THE GURU GUIDES

This book answers a very simple question. Let’s suppose that you went out and acquired all the books and articles you could find written by and about the world’s greatest entrepreneurs—people like Bill Gates, Michael Dell, and Sam Walton. Suppose you took the time to read all of the articles and books. What would you learn about what it takes to become a successful entrepreneur?

This book is the result such an effort. Here you will find the wisdom of over 70 of the world’s greatest entrepreneurs carefully extracted from more than 250 books and over 2000 articles about their ideas and exploits. We call this book The Guru Guide to Entrepreneurship. Think of it as your synthesis and digest of the best thinking about what it takes to succeed on your own.

The Guru Guide to Entrepreneurship provides you with a clear, concise, and informative guide to the wisdom of some of the world’s most successful entrepreneurs. It is a digest of the best thinking about what it takes to start your own business and succeed. But, we have designed this book to be more than just a digest. This book also provides you with a much-needed cross reference to the best thinking about the key issues involved in starting and running a business. The ideas of each entrepreneur are linked with those of others who agree or disagree. We identify the ideas and concepts that fit together and those that conflict. We provide you with an easy-to-follow guide to exploring the secrets of success of some of the worlds’ most successful entrepreneurs . We report on methods and results. Finally, we provide you with an evaluation of their strengths and weaknesses.

Table of Contents

The Guru Guide™ to Entrepreneurship consists of six chapters. Each chapter covers an important issue about starting and running a business and summarizes the ideas of our panel of gurus on that issue.

Chapter 1, "Should You Do It?" answers the most basic of questions. What does it take to be an entrepreneur? What attributes or characteristics are essential for success? How do you know if you have what it takes to become the next Bill Gates or Sam Walton, founders of Microsoft and Wal-mart, respectively? In this chapter we provide three self-tests for entrepreneurial potential offered by our gurus. We then discuss five constants of experience and opinion that our gurus say successful entrepreneurs share.

In Chapter 2, "The Perfect Idea," we examine where our gurus get their ideas for businesses, how they conduct their search, and what they have learned about the necessary ingredients for the perfect foolproof business. Here we outline what our gurus say are six near-perfect foundations for businesses and six suggestions our gurus offer for sharpening any business idea to the point of perfection.

Chapter 3, "Money Matters," deals with one of the activities entrepreneurs say they hate the most; raising money. In this chapter we discuss our gurus recommendations for how you should derive your estimates of start-up costs, raise initial capital, work with bankers and venture capitalists, manage your finances and weigh the pros and cons of going public.

In Chapter 4, "Getting Customers," we reveal our gurus tricks, tips, and techniques for attracting customers. We show you how they use promotions and gimmicks to get attention; how they court the press to garner free publicity; how they conduct market research; and how they develop and use advertising,

Of course once you attract customers, you want to keep them. That’s what Chapter 5, "Keeping Customers" is all about. We show you how our gurus calculate the value of a customer and describe three things that our gurus say are key to keeping customers for life. Among other things, in this chapter we outline our gurus secrets for providing world-class quality and service and for listening and responding effectively to customer complaints, ideas, and suggestions.

In our concluding chapter, "Managing People," we discuss how our gurus hire, inspire, motivate, reward, and, when necessary, fire the people who work for them. Among other things we explain in this chapter why our gurus say it is a mistake to try to hire people for specific jobs; and, why it is good to be a "tough" boss. We reveal our gurus secrets for developing team spirit; and, how they empower people to do what is right to exceed customer expectations all the time.

