Category: Competitive Advantage & Differentiation

Simple Strategy Lessons: Better before cheaper. Revenue before costs.

Sometimes the best ideas and best advice are the most simple. When I read the following article a while back, I loved it. And believed it. And continue to believe it. Michael Raynor and Mumtaz Ahmed from Deloitte Consulting performed a study that began with 25,000 companies… Continue reading

Three More Lessons from Warren Buffett and Berkshire Hathaway

Two recent items helped me draw lessons for how I want to manage my investment firm, Greybull Stewardship.  The first is Warren Buffet’s memo that he sent last month to the managers of the 80 businesses of Berkshire, and the other is in the book,… Continue reading

Resilient Companies Balance Continuity with Shock Absorption

Time can be an overlooked element in business.  Time can be an enemy, and time can be a friend.  Understanding the impact of time on your business separates the best business minds from the rest.  Time affects the pace of change for components of your business, your… Continue reading

Wonderful Competitive Advantage Through A Unique Distribution Channel

Sustainable competitive advantage — a goal which will be always sought and ever elusive in business.  It is difficult to define. Yet, we often know it when we see it. People attempt to draw-up lists in an effort to understand and remember the types of… Continue reading

Owners’ Words Best When Reflect Both Noble Purpose & Bottom-Line

This revealing story was told by speaker Lisa McLeod at the recent Murphy Conference for their impressive network of business brokers across the country.  McLeod gave a very nice talk based on her book Selling with Noble Purpose. McLeod was facing a conundrum in her… Continue reading

Berkshire Hathaway: If You Love the Management, Set Them Free

Private equity investors often take the “father knows best” approach to working with their management teams.  To me, this is crazy — particularly when the management team has years of experience with the business, the investors are new to the business, and the track record… Continue reading

We’re In Seed-Stage Boom, Not a Series A Crunch

Two related trends in venture capital investing have been getting attention for the last few years. The first is the growth in angel investing, particularly after the crowd-funding provisions of the JOBS Act. The second is the “Series A crunch” where many companies that receive… Continue reading

Business Improvements in Marketing As Well As Factory

W. Edwards Deming went from the USA to Japan after World War II and his ideas about continuous business improvements came back to the USA from Japan as a business management tool — kaizen: daily small improvements building a better process over time. See Deming. … Continue reading

Investment Returns Are Not Greener by Changing Industries

It is easier to earn outsized investment returns in some industries over others — I agree with that conventional wisdom.  As an investor or entrepreneur, it often pays off to think hard about which industries to enter.  If you have a choice, why not increase… Continue reading

Ideal business financing for growing, profitable companies in 100 posts or less?

“Teach what you want to learn” is the theme with which I started this blog in April 2012.  Since then, I have written 100 posts — which means I’ve learned for myself and shared what I’ve learned under several themes: Business financing and venture capital… Continue reading