All human beings are entrepreneurs. When we were in the caves, we were all self-employed… finding our food, feeding ourselves. That’s where human history began. As civilization came, we suppressed it. We became “labor” because they stamped us, “You are labor.” We forgot that we are entrepreneurs. That’s the quote from Nobel Peace Prize-winner Muhammad…
A billboard that sat along the 101 Highway in the Bay Area in 2009 put it bluntly: “1,000,000 people overseas can do your job. What makes you so special? For anything desirable, there’s competition. Good entrepreneurs build and brand products that are differentiated from the competition. They are able to answer the question, “Our customers…
Matt Cohler isn’t necessarily a name many would recognize as someone at the forefront of social networking, but Cohler, who is now a partner at Benchmark Capital, carved out a specific professional niche by making choices that differentiated him from the smart people around him. From Chapter 3: Plan to Adapt: Cohler spent six years…
Every good entrepreneur has to hustle and be resourceful in order to get their business off the ground. For example, Pandora’s founder, Tim Westergren, pitched the company to over 300 VCs before receiving any funding and did all sorts of things to keep the company afloat in the meantime. In The Start-Up of You, we argue…
In the first few weeks the book has been available, we’ve been thrilled with the reactions from everyday people for whom The Start-Up of You has made a difference in their lives and careers. On our LinkedIn Group, readers have been introducing themselves to the community and posting their thoughts on the book. Individuals from around…
We are thrilled to let you know that Ogilvy Notes created a great illustration of Reid and Ben’s talk at SXSW 2012 (click on the image for a larger version). Sacha Chua has also created a set of sketches based on the book (click for a larger version).
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An exclusive interview between New York Times columnist Tom Friedman and Reid and Ben over at Amazon.com is re-printed below. Whatever you may be thinking when you apply for a job today, you can be sure your prospective employer is thinking this: Can this person add value every hour, every day–more than a worker in…
That’s the title of a guest post by Reid published yesterday on TechCrunch. He opens by noting the contradictory advice entrepreneurs receive, which parallels the career advice we all receive: An entrepreneur receives lots of contradictory advice from really smart, experienced people. For example, you’ve probably been told to be both persistent and flexible; to have a…
Fortune magazine has an excerpt from The Start-Up of You online and in the magazine. There’s also a brief introduction of Reid by Jessi Hempel. The excerpt is an abbreviated and condensed version of Chapter 4: “It Takes a Network.” We’ve included some excerpts of the excerpt below, but we encourage you to read the full article at…