Business Brilliant: Surprising Lessons from the Greatest Self-Made Business Icons

There is a huge difference in the way middle class Americans think, and the reasonably wealthy. In this book, "Millionaire" means they have assets between 10-30 million dollars.The author shows multiple results of a survey with a typical middle class worker, and a wealthier (but not rich) counterpart.A few high points I got out of the book:Wealthy people tend to be the ones that own the business, not work for someone else. Wealthier people tend to take greater risks, not mad schemes, but they tend to not fear going outside their comfort zone.Most middle class people think that loving what you do is key. Most millionaires make money in boring businesses, not cutting edge businesses they have a passion for. Sure, follow what interests you, but own the business. Control the business.Middle class people tend to stop doing tasks when they stop getting paid. Millionaires tend to do tasks, because they are interested in the task, regardless of whether they are getting paid. Weird, I thought.The book asserts, and I agree with a reason women tend to get paid less in the same job as men. They negotiate their salary far less often than men. And usually accept the first salary offer. Men negotiate, on average (If I remember) a 7% bump in salary.Men simply negotiate more...and after a few job changes, this negotiating bias increases. This is information that was new to me. It isn't the entire reason for pay discrepancies, but it is a factor.Middle class people think it takes a big idea to create wealth. Millionaires tend to be in boring businesses that they do exceedingly well.Most middle class respondents to the survey said that you should use your own money to create wealth. Millionaires tend to take on outside investors, and use little of their own money.Millionaires are better connected. They know far more people, who don't know each other, than middle class consumers. Millionaires know more investors, suppliers, and people that can help them in business. Wealthier people know more people...who know more people. It's one of the reasons the wealthy get wealthier. Middle class workers don't form, and then use this web of connections. Millionaires also tend to partner with the strongest and wealthiest player. Connections are Currency, it seems.Middle class people tend to think "Win-Win" in negotiations. Wealthier people are more "Win-Whatever they will tolerate". Wealthier people will also walk away from a deal quicker than the middle class.In negotiations, you always want to be the "least interested" party. That ability to walk away, gives you a huge advantage.Wealthier people tend to negotiate far more than most. They are also more ruthless and demanding in their negotiations. Interesting.Wealthier people are far more likely to delegate tasks that they are not expert at, and middle class people tend to want to do most things themselves. It a matter of "I want to improve what my weak points are" VS "Forget my weak points. I'll make my strengths stronger, and delegate my weaknesses" (I'm paraphrasing here). Middle class people feel being "well rounded" is a worthy goal. Millionaires specialize and farm the rest out to cheaper labor.And, in my opinion, the most important part. Millionaires value defeat and losing. They know it teaches them the most useful skills. Middle class people tend to avoid losing, in all it's meanings. But, for some reason, millionaires don't see defeat the same way. To them it isn't personal, and it's fleeting. Most of us dwell on defeats more than that.The author surmises, and I tend to agree, that social conformity, the urge to fit in is far stronger with the middle class, and far weaker with millionaires.This has the looks of the next Think And Grow Rich. The author, Lewis Schiff, has made a major contribution here, I think.

The idea behind this book is straightforward: the author and a fellow consultant surveyed people from all income groups and then segregated them by income group to see if answers varied greatly between those groups. They found some strong differences and then pulled lessons out of these differences of opinion on the various questions asked. To me, that sounds like not a fully-convincing premise. Yet, it worked. While some of the topics seemed more immediately applicable to my life than others (more people are likely in a position to negotiate for something than they are to have access to take an ownership stake in something right now, for example), they seemed to be discussed in a way that I found more convincing than ever before. One example is the aforementioned concept of negotiation, a topic that I have taken courses on and not gotten the takeaway that I have from this book. Here, I got a good reminder that negotiation is an option much more often than I think. Too often people take a salary offer as final and that we will hurt someone's feelings if we ask for more, as if we are being invited into a family business and they are offering us as much as they possibly could already. But this in reality is almost never the case. Most of us know this objectively, I would think, but we do not have it on our minds, so to speak. We know it without realizing it. This book makes you think about some things that you know but don't realize. It also brought up some concepts like the power of 'weak ties', which is that we should not get so wrapped up in the same group because then we will only know that group, and that the people that we see once a month or so will more likely be where we get future business than those that we see frequently.Additionally, one thing that I like is the call-to-action/plan-of-action at the end, which I have just begun. It is a challenge to go through a number of steps in order to really think about your business (or future as yet unknown business), evaluate yourself, make goals, and other things that I have not yet reached.I highly recommend this book. I graduated with a BBA and a law degree with a large number of tax and business courses, and I wish the curriculum of at least one course had included more themes and ideas that are actionable in the way that these are.

