Transformative Entrepreneurs | Jeffrey A. Harris | Palgrave Macmillan

What separates a great idea from a great company? And what separates an innovator from an entrepreneur?

In Transformative Entrepreneurs, Jeffrey A. Harris — Managing Director at Warburg Pincus and adjunct professor at Columbia University Graduate School of Business — draws on 28 years of funding innovation to answer these questions through compelling, case-by-case studies of some of history’s most remarkable entrepreneurs and companies.

From the Cirque du Soleil and CNN, to Federal Express, Starbucks, and the Grameen Bank — Harris illuminates how great companies are envisioned, launched, and developed, and what it truly takes to transform an idea into a world-changing enterprise. Grounded in real practice rather than theory, Transformative Entrepreneurs is a vivid, lucid, and entirely comprehensible account of the entrepreneurial journey — and an essential read for anyone who wants to understand how innovation creates lasting economic and social impact.

Key Themes

• Entrepreneur vs. innovator — Harris draws a sharp and illuminating distinction: an innovator has an interesting idea, but an entrepreneur implements that idea through leadership, marshalling scarce resources, persuasive selling, and efficient operations
• Execution over ideation — ideas are cheap; execution is dear. This book deals with the execution side of innovation — the hard, human work of turning vision into reality
• Diverse entrepreneurial contexts — innovation is found in all kinds of settings, from public television children’s shows to the iPhone in your pocket, and entrepreneurs know no geographic, ethnic, age, or other boundaries
• Job creation and economic impact — an extraordinary chronicle of how determined individuals have produced superb results and created millions of jobs, with lessons for economies seeking to understand and harness innovation
• Leadership and resource marshalling — the many dimensions in which a successful venture must operate — from leadership and culture to capital, operations, and sales

What Readers Are Saying

“An extraordinary chronicle of how some determined individuals have produced superb results and created millions of jobs for the American economy.”
— William H. Draper III, author of The Startup Game

“Grounded and lucid and entirely comprehensible, honed as it is by a teacher who excites enthusiasm in his courses at Columbia Business School.”
— Sir Harold Evans, author of They Made America

“Jeffrey Harris provides us a magisterial tour of the entrepreneur’s difficult journey.”
— Paul Ricci, Chairman and CEO, Nuance Communications

About the Author

Jeffrey A. Harris is Managing Director of Energy at Warburg Pincus, New York. He is an adjunct professor at the Columbia University Graduate School of Business, where he teaches courses on venture capital and innovation, and has spent 28 years funding innovation across multiple industries and geographies.

Author: Jeffrey A. Harris
Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan
Published: February 2012
Format: Print (216 pages)
Genre: Business / Entrepreneurship / Innovation
ISBN: 9780230340268