you don’t have to. Backed up by stories of both his successes and failures, Ready helps readers learn shortcuts to help them do what eight out of 10 entrepreneurs can’t: Build and sustain a successful start-up. Illustrates the entrepreneurial journey from start to finish Helps readers decide—or not—to start a business Provides dozens of lessons learned and other takeaways budding entrepreneurs can put to use today.
Title Page; Copyright; About the Author; Acknowledgments; Preface; So How Did I Become an Entrepreneur?; How to Read This Book; Come Fly with Me; Table of Contents; Chapter 1 Setting the Stage; Entrepreneurship and Resonance; Entrepreneurs Create Something New; It Is Compelling; You Can Scale It; You Can Control It; A Ticket to the Game; Nobody Cares About Your Business; What Is a Business?; The Boat; The Employee; The Entrepreneur; Launch Strategies; The Soft Launch; Jumping In; Joining Someone Else's Party; Different Kinds of Work; The Laborer: Shoveling Dirt
Like a Boss: Have Other People Shovel Dirt forYouThe Big Boss: Hire a Team of Managers toManage the Shovelers; The Impresario: Invent a New Shovel and SellIt to the Shovelers; The Impresario Grande: Invent a Shovel andSell It to the Big Bosses; Grains of Sand; Intrinsic Motivation; A Vision to Guide You; A Passion for Pizza; The Bootstrap Mentality; Impact to Your Personal Life; Financial Strings Attached; Life on Hold; Time; Impact to Your Health; Resources; Chapter 2 Core Lessons; Basics Win Ball Games; No Partial Credit; Diversify; Common Single Points of Failure
A Single Distribution ChannelA Single Key Employee; A Single Channel; An Outsized Large Client; Specific Intention; A Waste of Cash, Time, and Energy; Backing Up the Truck; How to Determine the Demand of the Market; Make Yourself Obsolete; The Self-Regulating Business; The Self-Determining Business; You Will Need More Money Than YouThink; Active Iteration; Always Get a Contract; Watch Intellectual Property; Control the Money; Hope for the Best but Plan for the Worst; Changing Plans Is Easier When You Change Early; Value and Preserve Your Agility; Mistakes Are Inevitable
Customer Complaints: Treat Them Like GoldThe Dollar Exercise; Chapter 3 Marketing; Choose Your Product Well; What You Have to Work With; What Are You Shooting For?; What Is the Opening in the Market?; What Separates a Hobby from a Business?; Will You Be a Whale or an Eskimo?; The Precious Slice; Why You?; The Internet Is Not Magic; Parity Products and the Bozo Factor; The Two Approaches to Differentiation; Positional Differentiation; Structural Differentiation; Know Your Customer; When You Have Multiple Customers; Image Counts; If You Build It, They Will Come; Radicalize
Never Ask Water to Climb a LadderA Marketer's Tale; The Problem; What She Should Have Done; Climbing the Mountain; Learn to Love Statistics; The Marketing Mix; Product Pricing; Case Study: Meridian World Data and Pricing; Oprah Is Not Your Marketing Plan; If You Can't Measure It, You Can'tControl It; Chapter 4 Building a Team; Your Network Will Determine YourSuccess; The Best Employees Would Do the WorkEven Without the Job; The Psychological Contract; A Contract for Your Team Members; My Commitment; Manage Different People In DifferentWays; Friends as Employees; Friends as Partners
Hire Well or Not at All
Includes index.
Includes index.
“If I was going to start a new business today I would be sure to study and pay close attention to Kevin Ready’s new book, Startup. His wisdom, experience, and his self-effacing and honest writing make this a real gem for aspiring entrepreneurs and business people of all kinds.” —Bob Beaudine, author of The Power of WHO Startup: An Insider's Guide to Launching and Running a Business is for people who are excellent at something—product or web development, writing code, marketing or selling anything—but who are now toiling for others. Yet they have long had a dream: to take that special skill set and use it, on their own terms, in a startup business. This pattern is romanticized by the media in the form of the “tech entrepreneur”—the guy brainstorming with buddies in a garage who ends up selling his startup for millions. But what is the reality behind stories like that one? For that matter, what mental processes, frames of reference, hard knocks, and lessons learned make up the “back story” behind any startup success? This book not only reveals the actual experience of entrepreneurship, but it provides readers with a set of universal entrepreneurial skills and tools they can use to build a business. Author Kevin Ready has made this journey, and more than once. He earned his MBA—Master of Bruise Acquisition—through numerous encounters with “situations,” problems, black holes, bad employees, sea monsters, not enough money, and other karate chops to the organizational body. Startup illustrates in detail the lessons he learned the hard way—so you don’t have to. Backed up by stories of both his successes and failures, Ready helps readers learn shortcuts to help them do what eight out of 10 entrepreneurs can’t: Build and sustain a successful start-up. Illustrates the entrepreneurial journey from start to finish Helps readers decide—or not—to start a business Provides dozens of lessons learned and other takeaways budding entrepreneurs can put to use today.
Business.
Management science.
Business and Management, general.