Business Brilliant is an incredibly insightful book that is likely to shatter a number of the deeply held and misguided assumptions about the rich. Lewis Schiff has thoroughly researched, quantified and distilled the key factors that make successful people different.One insight that particularly astounded me was based on opposing attitudes to failure. Now most rational people would conclude that failure is a signal to give up and do something else, no shame in that right! Wrong, according to Lewis successful entrepreneurs embrace failure to help them improve their chances of success on the second, third and fourth bite of the cherry.Although the majority of the book focuses on the highs and lows of entrepreneurship, there's some fascinating research for employees too. According to Lewis only 25% of surveyed candidates who received job offers negotiated higher salaries, even though the vast majority of new employers were more than willing to offer them.In short, buy this book if you want to learn and implement the successful strategies people use to become rich!

One of the best books I've ever read. Top ten list. Very succinct, relevant, factual, intelligent and informative. Bravo

Great book full of ideas that away from the standard mindset.

Ich bin auf dieses Buch durch einen Forbes Artikel aufmerksam geworden. Während es in Deutschland bisher offenbar keine breite Aufmerksamkeit erfahren hat, hat es auf Amazon.com bei 48 Bewertungen fast fünf volle Sterne bekommen. Für mich persönlich ist dieses Buch eindrucksvoll und es hat mir definitiv neue Wege aufgezeigt.Ich finde spannend an 'Business Brilliant', dass es auf Grundlage einer Umfrage entstanden ist: Menschen in den USA wurden schwerpunktmäßig zu ihren Glaubenssätzen und ihrem Verhalten in Bezug zu Beruf, Karriere und Geld befragt. Die Aussagen wurden dann verglichen, zwischen denjenigen, die sich mit ihrem jährlichen Einkommen im oberen Drittel bewegen (ca. 70.000 bis 100.000 USD), selbst gemachten Millionären bis zu einem Vermögen von 10 Millionen und selbstgemachten Millionären mit einem Vermögen über 30 Millionen. Eine recht interessante Methodik, die spannende und für mich oftmals überraschende Ergebnisse lieferte. Gut gemacht finde ich, dass die einzelnen Ergebnisse dann anhand von Fallbeispielen (Bill Gates, Richard Branson, etc.) illustriert und diskutiert werden.In diesem Buch werden verschiedene Elemente deutlich, die zeigen, warum viele gut ausgebildete und talentierte Menschen Schwierigkeiten haben, reich zu werden. Der Autor schlägt auch einige Strategien vor, die einem helfen sollen, erfolgreicher zu sein. Es hat aber nicht den Charakter typischer Erfolgsratgeber.Ich persönlich finde, dass das Buch ein guter Wegweiser ist, der mich anregte, mich tiefer mit Themen zu beschäftigen, die ich bisher vernachlässigt hatte (z.B. Verhandlungsführung, Unternehmensgründung). Und das Buch hat mich auch motiviert, meine berufliche Ausrichtung zu optimieren (der Autor empfiehlt unter Anderem, dass man sich beruflich auf wenige Kernkompetenzen beschränken soll, die man besonders gut kann und die einem besonders Freude bereiten. Den Rest soll man rigoros delegieren. Von diesem Rat profitiere ich zur Zeit ganz besonders und bin auch glücklicher mit meiner Karriere)

Wow. This book was such a blessing. Not only did it actually talk about some myths related to what most entrepreneurs hold as gospel, but it also gave the common-sense reasons as to why they actually don't work!This book has helped me transform my business relationships, and view of my business, in terms that I know will be setting me and my business partner up for success for many years to come.Lewis - Thank You for helping me to see things that I have been overlooking in my business for years, and helping to set me up powerfully for wealth, happiness and success in my business!