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people who are exceptionally good in business aren’t so because of what they know but because of their insatiable need to know more.
they spend their time and energy defending what they think they know.
greatest businesspeople I’ve met are determined to get it right no matter what the cost.
An ethical certainty, a moral principle, a universal truth.
grounded people; they are compulsive about detail, pragmatic, down-to-earth, in touch with the seamy reality of ordinary life.
They know that a business doesn’t miss the mark by failing to achieve greatness in some lofty, principled way, but in the stuff that goes on in every nook and cranny of the business—on the telephone, between the customer and
salesperson, on the shipping dock, at the...
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possess an intuitive understanding that the only way to reach something higher is to focus their attention on the multitude of seemingly insignificant, unimportant, ...
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Those mundane and tedious little things that, when done exactly right, with the...
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and intention, form in their aggregate a distinctive essence, an evanescent quality that distinguishe...
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development of an extraordinary business as a never-ending inquiry, an ongoing investigation, an active engagement with a world of forces,
the continuous evolution of our senses, of our consciousness—of our humanness—
being present in the moment, from being attentive to what’s going on.
Statistics tell us that by the end of the first year at least 40 percent of them will be out of business.
Within five years, more than 80 percent of them—800,000—will have failed.
more than 80 percent of the small businesses that survive the first five years fail in the second five.
Why is this?
This book answers those questions.
which says that small businesses are started by entrepreneurs risking capital to make a profit. This is simply not so. The
fact, this belief in the Entrepreneurial Myth is the most important factor in the devastating rate of
IDEA #2 There’s a revolution going on today in American small business. I call it the Turn-Key Revolution.
Business Development Process.
power to transform any small business into an incredibly effective organization.
step-by-step method that incorporates the lessons of the Turn-Key
Key Revolution into the operation of that business.
an idea that says your business is nothing more than a distinct reflection of who you are.
your thinking is sloppy, your business will be sloppy.
you must change first. If you are unwilling to change, your business will never be capable of giving you what you want.
The face of the rock had become something to cling to rather than to scale. Exhaustion was common, exhilaration rare.
answer is simple: the entrepreneur had only existed for a moment.
call the E-Myth, the myth of the entrepreneur.
small businesses are started by entrepreneurs, when, in fact, most are not.
That Fatal Assumption is: if you understand the technical work of a business, you understand a business that does that technical work.
In fact, it’s the root cause of most small business failures!
The technical work of a business and a business that does that technical work are two totally different things!
the technician suffering from an Entrepreneurial Seizure, a business is not a business but a place to go to work. So
All of them believing that by understanding the technical work of the business they are immediately and eminently qualified to run a business that does that kind of work. And it’s simply not true!
In fact, rather than being their greatest single asset, knowing the technical work of their business becomes their greatest single liability.
The real tragedy is that when the technician falls prey to the Fatal Assumption, the business that was supposed to free him from the limitations of working for somebody else actually enslaves him. Suddenly
the job he knew how to do so well becomes one job he knows how to do plus a dozen others he doesn’t know how to do at all.
actually three-people-in-one: The Entrepreneur, The Manager, and The Technician.
in all of us, let’s examine the way our various internal personalities interact. Let’s take a look at two personalities we’re all familiar with: The Fat Guy and The Skinny Guy. Have you ever decided to go on a diet? You’re sitting in front of the television set one Saturday afternoon, watching an athletic competition, awed by the athletes’ stamina and dexterity. You’re eating a sandwich, your second since you sat down to watch the event two hours before. You’re feeling sluggish in the face of all the action on the screen when, suddenly, somebody wakes up in you and says, “What are you doing?
...more
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Because true trust comes from knowing, not from blind faith. And to know, one must understand. And to understand, one must have an intimate awareness of what conditions are truly present.
What people know and what they don’t. What people do and what they don’t. What people want and what they don’t. How people do what they do and how people don’t. Who people are
Because if Sarah trusted blindly, if she simply left it all up to chance, she wouldn’t be forced to do the work she didn’t want to do. The work of coming to agreement about what her relationship with Elizabeth was about. What role each of them was there to play. What it meant for Sarah to be an owner and Elizabeth to be her employee.
The Entrepreneur, this role of a businessperson, she left everything up to chance.
She abdicated her accountability as an owner and took on the role of just another employee.
“The true question is not how small a business should be but how big. How big can your business naturally
become, with the operative word being naturally? “Because, whatever that size is, any limitation you place on its growth is unnatural, shaped not by the market or by your lack of capital (even though that may play a part) but by your own personal limitations. Your lack of skill, knowledge, and experience, and, most of all, passion, for growing a healthy, functionally dynamic, extraordinary business.
requires intention at the outset of the business, entrepreneurial intention, as well as a willingness—no, a true passion—for the personal transformation such a process will call for: accessing new skills, new understanding, new
