Bestselling author Matthew Lesko has designed a practical, comprehensive roadmap for those who want to start or expand a business. He's doing Uncle Sam's job, showing taxpayers where to tap into 9,000 sources of free help, information and even money. More than 300 programs offer money for start-ups, buy-outs, inventions, real estate investments, and more.
Two out of every three businesses are started by women and the Federal, State and Local Governments offer thousands of programs that give money, help and information for women who are starting or expanding their own business.
If you want your startup to succeed, you need to understand why startups fail. “Whether you’re a first-time founder or looking to bring innovation into a corporate environment, Why Startups Fail is essential reading.”—Eric Ries, founder and CEO, LTSE, and New York Times bestselling author of The Lean Startup and The Startup Way Why do startups fail? That question caught Harvard Business School professor Tom Eisenmann by surprise when he realized he couldn’t answer it. So he launched a multiyear research project to find out. In Why Startups Fail, Eisenmann reveals his findings: six distinct patterns that account for the vast majority of startup failures. • Bad Bedfellows. Startup success is thought to rest largely on the founder’s talents and instincts. But the wrong team, investors, or partners can sink a venture just as quickly. • False Starts. In following the oft-cited advice to “fail fast” and to “launch before you’re ready,” founders risk wasting time and capital on the wrong solutions. • False Promises. Success with early adopters can be misleading and give founders unwarranted confidence to expand. • Speed Traps. Despite the pressure to “get big fast,” hypergrowth can spell disaster for even the most promising ventures. • Help Wanted. Rapidly scaling startups need lots of capital and talent, but they can make mistakes that leave them suddenly in short supply of both. • Cascading Miracles. Silicon Valley exhorts entrepreneurs to dream big. But the bigger the vision, the more things that can go wrong. Drawing on fascinating stories of ventures that failed to fulfill their early promise—from a home-furnishings retailer to a concierge dog-walking service, from a dating app to the inventor of a sophisticated social robot, from a fashion brand to a startup deploying a vast network of charging stations for electric vehicles—Eisenmann offers frameworks for detecting when a venture is vulnerable to these patterns, along with a wealth of strategies and tactics for avoiding them. A must-read for founders at any stage of their entrepreneurial journey, Why Startups Fail is not merely a guide to preventing failure but also a roadmap charting the path to startup success.
Presents over 9,000 sources of free information, and offers tips on such topics as applying for money, getting help from a bureaucrat, the Freedom of Information Act, finding information on companies, and women entrepreneurs.
No business operates in America today under purely market forces.Myriad rules and regulations govern every area of business conduct: from establishing the firm to ensuring protection of the environment to hiring and firing policies. More than half of all startups that fail in the first year do so not because they produce inferior products or neglect to analyze the competition, but because they do not understand the regulatory environment in which they operate. In What Entrepreneurs Need to Know about Government, Wesley Truitt presents the most comprehensive overview of government regulation and its impact on business management to date. Covering all levels of regulation (federal, state, and local/municipal) and all stages in a firm's growth cycle (establishment, expansion, and liquidation), Truitt shows entrepreneurs and managers of established business alike how to navigate the minefield of rules and policies that oversee business activity. Drawing from a wide variety of primary data sources and his own extensive experience in the public and private sectors, Truitt clearly explains how government regulation of business has evolved and analyzes its positive and negative implications for management. Featuring descriptions of all the key agencies and summaries of major laws, Truitt offers practical guidance through a huge array of issues, including: intellectual property protection, legal incorporation, product safety and liability, taxes, mergers and acquisitions, employee benefit programs, divestiture, and much more. He identifies common pitfalls to avoid, ways to benefit through government assistance programs, and methods for influencing the policymaking process. Including practical checklists and extensive listings of informational resources, What Entrepreneurs Need to Know about Government is an essential guide for any business competing in the not-so-free market.
Step-by-Step Advice on Making Your Home-Business Dreams a Reality From Priscilla Y. Huff, the leading expert on home businesses for women, The Self-Employed Woman's Guide to Launching a Home-Based Business is your step-by-step resource to getting the business of your dreams up and started in no time. Packed with expert advice and nitty-gritty details about what it takes to run a successful home-based business, this book will show you how to: ·Prepare—physically and mentally—for a new career from home ·Balance work and family time for maximum enjoyment—and minimum stress ·Find and fill out the proper tax, license, and insurance forms ·Handle customers and bring in new business ·Implement creative and effective marketing plans ·Manage your finances and accounting with ease ·And much, much more! Filled with valuable resources and profiles of successful home-based entrepreneurs, this book answers all your questions about starting an enjoyable and profitable venture.
"Based on in-depth interviews with more than 200 leading entrepreneurs, [including the founders of LinkedIn, Chipotle, eBay, Under Armour, Tesla Motors, SpaceX, Spanx, Airbnb, PayPal, JetBlue, Gilt Group, Theranos, and Dropbox], a business executive and senior fellow at [the Harvard Kennedy School] identifies the six essential disciplines needed to transform your ideas into real-world successes, whether you're an innovative manager or an aspiring entrepreneur"--
