Simply Success: How to Start, Build and Grow a Multimillion Dollar Business the Old-Fashioned Way

by Jack Miller and Jack Miller

Book Overview

In Simply Success, the former chairman and founder of Quill Corporation presents key lessons of entrepreneurship, including how to get started, set a vision, finance the business, and build a successful corporate culture. Based on his own experience, Miller shares his most hard-earned lessons, so you can avoid learning the same lessons the painful way. For entrepreneurs young and old, or even if only dream of starting a business one day, this book...

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0470224525
• ISBN13: 9780470224526
• Release Date: February 2008
• Publisher: Wiley
• Length: 240 Pages
• Weight: 0.05 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.9" x 6.4" x 9.0"

Customer Reviews

Lessons from the guru

I am an entreprenure with my own start-up business. I am fortunate to know Jack Miller's best friend and accountant Howard Bernstein and last week he has given me a hardcopy of Jack's book. I am still in the middle of it, but I wanted to give all of you a heads up on this gem. Jack Miller is the founder and CEO of Quill Office Supplies. Starting his business with $2000 in an abandoned coal storage (no kidding!) he grew the business into a $630 million/year business before selling it to Staples. In this book he talks about the lessons he has learned from 43 years of being an entrepreneur. Jack's writing style is simple, direct, and conversational in nature. It is as if he is sitting across the table and reminisces about his past. Not a literary gem, this book is nevertheless an entrepreneurial gem, full of key lessons that range from finance to family. My favorite so far is the equation of Success= (Vision + Dedication)*VERY HARD WORK :-) I believe it is a MUST READ for anyone who fancies themselves an entrepreneur.

Great Book on using Hardwork to build a business

I thought this book was really well written and describing a well proven formula on how to be successful, hard work. I think that is a little bit lost these days, everyone wants to have it all without working hard. This book breaks that illusion. It also discusses how to build a business without taking on a huge amount of debt. Some people think it is a badge of honor to have a business with a bunch of debt. I believe the opposite. This book also discusses that. If you want a good book on how to build a successful business using timeless values, this is a good book for you.

Practical Advice for Growing a Business

For those who dream of starting and running a business and then growing it into giant enterprise, another new book for you. Simply Success, How to Start, Build and Grow a Multimillion-Dollar Business--the Old Fashioned Way (John Wiley & Sons in February, 2008) Penned by Quill Corporation founder Jack Miller, Simply Success shares the lessons he learned turning his small business into a nearly $700 million office supply giant, eventually acquired by Staples. Miller's story is a testament to what you can do when you have passion for your work and are willing to reinvest your profits. In Simply Success Miller gives practical "how to" advice on growing a business. He began his office supply business with a telephone in his father's chicken store ("Are those chickens I hear in the background, sir?") then he got a more formal office--the retired coal bin in the sub-basement of his uncle's apartment building. What's the lesson in cheap rent? Best not to spend money that you don't have. Miller grew Quill from a one-man operation to more than 1,200 employees. This book explains in detail how he projected budget statements, conducted monthly financial reviews, developed goals, improved customer service and a host of other activities. "It's important," writes Miller, "to turn everything possible into routine processes (and this includes far more things than most people think) and then keep improving the routine. It's important to make sure that everyone down to the newest person at the lowest level knows exactly what their responsibilities are. Constant monitoring and correcting are always necessary to make sure that all those simple things are in deed, done well." Late in the book Miller sums up his experience in eight lessons, which I am roughly paraphrasing here: 1. Don't move outside of your core competency--it's a recipe for disaster. 2. Don't be an expert at everything--hire experts. 3. Don't risk all you have on one plan or pursuit. 4. Don't aim for rapid growth--10 to 15 percent a year is fine. 5. Pursue profits rather than grand hopes. 6. Don't keep the wrong talent onboard, clear them out. 7. Know your business, customers and market. 8. Don't blindly follow your advisors, they have their own agendas. This book can be inspiring at times and overly practical at other times. For entrepreneurs, Simply Success offers a hard, long realistic look at the work involved in creating a world-class business. Are you up to the challenge? Tomorrow's biggest and best companies will sprout from a handful of today's smartest small businesses. Will your small business be one of them?

Read this book to suck up the wisdom obtained by one person who has spent lots of years playing the

I liked this book. It had the potential to really be a great book. But the writing style just didn't cut it for me. It was just a little too conversational. And I don't agree with the author that entrepreneurs are born. They can be, but they don't have to be. The book is filled to the brim with content, and has the following 27 chapters: 1. A bit of history 2. What it takes to be an entrepreneur 3. Getting started 4. Financing 5. The miracle of hard work 6. The magic of a vision 7. Focus: Putting on the blinders 8. Concentrate on your customer 9. There is a better way 10. Plotting your course with strategic planning 11. Implementation: Making it happen 12. Forecasting and budgeting 13. Using your financial statements to get where you want to go 14. You can, too, argue with success! 15. Building a great corporate culture 16. Shaping a winning organization 17. Who controls your life? 18. Easing the burden 19. Doing more by doing less 20. Your growth as a leader 21. Someone changed the rules. Why wasn't it me? 22. About the life long learning process 23. The art of survival 24. How to do almost everything wrong 25. About advisors and boards 26. A family business can be great, or ... 27. The glory of the free enterprise system Besides what I say in the first paragraph of this review, I think this is a wonderful book. The chapter titles are spectacular! Anybody who knows anything about small business can skim these chapter titles and know they should want to read this book. The author covers pretty much A to Z regarding what a wanta-be entrepreneur or small business owner should know about and consider when earning a living in a manner other than just collecting a W-2. There are pearls of wisdom contained in this book. 4 stars!