Entrepreneurship Tips — Business Tips

Creating a Culture of Innovation to Win Entire Markets Are you in charge of innovation? Every CEO is. And many others should be too. Peter Drucker famously said: “Companies have only two jobs: Marketing and Innovation”. I believe he is 100% correct as everything else is relatively easy. The other things do not need much creativity, which is the rarest resource. This is why Hollywood screen writers, Producers, top Directors and Authors make very big bucks.  Not to mention successful Entrepreneurs like Elon Musk.  Who BTW spends almost all his time on product focused innovation. These two videos, and guiding...

  BEFORE After 3 Years   Revenue $20M, low profitability at < 10%   Four Locations, one failing Founder stressed with no real management team Growth rate: 15% CAGR Poor morale and recurring revenue with high employee turnover. Business Value: ~ $20 million   Revenue $40 million, high profitability at over 25% not including huge increase in enterprise value Six locations Founder has full team in place (done in first 6 months).  Less stress, more success and growth. CAGR: 40%-50%+ Morale improved greatly. Reduction in turn-over especially in senior positions. Offer to buy from Private equity firm for $60 million...

Well, I think the question is the wrong one to ask, really. It trivializes entrepreneurship. Would you ask, “How do I do my first brain operation?” Or “how do I play Carnegie Hall?  Nope!  The question should be what do I do to prepare to launch a startup? First understand that ideas are literally worthless. The press promoting the concept that an "idea is worth millions" is a problem. Building a company takes many things, and the person with only an “idea” has no chance. It is typically a 3 to 5 year to turn an idea into a business....

Giving Toothless Boards Some Bite  By Peter Cohen   Most directors are stuck in a system that makes it tough for them to protect shareholder interests. The author offers two solutions. The possibility of directors paying out of their own pockets for corporate misconduct occurring under their watch has been raised by three recent cases. On January, 18 Enron directors agreed to pay $168 million -- 10 of them spent $13 million of their own money -- to settle their portions of securities class-action suits. In February, a deal fell apart that would have had 10 former WorldCom directors settling...

Consultants And Getting The Most Value Added As a CEO I struggled long and hard over any decision to use a consultant. There are many issues that need to be managed by the client to keep a consultant from going overboard on time and costs. Too many need to long to get up to speed on your business (on your dime), cost too much, and can not provide tangible results on a limited project basis. Too many are unproductive and do things in ten hours that I know I could have done in 2-3 hours, as paying by the hour...