As America's head coach, President Obama needs to make some big and smart adjustments to jump-start economic growth and business investment, stimulate job creation, and get wages up for ordinary Americans.
Take control of who you report to, what you do, what you create. Or start a business on the side. Deliver some value, any value, to anybody, to somebody, and watch that value compound into a career.
In 1989, I started the National Association of Business Women. We incorporated microfinance and different job training for women. We did a survey, with USAID, that found women lacked training, credit and information.
I started a business with two guys I played with, Ronnie Lott and Harris Barton: Champion Ventures, it's a fund of funds. We have $400 million or so under management.
Well, actually, I had been working as a consultant to former companies of Enron, or predecessor companies of Enron and, so, I joined in 1990 to really start our wholesale merchant business.
Yelp has been in this business since it really became something worth thinking about in 2004, when the transition started happening from the world of the Yellow Pages to the world of searching online for local information.
I saw how the regulation I called for made things worse, didn't help consumers and simple competition was better. And I started praising business and occasionally criticizing regulation.
When I first started out in this business, it was easy because nobody wanted anything from me. But now everyone wants something from me, so it's hard to break away and just be a songwriter.
When I started out in this business, I really wanted to become iconic, but I'm glad that didn't happen. I like to do things like travel on public transport unnoticed.
For those working menial jobs or putting in 100-hour weeks for corporations, the lure of starting your own business can seem like a great way to get more flexibility, upside, and ownership.
Start with good people, lay out the rules, communicate with your employees, motivate them and reward them. If you do all those things effectively, you can't miss.
When I visit local communities, people often complain that they need the approval of several dozen government departments to get something done or to start a business, and people are quite frustrated about this.
I started out as a business manager for a national hotel chain based in Oklahoma. I got frustrated with what was happening in the state capital - the high cost of doing business and a lack of educated workers.
I have become a subscriber for 'Business Week.' It teaches me a lot about business, and I have really started to get into it. I'm interested in business and learning about how everything works.
You have a career, and you start as a business person. And you work your way, you reach this peak, and you know the time's going to come when you go back down.
But let me tell you what happens when regulations go too far, when they seem to exist only for the purpose of justifying the existence of a regulator. It kills the people trying to start a business.
You know who a complicated tax code kills? The guy or gal trying to start a business out of the spare bedroom of their home. So we've got to simplify our tax code.
It's a pragmatist's business, comedy. Start off with good intentions and references to the Pompidou Centre and you end up with boiled sweets and a pantomime cow.
The minute you start the process of deciding to make a film and you're communicating that vision to anyone, you're in the process of selling. If you don't understand that, you're not in show business. You're just not.
I never get the accountants in before I start up a business. It's done on gut feeling, especially if I can see that they are taking the mickey out of the consumer.
I think a lot of developments start with the desire of the developer to get what he really wants so that he can use it. It's not just the technical fascination or the business opportunity.
