Building Small

From the founders of the acclaimed Summit event series and community comes the story of their unconventional journey to business success and the hard lessons they learned along the way. “[Make No Small Plans] neatly crystallizes the teachings and takeaways—basic truths—from the past...

You don't have to starve to be an artist. Build a career doing what you love. In this practical guide, professional artist Lisa Congdon reveals the many ways you can earn a living by making art - through illustration, licensing, fine art sales, print sales, teaching, and beyond. Including industry advice from such successful art-world pros as Nikki McClure, Mark Hearld, Paula Scher, and more, Art, Inc. will equip you with the tools - and the confidence - to turn your passion into a profitable business.

In a world where meaningful connections are more important than ever, mastering the art of small talk can be a game-changer. "Mastering Small Talk: Building Confidence and Strategies for Engaging Conversations" is your essential guide to transforming those initial, often awkward exchanges into genuine, lasting relationships. Whether you’re navigating social gatherings, professional settings, or networking events, this book provides the tools and techniques to engage in confident and effective small talk.

In Launching & Building a Brand for Dummies, Amy Will covers everything from crafting a powerful brand identity and planning that all-important launch to being prepared to scale up as you begin to take off.

If you’re in restoration, you know what I mean — hustle worked, until it didn’t. One day, you were drying carpets, and the next you were running a restoration company. Now, you’re looking around for the resources: the business acumen, the cashflow answers, or the simple organizational tools to scale a thriving company. And my guess is, you’ve looked, but those tools have been hard to find, because no one’s ever provided a resource like that, specifically for restorers. That is, until now!

Starting a creative company needn't cost you everything. If you agree, then you'll find wit and wisdom in this book for creative entrepreneurs. Author, artist, and graphic designer Patricia Arnold presents her best tips for starting a handmade business with this initial volume in her Creative Entrepreneur series. After starting a decade-old business with a shoestring budget and then founding a second business six years later, Patricia Arnold has a lot to say about building creative businesses from scratch.

The proven, frustration-free way to make your business stand out online, from one of North America's leaders on digital marketing for small businesses. Today, you can launch a website, create social media feeds, and get products and services to market on some of the world’s most powerful sales platforms in a matter of hours. But marketing your small business effectively takes some careful thought.

"How to Start a Music Lessons Business" by VentureNest Books is a comprehensive guide aimed at aspiring music teachers and entrepreneurs who wish to transform their musical skills into a successful teaching practice. This step-by-step manual addresses common challenges faced when starting a music studio, including attracting students, managing schedules and finances, and implementing effective marketing strategies. The book provides vital insights into assessing market demand for music lessons and developing a unique brand that resonates with students.

How do you develop products that people will actually use and buy? This practical guide shows you how to validate product and company ideas through customer development research - before you waste months and millions on a product or service that no one needs or wants. With a combination of open-ended interviewing and fast and flexible research techniques, you’ll learn how your prospective customers behave, the problems they need to solve, and what frustrates and delights them

Due to a range of frequent and unavoidable mistakes, only ten percent of startups make it beyond five years. In this game-changing guide, startup veteran and serial entrepreneur Gregory Shepard combines twelve startup exits, four private equity awards, and decades' worth of expert insight and industry experience—including interviews with real entrepreneurs, Navy SEALs, Air Force Fighter Pilots, and more—to present you with straightforward, actionable strategies for mapping out your startup and achieving success.

In AI and the Octopus Organization: Building the Superintelligent Firm, leading futurist Jonathan Brill and innovation expert Stephen Wunker unveil a groundbreaking vision for how organizations must evolve to survive and thrive in the age of artificial intelligence. Drawing inspiration from the octopus, an ancient creature noted for both rapid adaptation and distributed intelligence, the authors show that only businesses that rewire their structure, leadership, and decision-making can unlock AI's full potential.

Building a Book of Business for Travel Advisors is a book for travel advisors looking to increase their income by growing their list of clients and securing high-commission bookings.

"Launching an Interior Design Business" by VentureNest Books is a comprehensive guide designed for aspiring interior designers eager to transform their creative passion into a thriving business. This essential resource addresses common challenges faced by individuals at the beginning of their entrepreneurial journey, particularly those lacking the necessary business know-how.

Part narrative, part business book, Architect and Entrepreneur is filled with contemporary, relevant, fresh tips and advice from a seasoned professional architect building a new business. The guide advocates novel strategies and tools that merge entrepreneurship with the practices of architecture and interior design.

Whether you're a solar sales professional, facility manager, engineer, or clean energy entrepreneur, Wired for Sun is your go-to guide for navigating the complex world of commercial solar development. Written by industry veteran Tim Montague, host of the Clean Power Hour podcast, this comprehensive playbook demystifies every step of the solar project development process—from qualifying leads and conducting site assessments, to modeling cash flow, navigating policy incentives, and closing deals.

It’s easy to think working less and making more is something available only to a blessed few. James has proven over and over again this is not the case. If you want to build a business that gives you financial peace of mind while allowing you to enjoy life now, not later...Work Less, Make More will get you on your way. It will help ensure the business you're building will work for you, not the other way around.

Being a startup CEO is a job like no other: it's difficult, risky, stressful, lonely, and often learned through trial and error. As a startup CEO seeing things for the first time, you're likely to make mistakes, fail, get things wrong, and feel like you don't have any control over outcomes. Author Matt Blumberg has been there, and in Startup CEO he shares his experience, mistakes, and lessons learned as he guided Return Path from a handful of employees and no revenues to over $100 million in revenues and 500 employees.

Building a Badass Boutique - Your 10-Touch Journey to Designing a Fitness Studio That Rocks takes operators through the key areas of Purpose, Pain, Positioning, People, Programming, Place, Processes, Plan, Pace, and Polish. The 10 touchpoints are unpacked clearly and comprehensively, offering new lenses, and allowing you, the business owner, to establish authentic foundations that will set you up to optimize and scale. Emma Barry is a global fitness authority advising the sector’s fastest growing segments: boutique studios, budget clubs, and fit tech start-ups.

Best Passive Income Streams for 2025 by VentureNest Books is a practical guide designed to help listeners secure their financial future by establishing sustainable income sources. Aimed at individuals who feel trapped in traditional jobs, this book outlines a roadmap from immediate financial concerns to a diversified portfolio of income streams. The content focuses on various innovative strategies for building wealth in the upcoming year.

Don Wenner is a master of scaling high-growth, high-profit entrepreneurial companies. In ​Building an Elite Organization​, he walks you through the Elite Execution System his company and other highly successful organizations use to drive growth and improve profitability.