Zero to One by #1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER If you want to build a better future, you must believe in secrets. The great secret of our time is that there are still uncharted frontiers to explore and new inventions to create. In Zero to One, legendary entrepreneur and investor Peter Thiel shows how we can find singular ways to create those new things. Thiel begins with the contrarian premise that we live in an age of technological stagnation, even if we're too distracted by shiny mobile devices to notice. Information technology has improved rapidly, but there is no reason why progress should be limited to computers or Silicon Valley. Progress can be achieved in any industry or area of business. It comes from the most important skill that every leader must master: learning to think for yourself. Doing what someone else already knows how to do takes the world from 1 to n, adding more of something familiar. But when you do something new, you go from 0 to 1. The next Bill Gates will not build an operating system. The next Larry Page or Sergey Brin won't make a search engine. Tomorrow's champions will not win by competing ruthlessly in today's marketplace. They will escape competition altogether, because their businesses will be unique. Zero to One presents at once an optimistic view of the future of progress in America and a new way of thinking about innovation: it starts by learning to ask the questions that lead you to find value in unexpected places.
The Complete Idiot's Guide to Business Plans Plus by The right way to start a business. This book includes all the invaluable information from The Complete Idiot's Guide(r) to Business Plans, Second Edition, but adds a content-rich CD-ROM, featuring more than 90 time-saving planning tools, business forms, and financial worksheets to help entrepreneurs prepare, write, and make the most of their business plans. According to the Small Business Administration (USA), in 2007, the number of new businesses was 680,000, and that number is expected to be higher in 2011 as the economy drives people into starting their own businesses. Features eight business plans covering a broad range of businesses. The new CD-ROM is user-friendly, up-to-date, and content-rich. 400 pages.