Title: Most People Only Try I Make Sure
Author: Karl George
Publisher: Anderson KBS Ltd
ISBN: 0-9544896-0-8
Price: £7.99
The cover claims that this book is essential reading for people thinking of starting a business and those already running a small or medium sized enterprise. Having recently started my own business, I was interested to see what I could learn.
The author, Karl George, is a qualified accountant and the managing director of a Birmingham based accountancy firm, who incidentally are the publishers of this book. He is also a business advisor, lecturer and trainer. This book is based on his experiences of running his own business and of advising others on running theirs.
I found the straight-forward style and presentation of the book made it easy to read and the size (100 pages and pocket-sized) meant that I could carry it around with me and dip into it whenever I had time. There are exercises and questions included throughout the book, which I found useful as a means of thinking about how the advice given could apply specifically to me and my business.
The book starts by pointing out that statistically almost 90% of new businesses fail within 10 years. Depressing as that fact is, I'd like to be in that elusive 10% so I felt I had to read on to find out about the seven strategies that the book is based around, which the author assures will help me to become a successful entrepreneur. A chapter is allocated to each of these strategies, with a bonus chapter at the end listing 67 tips for achieving success in business, including various suggestions such as remembering to step back and look at the big picture and the importance of having backup plans for every situation.
Overall, I found the book to be an interesting read. I had encountered most of the advice given in one form or another in other places, however, the emphasis on putting the advice into practice was valuable.
Reviewed by Jo Pearson
Having worked in the IT Training industry since 1995 firstly as a classroom trainer and later moving on to become an e-learning consultant for a large international law firm, I now work as an independent e-learning consultant providing authoring and consultancy services to a variety of firms.
