Small Business Economics

In the new edition of this fascinating book, a book that has appeared on MSNBC, CNBC, Slashdot.org, Lifehacker.com and in the New York Times, best-selling author Scott Berkun pulls the best lessons from the history of innovation, including the recent software and web age, to reveal powerful and surprising truths about how ideas become successful innovations - truths people can easily apply to the challenges of today.

Most new startups today are in highly regulated industries with strong incumbents - transportation, hotels, drones, energy, gaming, education, health care, cannabis, finance, liquor, insurance. The more startups try to snatch a piece of the establishment's pie, the more they risk running into a political wall. That's where Bradley Tusk comes in. As Tusk writes, "Every new company is essentially a tech startup. And when you disrupt someone in any industry, they don't say thank you. They punch you in the nose.

In the last thirty years, the developing world has undergone tremendous changes. Overall, poverty has fallen, people live longer and healthier lives, and economies have been transformed. And yet many countries have simply missed the boat. Why have some countries prospered, while others have failed? Stefan Dercon argues that the answer lies not in a specific set of policies, but rather in a key "development bargain," whereby a country's elites shift from protecting their own positions to gambling on a growth-based future.

Will Africa be the world's next hub of manufacturing? China is answering in the affirmative and investing accordingly. This book dispels the notion that this crucial story is merely about China's exploitation of Africa's resources, illuminating deep questions about our own Western approach to development and the implications for the future of manufacturing. The fact that China sees Africa not for its poverty but for its potential wealth is a striking departure from the attitude of the West, in particular the United States.

While playing hooky from a conference in Boston a few years back, three former colleagues from Northwestern's Kellogg School of Management hopped in a car and headed on a road trip. They pulled into a shoe store in Maine and noticed that the sales help was unusually pushy. After a few questions, they discovered the store had a "secret shopper" program, in which employees would be marked down if they were not sufficiently aggressive with customers. A lightbulb went off.

Victor W. Hwang and Greg Horowitt propose a radical new theory to explain the nature of innovation ecosystems: human networks that generate extraordinary creativity and output. They argue that free market thinking fails to consider the impact of human nature on the innovation process. This ambitious work challenges the basic assumptions that economists have held for over a century.

In Secrets of Silicon Valley, entrepreneur and media commentator Deborah Perry Piscione takes us inside this vibrant ecosystem where meritocracy rules the day. She explores Silicon Valley's exceptionally risk-tolerant culture, and why it thrives despite the many laws that make California one of the worst states in the union for business.

For 80 years, Dale Carnegie & Associates, Inc., has been training people to get the most out of what they put into their careers. The Leader in You builds on the fundamentals of human relationships to help you develop your own innate leadership skills. Learn basic techniques and find the leader in you to succeed.

How can we solve the problem of persistent poverty in low-status communities? Majora Carter argues that these areas need a talent-retention strategy, just like the ones companies have. Retaining homegrown talent is a critical part of creating a strong local economy that can resist gentrification. But, too many people born in low-status communities measure their success by how far away from them they can get.

From Uber to the presidential debates, the gig economy has been dominating the headlines, and for good reason. Today, more than a third of Americans are working in the gig economy - mixing together short-term jobs, contract work, and freelance assignments. For those who've figured out the formula, life has never been better! The Gig Economy is your guide to this uncertain but ultimately rewarding world. Succeeding in it starts with shifting gears to recognize that only you control your future.

The little-engine-that-could story of how a band of scrappy entrepreneurs are reviving the enterprise of manufacturing clothing in the United States.

From Michael LeBoeuf, the best selling author of Working Smart and the audio programs Working Smarter, Imagineering, and The Perfect Business, comes How to Win Customers and Keep Them for Life. With a hardhitting, action-ready rewards-and-incentives ideology, this is the ultimate program to building a successful business through customer satisfaction.

Starting a business can be a remarkable journey that can change your life for the better. But, before you start, you need to choose the perfect business idea. This amazing audiobook is packed with the best, most profitable business ideas and ways to earn extra cash. Every one of these businesses is generating profits for other ambitious people. Now it's your turn to start your own business and prosper in the years to come.

A series of shifts are happening in our economy: Millennials are trading in conventional career paths to launch tech start-ups, start small businesses that are rooted in local communities, or freelance their expertise. We are sharing everything, from bikes and cars, to extra rooms in our homes. We now create, buy and sell handcrafted products in our local communities with ease. CEO of Imperative Aaron Hurst argues in his latest book that while these developments seem unrelated at first, taken together they reveal a powerful pattern that points to purpose as the new driver of the American economy.

Successful Black Entrepreneurs is an insightful collection of Harvard Business School case studies about Black entrepreneurs succeeding in a variety of industries and through different routes, including start-ups, franchising, and acquisitions. The book also recognizes and celebrates Black entrepreneurial excellence, as it takes the listener through the stages of entrepreneurship, including ideation, raising capital, growing the company, and taking it public.

Are you ready to quit the rat race job and live a free life? Do you feel you overloaded by your office work? Do you want to change the state of things by starting your own business? This book will provide you a set of proven techniques which can help you to start a business from scratch and achieve financial freedom by turning your dreams to reality.

What makes the dream of self-employment so alluring, so pervasive in today's world? Benjamin C. Waterhouse offers a provocative argument: the modern cult of the hustle is a direct consequence of economic failures—bad jobs, stagnant wages, and inequality—since the 1970s. With original research, Waterhouse traces a new narrative history of business in America, populated with vivid characters—from the activists, academics, and work-from-home gurus who hailed business ownership as our economic salvation to the upstarts who took the plunge. Some flourish; some squeak by. Some fail.

The curtain is about to rise, say Pine and Gilmore, on the Experience Economy, a new economic era in which every business is a stage, and companies must design memorable events for which they charge admission. With The Experience Economy, Pine and Gilmore explore how successful companies, using goods as props and services as the stage, create experiences that engage customers in an inherently personal way.

Many of the most dynamic public companies, from Alibaba to Facebook to Visa, and the most valuable start-ups, such as Airbnb and Uber, are matchmakers that connect one group of customers with another group of customers. Economists call matchmakers multisided platforms because they provide physical or virtual platforms for multiple groups to get together. Dating sites connect people with potential matches, for example, and ride-sharing apps do the same for drivers and riders.

Silicon Valley, Singapore, Tel Aviv--the global hubs of entrepreneurial activity all bear the marks of government investment. Yet, for every public intervention that spurs entrepreneurial activity, there are many failed efforts that waste untold billions in taxpayer dollars. When has governmental sponsorship succeeded in boosting growth, and when has it fallen terribly short?