Follow the legend - seven strategy lessons from top entrepreneurs

Can you recall what the business world was like before Microsoft, Arcelor Mittal, and Ryanair? Such world chaning ...

Peter Cohan and U. Srinivasa Rangan

01 December 2006

Strategy and entrepreneurship

Can you recall what the business world was like before Microsoft, Arcelor Mittal, and Ryanair? Such world chaning companies, created by intrepid entrepreneurs, can teach us key lessons about strategic vision. And Peter Cohan and U. Srinivasa Rangan say that corporate managers should pay special attention.
Follow the legend seven strategy lessons from top entrepreneurs

Follow the legend seven strategy lessons from top entrepreneurs

Entrepreneurs seem to win against the odds. Whether the story is about Bill Gates, Richard Branson or any other legendary entrepreneur, that story usually ends with the word “success”. But how do the best entrepreneurs manage to succeed so often and so convincingly? We’ve found that the entrepreneurial mind employs the following seven principles of strategic decision-making:

Exploiting confirmatory bias
Letting a thousand flowers bloom
Expanding through beachhead acquisitions
Selective stealing
Changing the rules of the game
Using paranoia, and
Avoiding head-on competition

These strategy lessons are as valuable to managers in established companies as they are to entrepreneurs; the key is to understand the power of each strategic weapon.

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Follow the legend - seven strategy lessons from top entrepreneurs

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