Real life business lessons

“ We learn from mistakes ” - we have heard this many times already. And, of course, it is always more pleasant to learn from the mistakes of others. Especially when it comes to business, when money, reputation, and career are at stake ... The abstruse textbooks write the right things, the truisms. But after all, life is different, right? Then what prevents us from learning from real stories of people who have traveled their own way, created a business from scratch, which were in many ways pioneers?

The Pioneer Almanac is a collection of stories from more than 20 business innovators. They include such diverse people as designer Jessica Hish and Tom Kay - the founder of Finisterre , which offers revolutionary technology for surfing in cold water. The almanac was created by film director Mark Anderson and his wife, graphic designer Emily Anderson.

Each story pays great attention not only to the facts from the life of businessmen, their experience, their ups and downs, but also their way of thinking. The characters themselves describe how they thought and what they did to become what they are now.

The book from the first person tells the story of the emergence of the most incredible ideas and innovative start-ups. All this together gives an idea of ​​what is happening with the business now and what will happen with it tomorrow. But what about the Almanac itself? Right now, another successful business story will unfold before your eyes.
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A lesson from the authors of the book

Did you know in advance whose stories you wanted to include in the book? Or was everything solved in the process?

Mark Anderson : We knew exactly who we wanted to include. But as we compiled the book, the search continued for interesting characters. As a result, many were added in the process.

Some names of the heroes of the book are well known to all, others - not very. Can you talk about the process of selecting people for your project?

MA: We literally showered people with offers of cooperation! But our biggest difficulty was that we did it in a completely different way. We sent each potential participant a personal invitation that included a unique URL. When a person went to this URL, there was a personal video message from me and Emily on the web page. It explained what the project was and what we were going to do. Overwhelmingly, there were positive feedback. We were simply amazed by the openness and enthusiasm of all participants!

One of the most interesting features of the book is the style of presentation. Everything is presented in a lively language, frankly and with its own attitude to the matter, which is not similar to the style of presentation of ordinary books about business. Maybe some stories made a special impression on you?

M. A .: We were just trying to achieve this effect. Personally, the closest thing to me is Jason Blumer 's The Anyone Paradigm article. He develops the idea that most business projects are created to serve anyone who meets on the way. Jason also debunks a common myth: the more customers, the more profit. Further, he discusses ways to make sure that you attract exactly those customers that you need. And we had to learn this lesson from our own experience in business.

You have collaborated with people from all over the world. How do you experience this?

MA: We worked in a team, met and interviewed our heroes. Each of our heroes was happy to talk about their trials and tribulations as well as their successes. We were amazed at how honest and open they were when it came to their personal stories.

Even at the very beginning of the book, you mentioned that participating in a conversation with Adam Morgan ( eatbigfish.com ) was like a “lightning strike” for you, after which your interest in “pioneers” flashed. How soon after this came the idea for the book?

MA: The EatBigFish was the starting point for the whole process (and I also recommend everyone to read their books), but, nevertheless, the launch of the Almanac took us 3 years. We started naively believing that the process would be simple. In fact, there was some kind of endless process of starting a new business.

The hardest moment was when we could not launch our first campaign on Kickstarter. Since we gave great publicity to our appearance there, it was then quite difficult for us to leave. We learned a lot from the history of Kickstarter, in the end, the book only benefited from this. But, definitely, there were situations when we were ready to surrender.

When it came to history processing, section editing, layout development, layout, how long did it take? Was it easy to put all this together?

M.A. Processing of stories took about 3 months. Design and layout took a month. True, the situation there is a bit complicated due to the appearance of our daughter at the final design stage! In general, the project would never have happened without the support of amazing people. The correction of the text was carried out by our friends from the agency Stranger Collective . We had two very talented photographers: Alastair Sopp and Rasmus Keger , and in the USA Josh Vyvyan did illustrations to articles in which there were no photos. And there were many, many people who gave us support and extended a helping hand on our way.

What do you think, for whom, in the first place, the Almanac was created?

MA: First of all, it was created for us. We had a desire to make a book that we would like to have when we started our own business. Because at business community events everything is described very smoothly. Everyone is always great, and they are forced to look at the world of business through rose-colored glasses.

There, people do not really share their experiences in overcoming difficult situations and the lessons they have learned from it. And books about business seem too scientific and theoretical to us. Our initial idea was simply to collect authentic stories and real experiences of businessmen who inspired us.

The reaction to the book was what you expected?

M. A .: The reaction exceeded expectations and showed that the result was worth it. We are pleasantly surprised by the huge number of orders outside the UK. We distribute the book worldwide. There is a global community of outstanding people who try to do business in a different way. We are very proud that many people who supported Kickstarter for the first time continue to order copies of books for friends and family. We also received countless letters from people who talk about the moments that inspired them the most.

What has changed for you personally since the book was published? What do you understand about yourself and about the business that you would like to do?

M. A .: Everything is constantly changing - that's what we love in our business. We are constantly in the process of learning. We develop a clear understanding of what we want to do and with whom we want to do it. It may seem too simple, but for us it works. This was the process that led us to the desired result.

We adhere to our beliefs and this helps us quickly and effectively make the right decisions and focus on our personal success. Doing business is hard. Sometimes very hard. There are times when we have to pass a strength test. And in such situations helps a strong belief in what you do and why.

What is the future of the Almanac of the pioneers? Will the next issues?

MA: The future is quite an exciting thing. The Almanac project has already been launched, now we are working on a series of special manuals, where each Almanac is devoted to one topic. We also have a new team that is working on a project and a book (which comes out in September) about women in business.

Our immediate goal is to finally launch our new website. It took longer than expected due to work on other projects.