Berkonomics

By: Dave Berkus

Narrated by: Dave Berkus

Length: 6 hrs and 21 mins

Publisher's summary

With over 50 years of entrepreneurial, management, and corporate board experience, Dave Berkus offers 101 business insights for management and boards of companies of all sizes, served up as concise nuggets of actionable wisdom. Interwoven with over 50 of Dave's stories, describing his experiences, this audiobook is an indispensable guide for CEOs, management, and corporate boards for:

• Sharpening your corporate vision
• Strategic planning
• Product and price positioning
• Building and leveraging your board
• Finding and nurturing “teacher-customers"
• Focusing resources for growth
• Positioning for a liquidity event

Spend time with this internationally-recognized business expert, author, and keynote speaker, as he guides you through stages of your corporate growth, using his experience and wisdom to point out opportunities and roadblocks along the way. Listen to his personal stories of successes and failures, and lessons learned. Share his humorous recounts of experiences that informed his teachings passed onto you. Then, graduate with a degree in "Berkonomics", and use these insights to drive your growth and business success.

©2010, 2022 David W Berkus (P)2022 David W Berkus

Must-read for startups and startup investors!

I heartily recommend _Berkonomics_ for anyone involved in small to medium-size business ventures. This especially should be required reading for any startup that seeks outside investment, and for the investors too. A lot of failed startup CEO/founders would have been successful if they had read this book *before* forming partnerships, renting an office, hiring employees, or taking outside investment! Likewise, many angel investors will wish they had read this book *before* writing their first checks.

Dave Berkus is an extraordinarily experienced and successful entrepreneur and legendary angel investor over 50 years. He shares many memorable stories from his career including many remarkable failures along with his successes. This is your chance to learn from a master, and learn from other people's mistakes. His stories are impactful and will likely change how you think about and approach your business and career.

Berkus shares his insights and stories in a relaxed and entertaining manner. Berkus "has seen your movie before", and more than once I chuckled with recognition as he described a hard-learned lesson that I've also experienced or witnessed. He reads the book himself and does a very good job as he has a smooth voice that is pleasant to listen to. (It's not surprising that he is a sought-after and popular speaker!)

Note that this is a book of short insights, compiled from Berkus' successful blog. This is like a high-level summary of the life-cycle of a small business from startup to exit, but each insight could probably be turned into a full-length book. One example is a concise insight on continuous process improvement; yet many books have been written on that subject, including one excellent book that Berkus specifically recommends.

What surprised me the most was how inspired I felt. Dave Berkus is a class act, who humbly smiles at his successes, heartily laughs at his failures, appreciates the people who helped him along the way, appreciates his good fortune, and gives back to the community in many ways. For example, there are some truly heart-warming examples of how Berkus showed his appreciation to employees, which inspire me to be a better, more thoughtful, more intentional colleague and manager.

I was glad to spend this time with Dave Berkus, and hope to be more like him when (if) I grow up.