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I hate most interviews, and I think everyone else does too.

This interview is different: It’s insightful and actionable. Weird, right? I promise not to ask where Howard was born. Yeah, I don’t care either.

In this installment of the Uncommon Interview series we hear from entrepreneur, business turn-around and acceleration specialist Howard Mann of Brickyard Partners, famous for the little book pictured at right (available as a free eBook).

Many of you are just starting out on your startup journey, still bright-eyed and bushy-tailed, full of hope and confidence. Or fear and fraudulence, whatever.

But despite what many-signaled folks would have you believe, it’s hard to maintain ..read more

I remember “disruptive” when it was called “paradigm shift.” That phrase died during the tech-bubble along with “portal” and “think outside the box,” yet the concept has returned. Don’t follow along.

When I get pitched — usually by someone raising money — that they “have something disruptive,” a little part of me dies. You should be worrying about making something useful, not how disruptive you can be.

“Disruptive” is the in-vogue word for the opposite of “incremental improvement.” A disruptive product causes such a large market shift that entire companies collapse (the ones who don’t “get it”) and new markets appear.

Disruptive is fascinating, disruptive changes the world, disruptive makes us ..read more

“I feel like a fraud. I’ve been at this for 16 years and I still feel like a fraud. I’m just waiting for the day they see through the façade, but they keep coming back every year.”   –Jason Young

Ah yes, the awe-inspiring words of confidence from the seasoned entrepreneur. My friend Jason intended this as soothing words of solace during (one of my) periods of personal freak-out while Smart Bear was in its infancy.

I felt like a fraud every day. Here I was, selling a wobbly, buggy tool and pawning myself off as an expert in a field that ..read more

This is a guest post from my wife Darla, herself an entrepreneur and chef with a healthy dinner delivery service and a food/recipe blog. Darla and I made different trade-offs with our businesses and I wanted her to share her perspective.

A lot has been said in response to Jason’s post about sacrificing your health for your startup. Some think his position is excessive; some say it depends on your goals. Can you run a lifestyle business that doesn’t require so much personal sacrifice?

I did. I started Fork In The Road, a wee little healthy dinner delivery ..read more