Never Bet the Farm

Entrepreneur: Be prepared. Never Bet the Farm celebrates entrepreneurship in its entirety, presenting a framework that can help entrepreneurs reduce risks and simplify decision-making. It is at once both encouraging and cautionary, but neither a textbook how-to nor an inspirational tome lacking substance. “We’re living in a world with unimaginable adversity and invisible threats,” writes Iaquinto. “Why should entrepreneurs be any different from a sailor who stows a well-stocked emergency pack or a mill worker who puts a little bit aside each month for a rainy day or a Boy Scout following his motto, ‘Be prepared?’”

• How two leading entrepreneurs, Anthony Iaquinto and Stephen Spinelli, turn much of the so-called expert advice for entrepreneurs on its head.
• That by preparing for setbacks and using a framework that can help reduce risks and simplify decision-making, entrepreneurs can increase their probability for success.
• There is not an ideal entrepreneurial type, and that luck can be as important as a business plan in many enterprises.
• That entrepreneurship is a career, not a one-time event, and winners are those who can keep themselves in the game.
• There are easy-to-understand and attractive tools for anyone who has a business idea, but who might be wary of the risks implied in starting their own business.