Entrepreneurship

Times change and markets transform themselves overnight. The half-life of common wisdom is shorter than ever. But top private equity firms have distilled a set of institutional habits that boost the likelihood of their success. What’s critical to this success? Attitude. PE leaders take pains to foster a “results-oriented mind-set”. In short, that means creating […]

I recently sat down with Larry Cheng, a partner at Fidelity Ventures. He writes one of my favorite VC blogs, Thinking about Thinking, named after a course that both of us had the chance to take many years back at Harvard College. As part of my ongoing interview series investigating what lies at the center […]

The hardest part of being an entrepreneur can be learning to turn down business. It is also the only way to survive—and grow.

It puts a premium on customer experience, but undervalues strategic thinking.

A few years ago, while I was a first-year Ph.D. student in the engineering school at Johns Hopkins University, I had a business idea. I had taken two excellent courses on microelectronics, and decided that I could build a business around them in my native Nigeria. As a college student in Nigeria, I had wanted […]

Four questions to ask before you make a painful decision.

For visionary CEOs in the for-profit finance sector, a giant business opportunity is emerging: connecting entrepreneurs and their organizations with the resources they need to create lasting social change. Since the late 1980s, the citizen sector has taken off and experienced rapid growth in terms of productivity and impact. The financial industry has not kept […]

How to defend and expand its advanced industries.

Two factors determine who’s at risk.

As Afghan-U.S. relations continue to deteriorate, it's hard to imagine that the two nations can find political common ground. But the language of business...

Crucial (and cost-free) ways policymakers can support scale-up entrepreneurs.

Starting your own business is not a panacea.

Do you have what it takes to go big?

Finding the hackers, problem-solvers, and other people impatient for change.

To accelerate your search for a viable new growth model, start with the two-pizza rule.

It became a fixture among startups because it understood their needs better than other banks.

Inside the DEI journey of a Black-owned business, Uncle Nearest, which has become the fastest-growing whiskey brand in the United States.

Accelerating technological improvements have changed the speed with which new innovations penetrate markets. Graphed over time, the market adoption of...

How do some entrepreneurs, corporate innovators, and investors turn adverse conditions to competitive advantage? Chakravorti, of McKinsey and Harvard...

Why should business among the very poor be different than it is anywhere else? Listen to customers, standardize processes, and don’t be afraid to make a profit.