Whether you are an entrepreneur with an idea or a leader of an established company, you need to understand businesses thoroughly--how they work, what they do, how they are managed. You need to apply this understanding to your own business, so you know what you have to do to build and manage it. You need to develop your own skills and capabilities, so you know how to Think like a leader and manager, Act to lead and manage effectively, and Do to deliver the results you expect. How do you learn to do all this? You need a handbook with a set of tools to provide the what and how of building, managing, and leading your business. This is what The Business Leader's Handbook Series is about. We have developed an approach with a set of tools and defined skills, information, resources, training, and mentoring that we use to build, manage, and lead our own successful businesses. We are now making our approach and tools public and available to you in our Handbook Series. From Idea to Business--the first volume in the series--applies the Vecker Approach to the earliest stage of business: Developing a business idea and turning it into a viable business. It does this by helping you think about what your business does, how it works, and how it is managed. When you do this thinking, you can develop a business model that can be implemented and a plan that leads to the results you want.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Thomas Cowan began his career at IBM and went on to build, manage, and lead companies of all sizes. Most recently, during his three-year tenure as chairman and CEO of OutlookSoft Corporation, revenue grew 10 times, with the company becoming a major competitor in the performance management marketplace. Mr. Cowan is currently head of Vecker Corporation, which helps build successful businesses and leaders. A native of South Carolina, Mr. Cowan received his undergraduate degree from Wake Forest University and an MBA for the University of South Carolina. He is the author of a number of books, including Business Basics, Leadership Basics, and The Business Leader's Handbook Series.