1: There are two traps CEOs and leadership teams fall into regarding innovation.

Trap #1: “The minute we think we truly understand the customer and can take our attention off discovering what matters, we’re dead,” Panera founder Ron Shaich writes in Know What Matters: Lessons from a Lifetime of Transformations.

“Sooner or later,” Ron notes, “even the most brilliant and innovative concept will fall behind the times and become … continue reading

1: “Ben, think about how you might run the business if capital were free.”

That was the advice Andy Rachleff of Benchmark Capital gave Ben Horowitz, who was the CEO of Loudcloud, a startup focused on network security, scaling, and disaster recovery.

The year was 1999.

Ben and Loudcloud co-founder  Marc Andreessen were coming off the spectacular sale of  Netscape to AOL for $4.2 billion.

Benchmark invested $15 million … continue reading

1: “The hard thing isn’t setting a big, hairy, audacious goal,” Ben Horowitz writes in The Hard Thing About Hard Things: Building a Business When There Are No Easy Answers.

“The hard thing is laying people off when you miss the big goal,” Ben notes.

Not the hard thing: Hiring great people.

The hard thing: “When those ‘great people’ develop a sense of entitlement and start demanding unreasonable things,” … continue reading

1: Hollywood tells us that being an entrepreneur is all about being a “high-flying, confident risk-taker who beats the odds and retires young,” Ron Shaich writes in his outstanding book Know What Matters: Lessons from a Lifetime of Transformations.

This week, we’ve been analyzing Ron’s rise as the founder of Panera Bread. In 2017, he and his team would sell the company for $7.5 billion, one of the largest … continue reading

1: In 2017, Panera Bread founder Ron Shaich sold the company for $7.5 billion, one of the largest deals in restaurant history.

What does Ron believe is the “the singular element” that created this enormous amount of value?

The “Concept Essence” document that he and his team created twenty-one years earlier.

What exactly is a Concept Essence? 

It “isn’t a business plan,” Ron writes in his book … continue reading

1: Fledgling entrepreneur and future Panera Bread CEO Ron Shaich realized he had a problem: People don’t eat cookies for breakfast.

Ron was 26 and had just started the Cookie Jar in downtown Boston. The year was 1980.

“Every morning, I watched tens of thousands of potential customers pass me by without a glance,” he writes in his terrific book Know What Matters: Lessons from a Lifetime of Transformations.… continue reading

1: It was 6 AM, and more than fifty people were standing in line outside the Au Bon Pain bakery cafe in Boston’s Copley Place mall.

“I couldn’t believe my eyes,” Ron Shaich writes in his terrific book Know What Matters.  “I’d spent months desperately trying to figure out how to get people to stop walking past our door.

“And now, here they were, waiting in line,” he recounts. … continue reading

1: “Excuse me, sir, would you like to try a cookie?”

The year was 1980. Future Panera Bread CEO Ron Shaich, then 26 years old, was standing on the sidewalk of a busy street in downtown Boston.

“I held out a tray of chocolate-chip cookies to a square-jawed gentleman,” Ron recalls in his excellent book  Know What Matters.

The man hesitated, then he took a cookie. 

“We’re testing … continue reading

1: “I’m really sick of all the day-to-day stuff,” said Andre, the owner of a manufacturing company, to his friend Simon in Dan Martell‘s book Buy Back Your Time. “I think I need to hire an operations manager.”

“Okay, Andre,” Simon said. “But before you do that, talk to me about your day. What’s the biggest chunk of time you spend each week on something you hate … continue reading

1: We often think of successful entrepreneurs who end up like Richard Branson or Oprah Winfrey as “lucky,” “wealthy,” or “privileged,”  Dan Martell observes in his book Buy Back Your Time.

“Any of these may be true,” Dan notes, “but in general, that doesn’t take into account the capital-T Truth. Oprah achieved her monumental success not because she found luck, wealth, or privilege—she had next to none of those—but … continue reading