The trials and tribulations of going it alone
Book review | Frank Farwell
Chicken Lips, Wheeler-Dealer, and the Beady-Eyed MBA is a nonfiction narrative of a tenderfoot startup company and its neophyte trail boss who maneuvers his way out of hostile territory into a land of plenty. The sequence of mishaps and recoveries gives a living lesson on how to, as well as how not to, go out on one's own.
A detailed appendix, tied in at the end of the book, gives a chapter-by-chapter analysis of what was done right - and wrong - and teaches readers to learn from the author's step-by-step journey. The result? Readers can more efficiently steer their own start-ups and maximize their chances of reaching the winners' circle - and its considerable payoffs.
It is a timely story now that the employment landscape has become an increasingly dynamic, unpredictable playing field that viciously sheds salaried and hourly workers as if they were fleas on an intolerant beast. Worsened by today's staggered and slowly recovering economy, the trend has reached a crisis stage. Knowing how to work for oneself is now more critical than ever; cast off or still employed, the disillusioned worker needs a reminder that there is an alternative.
The book shows by example that even when times are bad, starting a business can offer a bridge to employment, financial independence, and personal fulfillment.
Author Frank Farwell was a marginally salaried staff editor in his late 20s when he decided to leave the corporate world and strike out on his own. In the depths of a sharp recession, many friends felt he was either extremely brave or terribly foolish. His small family lived on a shoestring while he survived ongoing foibles and failures, learned from mistakes, met an alarming range of colorful characters, and eventually found a forgotten product from China with a defined American market niche. Persistence and hard work provided striking results: His company, WinterSilks, became a three-time Inc 500 company and, 11 years after its founding, still owning 100 percent of its stock, he sold it for a handsome fortune.
This book is the first business memoir in recent years to serve as both an engaging real-life story as well as a guide to starting and succeeding at self-employment. It entertains and instructs by example rather than by merely listing dry, numbered principles. It is a book that entertains and instructs and is as much "ha-ha" as it is "how-to". It is a must-read for all budding entrepreneurs, for business people dealing with China's complex retail supply chain and for business and general-interest readers who simply enjoy a great story.
China Daily
(China Daily 05/16/2011 page17)
