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Business
Stripped Bare: Adventures of a Global Entrepreneur,
by Richard Branson
Review by Jo Owen (October 2008 : Director
Magazine)
Britain's
best-known businessman brought out another book last
month. Does it tell readers anything they didn't know
already?
Why
does he keep writing books? If he is short of a bob
or two, book royalties won't save him. If he needs
publicity, he should do something simpler, like launch
a private space shot. It is difficult to find anything
new and insightful to say about business. Even the
title of his book, Business Stripped Bare, pays homage
to Management Stripped Bare, which I wrote several
years ago. Imitation is the highest form of flattery.
Let's hope we do not see Sir Richard stripped bare
for the launch.
In
the book, Sir Richard recalls countless stories from
his business empire. They illustrate many basic truths
of business life. They may be obvious, but they are
worth saying. At least he does the reader a service
by saying them well. Business Stripped Bare entertains
more than informs and it doesn't need to be insightful
to work. It needs the bearded one on the front cover
and the Branson PR machine behind it. It will succeed,
but not enough to pay for his space shot.
The
real test for a business book is whether it can be
put into practice. Long suffering users of Virgin
Trains understand the gap between theory and practice.
A train ticket from London to Birmingham? No problem,
after you have worked your way through 30 screens
on your computer. Buying a train ticket should be
short and simple. But it's easy to find yourself in
the never-never land of not being able to get into
the Virgin Trains booking system as either a new or
existing user. Writing about how to do things well
is clearly easier than doing them.
Sir
Richard starts by urging us to "find good people"
and "set them free". He then inundates us
with anecdotes on this theme. This sets the tone for
the book. It is fast-paced, anecdotal, inspirational
and remarkably short of practical detail around how
to do all the things he urges. He reports that managers
need "a modest amount of psychological insight"
and that "people come and go". This may
be true, but does not help us know what to do, or
how to do it.
His
people rules include: employees are number one; think
small to grow big; manage in the good times for the
bad times; irreverence is OK; it's OK to be yourself;
and have fun at work.
This
is all good stuff, backed up with inspiring anecdotes.
A practising manager might wonder how to have irreverent
fun when doing the year-end tax return, and whether
the tax man will join in.
The
section on branding shows how Sir Richard thinks of
the Virgin brand as: "a guarantee that you will
be treated well, that you will get a high quality
product which won't dent your bank balance and you'll
get more fun out of your purchase than you expected".
This is his cue for more anecdotes about how his different
businesses have achieved success. The closest the
reader gets to seeing how you can do this is his observation
that "publicity is absolutely critical".
Given he's the master of PR stunts, this is a bit
like telling us the Pope is a Catholic.
The
section on delivery starts with him name dropping
Christina Aguilera, Raymond Blanc, the French president
and his engagements with Swedish television and big
shots in Japan and India. Perish the thought that
he might be promoting himself in this book. The section
then turns into another procession of anecdotes around
the successes of his trains, mobile phones and airlines,
with a brief rant about the Lottery. His advice on
delivery is that it is "best approached steadily,
and with fortitude". There is not much about
selling train tickets competently and not much about
how practising managers can improve delivery.
Fortunately,
the eulogy to his own success is interrupted by a
section on Learning from mistakes and setbacks. He
provides a personal view on an early tax scam on records,
a train crash, Virgin cola, going public and the Northern
Rock saga. There is some learning and much self-justification.
Self-doubt is not part of his success formula.
From
here on, the pattern is established. Chapters around
innovation, entrepreneurs and leadership and social
responsibility are used as vehicles for more anecdotes
from his career. As the whirl around his business
empire becomes a blur, one thing is obvious. For most
managers, career is a noun. For Branson, career is
a verb that describes his frenetic charge from one
enterprise to the next.
Business
Stripped Bare will leave you breathless as you try
to follow the rampage across global business. There
is no great system to the book. Chapters merely provide
a theme for the anecdotes.
Overall,
the book is an entertaining, if disjointed, ramble
through a remarkable business career. It does not
strip business bare, and will be more inspirational
than practical help to most managers.
Publisher:
Virgin Books
October 2008 : Director
Magazine for Business Leaders
Profile
Richard
Richard
Branson Official Website and Blog
I was born in 1950 and educated at Stowe School. It
was here that I set up Student magazine when I was
16.
In
1970 I founded Virgin as a mail order record retailer,
and shortly afterwards I opened a record shop in Oxford
Street, London. In 1972 we built a recording studio
in Oxfordshire where the first Virgin artist, Mike
Oldfield, recorded ‘Tubular Bells’.
In 1977 we signed the Sex Pistols and we went on to
sign many household names from Culture Club to the
Rolling Stones, helping to make Virgin Music one of
the top six record companies in the world.
With around 200 companies in over 30 countries, the
Virgin Group has now expanded into leisure, travel,
tourism, mobile, broadband, TV, radio, music festivals,
finance and health and through Virgin Green Fund we
are investing in renewable energy and resource efficiency.
In February 2007, we announced the Virgin Earth Challenge
- a $25 million prize to encourage a viable technology
which will result in the net removal of anthropogenic,
atmospheric greenhouse gases. In July of the same
year I had the honour of joining my good friend Peter
Gabriel, Nelson Mandela, Graça Machel, and
Desmond Tutu to announce the formation of The Elders,
a group of leaders to contribute their wisdom, independent
leadership and integrity to tackle some of the world’s
toughest problems.
I am also very proud of the work of Virgin Unite,
our not-for-profit entrepreneurial foundation, which
continues to focus on entrepreneurial approaches to
social and environmental issues and enjoy supporting
their work in every way I can.
Visit virgin.com for more info.
Profile
Richard
Branson
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