Read “Business Lessons” and Learn from Others’ Mistakes


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Fear of failure is among the top concerns of any entrepreneur. The book “Business Lessons” will make you aware of the most common mistakes; ones that even the most successful of entrepreneurs have made. Although brief, it is written in a style that is both easy to read and learn from.

Business Lessons

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There are millions of entrepreneurs in the world, all with the dream of working for themselves, achieving success and gaining financial freedom. Countless books have been written with the aim of steering aspiring new entrepreneurs down the road to success.

Yet, despite all of these books, countless businesses and entrepreneurs fail for one reason or another. “Business Lessons: 150+ Startup Mistakes and Entrepreneurship Lessons Shared by 55 Successful Founders” seeks to highlight the most common mistakes made by new, and even the most seasoned of entrepreneurs. The hope is that readers will be able to avoid such mistakes in their own businesses.

Learning from Our Mistakes is a Part of Life

Learning from other people’s mistakes is an opportunity that should not be lost.

“Business Lessons” draws from a collection of interviews undertaken by the author with well known entrepreneurs. It contains details of what these entrepreneurs have identified as their top mistakes when starting out.

Those interviewed own a varied range of businesses. Some are digital entrepreneurs. Others are tech entrepreneurs. There are also an assortment of entrepreneurs providing other services included. During each interview, Fabius has asked each entrepreneur to name the top three missteps they made when starting their companies. Their answers, and what they learned from these mistakes, make up the bulk of the book.

Not surprisingly, a variety of these mistakes are common to many of the entrepreneurs interviewed. But some are more unique due to the type of business these entrepreneurs have established. What all the entrepreneurs interviewed have in common is that instead of giving up, they learned from past mistakes, and went on to become successful in their businesses.

No book will ever be able to prevent you from making mistakes when starting out in business. However, the author’s intention here is to help those just starting out to be aware and able to avoid the most common and frequently made mistakes. As he states:

“As an entrepreneur, you will make mistakes. There’s no way around it. The goal here is to help you learn from them and to help you prepare yourself for the rocky roads ahead.”

To conclude the book, the author has put together a list of his “Top 30 Startup Tips for Newbie Entrepreneurs” and “Top 20 Reasons Your Startups Will Fail.”

Herby Fabius (@BillionSuccess) has built up a vast wealth of knowledge on the subject of entrepreneurship through interviewing founders and successful entrepreneurs. He is also a social media expert as well as being an entrepreneur himself, having founded BillionSuccess.

As an enthusiast for entrepreneurship, he has become a well known motivational speaker for those looking to learn about what it takes to be an entrepreneur, and how to start a business.

Should You Read “Business Lessons?”

If you are already an entrepreneur, you will undoubtedly recognize many mistakes which are described in “Business Lessons.” You may even see others you will want to avoid in the future. I certainly did, especially the mention of trying to do everything yourself, not trusting others, and selecting the wrong kind of staff.

The fact that the author has used material from interviews carried out with a selection of established entrepreneurs makes the content authoritative rather than a matter of opinion. Therefore, what you get in “Business Lessons” is the experience and advice from those that have been through it and succeeded.

This in itself makes it a valuable book, and one that any would-be entrepreneur will benefit from taking the time to read. Making mistakes and learning from them is all part and parcel of becoming a successful entrepreneur. “Business Lessons” provides those who read it prior to starting their ventures with valuable information and an opportunity to avoid the most common and frequently made mistakes.

As humans, we all make mistakes, and while the mistakes made by the entrepreneurs included in “Business Lessons” tend to be the most common and frequent ones made by founders, I am sure there are more worth mentioning. In view of the brevity of the book, I would have liked to have seen interviews mentioning other common failings from a more diverse range of businesses.

Starting your own business can be a daunting affair, especially if you haven’t done it before. Whatever business you’re looking to start or have started, you will undoubtedly have concerns and a fear of making mistakes that could cause your business to fail.

“Business Lessons” should help to allay these fears. It demonstrates that even the most successful entrepreneurs can make the most basic of mistakes. The biggest mistake you can make is failing to learn from them, whether they are your own, or those that others have made.

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2 Comments ▼

John Blunden John Blunden is a Book Reviewer for Small Business Trends. He is a British writer now living in South Africa where he successfully owned and ran a variety of businesses for several years before deciding to take up his passion for writing.

2 Reactions
  1. As I have made many business mistakes, I better read this book! 😉

  2. *Great Book! Needed this for sure as I move forward in entrepreneurship!