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Although entrepreneurs commonly give advice, many of their most valuable lessons are left unsaid. This article lists and explains ten entrepreneurial “secrets.” 1. People are lazy and most innovations involve efficiency or reduced effort. 2. People are impatient and want instant gratification. 3. Starting a new business is a slow and deliberate process, but time is limited. 4. There is value in getting started and learning as you go. 5. Everything is a trade-off. 6. Unexpected things happen. 7. Take care of your body and you will make better decisions. 8. Know the intimate details of a venture. 9. Learn from everything. 10. Don’t be a jerk.

Business growth, though one of the most discussed topics in the entrepreneurial world, is the subject of many faulty assumptions and erroneous beliefs. In detailing the science of business growth, this article starts by debunking the common myth that growth is always good. Growth can create value, but mismanaged growth can destroy value. A growth risk assessment tool is provided so that entrepreneurs can assess whether or not their firm is prepared to grow. Growth requires much more than strategy, and the author shares lessons such as that growth requires constant improvement, that hiring for cultural fit is essential, that a choice must be made between a team culture and a star culture, and that when a firm believes it “has it all right,” it has started to decline. The article discusses business upgrading and the growth plateau, and describes the four ways to grow — through improvements, innovations, scaling, and strategic acquisitions. It ends with a nine-part strategic growth checklist that includes geographic expansion, introduction of complementary products to existing customers, and expansion to new customer segments with existing products.

Little is known about the growing phenomenon of the “reluctant entrepreneur,” or individuals who start new ventures because they have no other choice. Often, these individuals would prefer to work as salaried employees but find themselves jobless; their motivation is less the entrepreneurial spirit than economic necessity. This article, based on an empirical study of 287 reluctant entrepreneurs, examines the personality issues that may drive them and provides evidence that they can achieve impressive results despite their less-than-perfect motivation. The study seeks to find out whether reluctant entrepreneurs possess the “Big Five” characteristics of entrepreneurs — risk-taking, need for achievement, need for autonomy, self-efficacy, and internal locus of control. The authors find that reluctant entrepreneurs are generally older than opportunity entrepreneurs when they start their business, and so have more managerial experience. A higher level of managerial experience predicts a higher level of success, and a higher level of the Big Five characteristics predicts a lower level of reluctance to become and remain an entrepreneur. Although it is encouraging that reluctant entrepreneurs are often successful, it is less encouraging that many are unhappy and want to return to their positions as salaried employees.

Many entrepreneurs believe that simply filling a niche will result in business success, but they fail to see the crucial role of effective media relations. Media coverage is essential in order to raise capital, generate demand, and gain credibility, yet it is difficult to attain. The direct method to attract media coverage is to issue a press release, yet this rarely garners attention unless delivered by a large firm. The indirect method, however, is to cater to the media’s needs — in effect, asking not what a reporter can do for you, but what you can do for a reporter. The author, a Manhattan-based public relations expert, describes how decades ago he earned limited coverage in The Wall Street Journal for a client’s medical product. But rather than focusing on simply promoting the product, he could have leveraged the inventor’s medical credentials and knowledge — this way, the media could have interviewed him as an expert who had made a scientific discovery and then gained familiarity with the product. In another case, a facial recognition product failed to gain publicity until after the World Trade Center attacks, when the inventor was widely interviewed as an authority on how to increase border security. This article suggests that if an entrepreneur can become positioned as a source of information on the broader field encompassing or related to their product, then the media can in turn become the entrepreneur’s "customer."

A recent MBA graduate has just received a one-year business assignment as a business development and marketing advisor to work with the Vietnam Handicraft Initiative (VHI), a vocational training and employment center for people with disabilities, located in Central Vietnam. Her job is to assist the VHI to increase its productivity, become sustainable and strengthen the capacity of the organization through improved business and marketing plans. Within the first four weeks of her arrival, she needs to detail her assessment of the VHI and provide key recommendations and focused work objectives for the remaining 11 months of her placement. She expects that the many cultural differences encountered along the way will provide a real challenge in accurately assessing the VHI and developing a detailed work plan.

Increasingly, commercializing new technological innovations means drawing on multiple inventions spread across various firms. In multi-invention contexts (such as smartphones), a single person or company rarely invents and patents all the components of a commercially viable product. Success requires that companies choose the right business model, manage their patent strategies, and align their business model and company strategies. Firms must choose between integrated business models (assembling as many complementary technologies and commercialization assets as possible within the firm) and non-integrated business models (combining inventions with those of others through component or licensing market relationships). <br><br>After selecting a business model, firms need to implement a patent strategy, which can be broadly categorized as either a) proprietary, where the firm seeks to stake out and defend a proprietary market advantage; b) defensive, where the firm may not wish to use patents to gain a competitive advantage, but needs to not be put at a competitive disadvantage by other firms’ patents; and c) leveraging, where the firm relies on using a patent’s power to prevent others from using the invention, thus enabling the firm to collect revenue, influence a technology, or close business deals. The article concludes by highlighting the importance of firms developing and aligning patent strategies with business models from the beginning, not merely on an ad hoc basis.

