Worthless, Impossible, and Stupid: How Contrarian Entrepreneurs Create and Capture Extraordinary Value

by Daniel Isenberg Narrated by David Drummond

Overview

Global entrepreneurship expert Daniel Isenberg presents a novel way to approach business-building, with insights and lessons learned from a worldwide cast of entrepreneurial characters. This group of courageous and energetic doers has created a global and diverse mix of companies destined to become tomorrow's leading organizations.

Worthless, Impossible, and Stupid is about how enterprising individuals see hidden value in situations where others do not, use that perception to develop products and services that people initially don't think they want, and ultimately go on to realize extraordinary value for themselves, their customers, and society as a whole. Amazingly, this process repeats itself in one form or another countless times a day all over the world.

Editorial Reviews

Library Journal - Audio

10/15/2014
Isenberg (entrepreneurship practice, Babson Coll.) presents a fresh perspective on entrepreneurship, one that focuses on helping enterprising individuals see hidden value in opportunities and on how to use this skill to develop products and services that consumers initially may not even know they want. Isenberg links with entrepreneurism the important function of a business to create new value in new ideas that otherwise would not have been created. Isenberg also assists budding entrepreneurs with developing a mental clarity that helps them recognize opportunities where others see nothing, while maintaining a high level of commitment to being extraordinary. He emphasizes contrarian thinking that breaks the mold of traditional venture-capital investing and targets a new class of global entrepreneurship. Quality improvement professionals will recognize in this work some of the key principles championed by W.E. Deming, one of the world's most important quality consultants. The many stories of successful new businesses around the world that broke the traditional rules of start-up and narrator David Drummond's solid, steady reading help listeners connect with this important contribution to business literature. VERDICT Recommended for the business collections of public libraries.—Dale Farris, Groves, TX

OCTOBER 2014 - AudioFile

Full of stories about the David Isenberg’s extensive business experiences, this extended lesson shows how entrepreneurs find success by thinking differently, seeing things others don’t see. The author’s writing has an academic or perhaps engineering quality—it conveys a way of looking at things that is mostly analytical and certainly lacking in charisma. This aspect of the book seems exaggerated by David Drummond’s performance, which hits all the enunciation and phrasing marks but has a low-key, unwavering urgency that would be more appropriate for a military training film than a lesson like this. This is an audio with some important insights to offer, but, whether it’s the performance or the something about the author’s perspective, it comes across in audio as intellectually removed and inaccessible. T.W. © AudioFile 2014, Portland, Maine

Product Details

BN ID:	2940171730949
Publisher:	HighBridge Company
Publication date:	05/14/2014
Edition description:	Unabridged

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