The Bezos Letters
14 Principles to Grow Your Business Like Amazon
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- $19.99
Publisher Description
Amazon is the fastest company ever to reach $100 billion in sales and they didn't reach that landmark by staying in their comfort zone. Risk taking is the key that unlocked the door to growth at Amazon, but those risks were (and are) intentional, calculated, and strategic. Thomas Edison believed, "I have not failed. I've just found 10,000 ways that won't work." and Amazon's founder, Jeff Bezos, has always linked experimentation and failure with growth and success.
But "risk taking" can be costly (even disastrous) if you don't know how to use it to your advantage. Fortunately, Bezos has provided every business owner a "hidden in plain sight" roadmap for how he grew Amazon through his Letter to Shareholders (or as he named them, share owners) that he has written annually for the past 20 years.
For the first time, Technology and Risk expert Steve Anderson has analyzed and distilled these letters to reveal the key 14 Growth Principles that unlock the lessons, mindset, and steps Bezos has used to make Amazon the massive success it is today.
Now, business owners, leaders, CEOs, employees, and managers can apply these same principles to grow their business to be more efficient, productive, and successful - fast!
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Anderson, a professional speaker on tech and business, takes a perceptive look at Amazon founder Jeff Bezos's annual shareholder letters, extracting 14 key "growth principles" that both the large corporation and "solopreneur" can use to scale up. Asserting that, "in some form or another," every principle can be found in each of the 21 letters issued to Amazon shareholders since 1997, Anderson begins with the intriguing "Encourage Successful Failure,' " a point made by Bezos in explaining why he doesn't regret high-profile flops like Pets.com. Principle 4, "Obsess Over Customers," is illustrated by how Amazon pushed third-party merchants hosted on the site to prioritize customer care via its advocacy for "Frustration-Free Packaging." Other principles include "Make Complexity Simple" (which led to Frustration-Free Packaging) and "Promote Ownership," which involves the dramatic differences in mindset between an owner and a "tenant," and the importance of getting employees to adopt the mindset of the former. Whether businesspeople can generate growth by adopting Anderson's recommendations will have to be seen, but they should certainly enjoy the stories and observations he shares about one of the world's most influential companies.
