HBR on Entrepreneurship

HBR on Entrepreneurship

Starting and growing a business is messy—uncertain demand, tight cash, hiring headaches, and a dozen bets to place with limited time and money. Harvard Business Review’s On Entrepreneurship pulls together hard-won lessons from seasoned builders so you can see around corners, avoid expensive mistakes, and focus on the few moves that actually create value.

This isn’t about buzzwords. It’s about picking the right opportunity, pressure-testing your model, serving real customers fast, and keeping cash healthy while you build a team you can trust. You’ll get clear frameworks you can use on Monday morning—how to size a market without kidding yourself, how to price for profit, how to design a simple sales engine, and when to pivot instead of pushing a bad plan uphill.

Why this matters now

• Noise is high: Ideas are cheap; execution wins.

• Cash is king: Growth without margin and cash discipline is just stress with a logo.

• Talent is tight: The right first ten hires beat the next hundred.

Core themes you’ll use immediately

• Opportunity selection: Solve a costly, frequent pain for a specific customer.

• Business model clarity: Who pays, for what, how often, and at what margin.

• Customer proof early: Talk to buyers, ship a simple version, and learn fast.

• Unit economics > vanity metrics: Contribution margin before scale.

• Hiring for ownership: Values, coachability, and bias for action.

• Founder focus: Do the few things only you can do; delegate the rest.

The Builder’s Playbook (6 moves)

1. Define the job to be done
   One sentence: “We help ___ get ___ without ___.” If you can’t write it, customers won’t buy it.

2. Prove demand fast
   10–20 real customer conversations → a simple offer → one measurable purchase or signed intent.

3. Price for profit, not approval
   Start at a price that supports healthy gross margins; discount only with a reason and an end date.

4. Design a simple sales engine
   Clear ICP (ideal customer profile), one repeatable channel, one script, one follow-up rhythm.

5. Protect cash like oxygen
   Weekly cash view, 13-week forecast, ruthless expense triage. In a pinch: collect sooner, pay later, carry less.

6. Hire slow, onboard fast
   Scorecards for roles, trial projects where possible, and 30-60-90 day plans for every new hire.

Quick wins this week

• One-page model: Customer, problem, offer, price, channel, costs, margin. Tape it above your desk.

• 20-call sprint: Talk to twenty target buyers; capture exact words. Build offer copy from their language.

• Cash Friday: Review AR/AP, aging, burn, runway. Make one move that improves cash in 30 days.

• Pipeline in public: A whiteboard with leads, stage, owner, next action, and date—updated daily.

• Kill a zombie: Stop one low-ROI project and redirect time to sales or delivery.

Simple metrics that actually matter

• Gross margin/contribution margin

• CAC payback: Months to recover customer acquisition cost

• Sales cycle length: First contact → signed deal

• Lead → close conversion by channel

• Retention / repeat rate: Are customers coming back?

• Cash runway: Weeks until zero at current burn

Field snapshots

• Local services startup: Swapped broad ads for one ICP + referral partnerships; CAC payback dropped under 60 days.

• Fabrication shop add-on venture: Raised price 12% with a value guarantee; gross margin rose 6 points, churn unchanged.

• B2B distributor: Moved to weekly Cash Friday review; cut DSO by 12 days in a quarter.

Scripts you can borrow

• Customer discovery: “Walk me through the last time this problem cost you time or money. What did you try? What did it cost?”

• Value pitch: “Here’s the outcome in two numbers—time saved and dollars avoided. If we don’t hit it, you don’t pay the difference.”

• Price pushback: “If price were fair, what result would make this a ‘yes’ right now?”

• Hiring close: “In 90 days, if you crushed it, what would be true? Let’s write that plan together.”

A 14-day starter plan

Days 1–3: Write your one-page model. Define your ICP. Schedule twenty discovery calls.
Days 4–7: Test a simple offer at a profitable price; collect payment or signed intent. Start the pipeline board.
Week 2:

• Launch one repeatable channel (outbound list, partner intro, local event, or targeted ads).

• Institute Cash Friday and a 13-week forecast.

• Draft scorecards and 30-60-90s for your next hires.

How you’ll know it’s working

• Your pitch is shorter and clearer—and prospects repeat it back.

• You’re saying “no” to off-model work without guilt.

• Deals move faster; follow-ups are crisp.

• Margins improve, and cash stress eases.

• The team knows the weekly numbers that matter and how they move them.

You don’t need a perfect plan to build a real company. You need a clear offer, early proof, disciplined cash habits, and a team that owns outcomes. Start with what HBR teaches best—focus, evidence, and practical discipline—and grow from there.