Our Gurus

In alphabetical our entrepreneur gurus are:

J. Waiter (Walt) Anderson, co-founder White Castle

Marc Andreessen, co-founder of Netscape Communications

Mary Kay Ash, founder of Mary Kay Cosmetics

James L. (Jim) Barksdale, co-founder Netscape

Phineas Taylor (P.T.) Barnum, founder of "The Greatest Show on Earth"

Jeff Bezos, founder and CEO of Amazon.com

Arthur Blank, co-founder of Home Depot

Richard Branson, founder of the Virgin Group

Charles Brewer, founder of Mindspring.com

Warren Buffett, founder of numerous investment companies and owner of Berkshire Hathaway

William Alle Burpee, founder of Burpee Seed Company

Tom Chappell, co-founder of Tom's of Maine

Jim Clark, founder of Silicon Graphics and co-founder of Netscape Communications

Ben Cohen, co-founder Ben & Jerry's Ice Cream

Michael Coles, co-founder of the Great American Chocolate Chip Cookie Company

Finis Conner, founder of Conner Peripherals

Joshua Lionel Cowen, founder of Lionel Trains

Cecil B. Day, co-founder Days Inn of America, Inc.

Michael Dell, founder of Dell Computers

Anthony Desio, founder of Mail Boxes, Etc.

Roy Disney, co-founder of Disney Brothers Studio (later Walt Disney Productions, Ltd.)

Walt Disney, co-founder of Disney Brothers Studio (later Walt Disney Productions, Ltd.)

Larry Ellison, founder of Oracle Corporation

Charles Ferguson, co-founder Vermeer Technology Inc.

Debbi Fields, founder of Mrs. Fields Cookies, Inc.

Bill Gates, co-founder of Microsoft

Earl Graves, founder, publisher and editor of Black Enterprise

Jerry Greenfield, co-founder Ben & Jerry's Ice Cream

Andrew Grove, co-founder of Intel Corporation

Bud Hadfield, founder of Kwik Kopy and Franklin's Printing

Wilson Harrell, founder of over 100 companies, columnist for Success Magazine and former publisher of Inc. Magazine

Frank Hickingbotham, founder of TCBY (This Can't Be Yogurt)

Soichiro Honda, founder of Honda Motor Company, Ltd.

Wayne Huizenga, founder of Waste Management, Inc., former Chairman of the Board and CEO of Blockbuster Entertainment Corp., chairman and CEO of Republic Waste Industries, Inc.

Masaru Ibuka, co-founder of Sony Corporation

Edgar Waldo (Billy) Ingram, co-founder of White Castle

Kenneth Iverson, former president and chairman of Nucor Corporation

Steven Jobs, co-founder of Apple Computer, Inc.

Howard Johnson, founder of Howard Johnson Co.

Herb Kelleher, founder of Southwest Airlines

Phil Knight, co-founder of Nike Corporation

Jim Koch, founder of Boston Beer Company

Ray Kroc, founder of McDonald's Corporation

Edward Land, founder of Polaroid

Chris Larsen, co-founder of E-Loan

Charles Lazarus, founder of Toys "R" Us

Bill Lear, founder of Lear Jet Corporation

Bernie Marcus, co-founder of Home Depot

Konosuke Matsushita, founder of Matsushita Electric Industrial Company

Jim McLamore, founder of Burger King

Edward Miller, co-founder and Chairman of Spic and Span Inc.

Tom Monaghan, founder of Domino's Pizza

Robert Mondavi, founder of Robert Mondavi Winery

Akio Morita, co-founder of Sony

David Packard, co-founder of Hewlett-Packard

Ross Perot, founder Electronic Data Systems (EDS), founder Perot Systems Corporation, Presidential candidate

Stephen Pollan, financial consultant and writer

Anita Roddick, founder of The Body Shop

Bill Rosenberg, founder of Dunkin Donut

Pleasant Rowland, founder and president of Pleasant Company

Colonel Harland Sanders, founder of Kentucky Fried Chicken (KFC)

Ricardo Semler, president and CEO of Semco, S.A.

Howard Schultz, founder Starbucks Coffee Company

Fred Smith, founder of Federal Express

Thomas Stemberg, co-founder of Staples

Dave Thomas, founder and Senior Chairman of the Board of Wendy's International, Inc.

Ted Turner, founder of Turner Broadcasting System, CNN and Headline News

Jay Van Andel, co-founder of Amway Corporation

Lillian Vernon, founder of the Lillian Vernon Corporation

Sam Walton, founder of Wal-Mart Stores, Inc.

An Wang, founder Wang Laboratories, Inc.

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