If you're like me and live in the wild and crazy village of Startupville, The Art of the Start by Guy Kawasaki is an essential read. Over the course of a little more than 200 pages, Kawasaki is able to capture the bottom line, must knows for entrepreneurs in the startup stage of development. His book covers everything from A to Z in a pointed style that makes for great reading for those with limited attention spans--myself included.
I didn't find the book on my own, though I've read some great articles from the author in other publications. It was recommended to me by a member of the local venture association following a pitch we made last week. If I could have listed what I wanted in a startup book, I don't know that I'd have been able to put it together any better than this. Here's a list of the topics covered:
- Startup Overview
- Positioning Your Business
- Pitching to Investors and Customers
- Writing a Business Plan
- The Fine Art of Bootstrapping
- Recruiting
- Raising Capital
- Partnering
- Branding
- Rainmaking
- Becoming a Mensch
After reading the chapter on pitching to investors, I realized a number of deficiencies in our current pitch and will go about the work of making some adjustments over the course of this week. We didn't completely bomb our pitch, but it definitely needed some work and we were fortunate that we were pitching to a forgiving audience.
Having been in the startup process for more than a year, I have learned a good many things--many of which could have been learned more quickly by simply reading this book. How does that saying go?
"You'll be the same person a decade from now except for the people you meet and the books you read."
It goes something like that anyway. In this instance, I'm very fortunate to have met some great folks through this process and one of them has given me a terrific book to read.