Now a public company, Tesla Motors has grown from an IPO and partnerships with Daimler and Toyota. Telsa has forgone the traditional dealership business model to sell directly to the public creating a unique customer experience. Now faced with negative press and reports from analysts that Tesla vehicles are too expensive, Elon Musk must decide what the next steps for Tesla Motors are.

<p style="color: rgb(197, 183, 131);"><strong> AWARD WINNER - Euro-Mediterranean Managerial Practices and Issues, European Foundation for Management Development (EFMD) Case Writing Competition</strong></p><br>The case describes an innovative business model offering wine and a French cultural experience to North Americans. Students are given an opportunity to learn about the challenges of reviving a 1,000-year-old chateau, farmhouse, and vineyard while building a viable wine export and travel experience business. The case refers to a 15-minute online video that includes an interview with the entrepreneur, pictures of the Montlaur estate, and excerpts about Guédelon Castle, a medieval construction project.

This case traces the history of an engineering consulting firm and highlights differences between its two principals. The partnership worked very well overall, and Longview Services made money from the start. But it soon became clear that the duo had some differences in style that would need to be worked through.

This case traces the history of a local, family-owned office supply business as it faces competition from national retailers.

It was 2010, and the Salazar family wanted funding to expand their animal husbandry support services business. They believed the time was right to pursue a bigger share of the expanding market for government, pharmaceutical, and biotechnology contracts with research labs.

Now in his mid-40s, Tom Bandy was not a novice entrepreneur. He was a veteran of the IT revolution two decades earlier. He had started a company after college that successfully exploited a market niche in database management. But by his late 30s, he had lost the business. Now he was ready to launch a new business. And guided by experience, he had some thoughts about how to finance it.

Every time Jim Fonner thought about how his own business had zigged and zagged, he was prone to laugh. Once employed at Weyerhaeuser, the international paper- and wood-products company, Fonner had left the management ranks to transform himself into something very different: one-half of the Beach Blues Brothers, a duo of singing, dancing, Hawaiian shirt-clad salesmen selling patio furniture door to door to Florida hotels. Ten years later, in 2007, he was running a company in Lexington, Virginia, supplying commercial outdoor furniture nationally. It had not exactly been a linear progression to the Shenandoah Valley.

Arnie Katz was thinking about his company's recent expansion into Richmond. It was a different environment than Charlottesville, where the company had started up and experienced its first successes. In a larger, less tight-knit city such as Richmond, he did not believe the company could rely on the same organic word of mouth that had fueled its early growth in Charlottesville. Acquiring new customers in Richmond might require traditional advertising. What kind of mix of the two approaches should he employ?

The new president and CEO of ACCION New York, a community development loan fund, was considering leading her organization in a combination with an affiliate organization, ACCION USA, and that morning, she would be conducting a meeting to discuss how to present the combination question to the directors at Friday's board meeting.

Bandy was no stranger to entrepreneurship and the problems brought about by success. Having honed his programming skills in the 1980s, he had already founded a database company that had seen great success-and then had been squeezed out by investors. He spent a few years after that working for a computing firm in Richmond until a chance remark by his young son spurred him to become an entrepreneur again. In 2005, he founded BandyWorks, a computing services consulting firm.

Katrina Didot's local organic food business, A Bowl of Good, was on the upswing now, and there was a chance to expand operations. In order to do that, Didot knew she needed a partner to shoulder some of the work. Didot had the recipes and knowledge-and she had drive. She needed someone who could make the trains run on time and ensure things flowed smoothly when it came to operations.

Sitting at their kitchen table early one morning, Renee and Gary Harris agreed that they finally had almost everything in place: a solid business plan, a great network of suppliers, an appealing and well-priced menu, start-up capital from their own personal savings

Using computer spreadsheets to track the finances for his restaurant-CC's Gourmet Kitchen-was one of Carl Coleman's least favorite things to do. This had been especially true at the end of each month since he opened. This evening in July 2010 was no different, as one figure in particular, the paltry $2,800 in profit, was characteristically depressing. "If I don't make some changes soon," Coleman said to himself, "I'm not going to be able to afford this."

BL Gruppo was a holding company that operated eight wildly acclaimed and highly rated restaurants, plus a catering operation, in Boston, Massachusetts. Its culinary mini-empire had continually achieved recognition as a great organization. But the story of BL Gruppo was actually two stories, of two entrepreneurial journeys. One was the journey of Barbara Lynch, a high school dropout who, through hard work, self-education, perseverance, and entrepreneurial focus, became a world-class chef. The other was the journey of someone with no formal business training who built a culinary business employing over 230 people and grossing close to $18 million in revenue. Now Lynch faced what she considered one of her biggest challenges: How might she institutionalize her business to sustain the enjoyment expected by her regular customers and the opportunity for advancement by her loyal employees, while at the same time giving her management team and herself chance to monetize and create wealth? And just as important: Should she keep directing her entrepreneurial zeal toward trying new business opportunities? ?