The Facts of Business Life: What Every Successful Business Owner Knows that You Don't

The Facts of Business Life: What Every Successful Business Owner Knows that You Don't

by Bill McBean
Released October 2012
Publisher(s): Wiley
ISBN: 9781118094969

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Book description

Being a successful business owner means more than knowing one's industry and understanding the basic concepts of leadership, management, or motivation. It means being able to master many areas of business, and knowing how each of these areas relate to and build on each other. It also means understanding how those areas change as a business goes through its inevitable life cycle, and how the owner must be prepared to change with them. The Facts of Business Life is the first book designed to provide readers with the means of achieving the kind of long-term understanding that is the key to true and lasting success.

Toward that end, the book covers the seven Facts of Business Life that every successful business owner knows, including: "If You Don't Lead, No One Will Follow," "If You Don't Control It, You Don't Own It," "Protecting Your Company's Assets Should be Your First Priority," "Planning Is About Preparing for the Future, Not Predicting It," "If You Don't Market Your Business, You Won't Have One," "The Marketplace Is a War Zone," and "You Don't Just Have to Know the Business You're In, You Have to Know Business."

Devoting one chapter to each Fact, the book explains what it is, what it means, and, most important, how it can help entrepreneurs achieve success and stay away from potentially harmful mistakes. Equally important, each chapter enables readers to not only understand the Facts on their own, but also in terms of how they impact on a business as it passes through each of the five levels of every successful company's existence: "Ownership and Opportunity," "Creating Your Company's DNA," "From Survival to Success," "Maintaining Success," and "Moving On When It's Time to Go."

Written by a successful businessman with four decades of ownership experience, and packed with valuable advice, The Facts of Business Life presents every business owner—whether he or she is starting, building, maintaining, or exiting a business—with the key facts that, applied together, can ensure a strong and lasting enterprise.

Table of contents

  1. Cover
  2. Contents
  3. Title
  4. Copyright
  5. Dedication
  6. Foreword
  7. Acknowledgments
  8. Introduction
  9. Chapter 1: The Facts of Business Life
    1. The Facts
    2. The Business Life Cycle
  10. Chapter 2: The Five Levels of Business Success
    1. Level 1: Ownership and Opportunity
    2. Level 2: Creating Your Company’s DNA
    3. Level 3: From Survival to Success
    4. Level 4: Maintaining Success
    5. Level 5: Moving on When It’s Time to Go
  11. Chapter 3: Fact 1: If You Don’t Lead, No One Will Follow
    1. Level 1: Ownership and Opportunity
    2. Level 2: Creating Your Company’s DNA
    3. Level 3: From Survival to Success
    4. Level 4: Maintaining Success
    5. Level 5: Moving on When It’s Time to Go
  12. Chapter 4: Fact 2: If You Don’t Control It, You Don’t Own It
    1. Level 1: Ownership and Opportunity
    2. Level 2: Creating Your Company’s DNA
    3. Level 3: From Survival to Success
    4. Level 4: Maintaining Success
    5. Level 5: Moving on When It’s Time to Go
  13. Chapter 5: Fact 3: Protecting Your Company’s Assets Should Be Your First Priority
    1. Protecting Tangible and Intangible Assets
    2. Protecting Products or Services
    3. Protecting People
    4. Level 1: Ownership and Opportunity
    5. Level 2: Creating Your Company’s DNA
    6. Level 3: From Survival to Success
    7. Level 4: Maintaining Success
    8. Level 5: Moving on When It’s Time to Go
  14. Chapter 6: Fact 4: Planning Is About Preparing for the Future, Not Predicting It
    1. The Elements of a Proper Business Plan
    2. Level 1: Ownership and Opportunity
    3. Level 2: Creating Your Company’s DNA
    4. Level 3: From Survival to Success
    5. Level 4: Maintaining Success
    6. Level 5: Moving on When It’s Time to Go
  15. Chapter 7: Fact 5: If You Don’t Market Your Business, You Won’t Have One
    1. The Elements of Marketing
    2. Level 1: Ownership and Opportunity
    3. Level 2: Creating Your Company’s DNA
    4. Level 3: From Survival to Success
    5. Level 4: Maintaining Success
    6. Level 5: Moving on When It’s Time to Go
  16. Chapter 8: Fact 6: The Marketplace Is a War Zone
    1. The Products or Services You Sell
    2. How Your Business Operates
    3. How Your Business Competes—The “X” Factor
    4. Level 1: Ownership and Opportunity
    5. Level 2: Creating Your Company’s DNA
    6. Level 3: From Survival to Success
    7. Level 4: Maintaining Success
    8. Level 5: Moving on When It’s Time to Go
  17. Chapter 9: Fact 7: You Don’t Just Have to Know the Business You’re In, You Have to Know Business
    1. Product
    2. People
    3. Accounting and Finance
    4. You
    5. Level 1: Ownership and Opportunity
    6. Level 2: Creating Your Company’s DNA
    7. Level 3: From Survival to Success
    8. Level 4: Maintaining Success
    9. Level 5: Moving on When It’s Time to Go
  18. Conclusion
  19. About the Author
  20. Index

Product information

  • Title: The Facts of Business Life: What Every Successful Business Owner Knows that You Don't
  • Author(s): Bill McBean
  • Release date: October 2012
  • Publisher(s): Wiley
  • ISBN: 9781118094969