If You Really Want to Change the World by Henry Kressel

As one chapter heading notes: “Market pain = market opportunity. Each is weighty and demands considerable research and graft. The framework the book offers is eight steps. ‘Fail fast, fail often’ is marketing rubbish.” It’s not that you shouldn’t have to move on sometimes, but it shouldn’t be a strategy. “There is a problem with basing your business solely on your love of a piece of technology.” They quote Michael Moritz, the venture capitalist at Sequoia Capital: “Pivot means you’ve failed. This “pivot until you succeed” strategy has appeal for those in love with the technology who want to launch it to find out what their customer base is. This is not a book for creators of fart apps. Your hope is to get to a state where the product you develop actually meets the market need.” This is a bad business model, they write. You put together a team, start the venture and keep trying to succeed by a process of pivoting (trial and error). “The idea seems simple enough: you have a broad venture concept but not a clear understanding of the market and product. Moreover, they want to counter an idea that has become fashionable in the start-up world: the cult of failure. Our book will be your Sherpa - to help you establish your base camp, learn the routes and get to the top of Mount Everest.” Yet every day, they write, “entrepreneurs attempt to create great companies with only the most rudimentary information.

No one would attempt such a feat without studying the routes and the climate, laying out the foundations and being helped by experienced Sherpas. There is something old fashioned about its message amid a book market that is saturated with take-away ideas that often turn out to be disposable.Īt the start the authors, Henry Kressel and Norman Winarsky - experienced technologists, venture capitalists and executives - cite the venture capitalist Vinod Khosla, who said creating a great company can be like climbing Mount Everest. It has no quick fixes - this is all about understanding the nuts and bolts, how to roll your sleeves up, do the hard work.

If You Really Want to Change the World by Henry Kressel