James C Wetherbe
Interest: Innovation Organization Information Technology Angel Funding Mergers and Acquisitions Ethics Product Development Strategy Family Business Legal Contracts Entrepreneurship
Industry: Telecommunications & Internet Retail Trade Banking, Finance, Insurance Real Estate, Rental, Leasing Sales, Marketing, Advertising Accommodation & Food Services Information, Software, Data Educational Services Arts, Entertainment & Recreation Construction Publishing, Media, Broadcasting Transportation & Warehousing Social Media & Networks
Interviewee:
Authored Resources
Entrepreneurial Brinkmanship: Lessons Learned from Best Buy and FedEx
15761 viewsAs these iconic companies prove, sometimes an entrepreneur has to bet the company to survive.
EIX: Reducing Cycle Time in Thought Leadership
17944 views Time and money are two crucial resources, but they are significantly different. Money not used today can be saved and used later if we so choose. Time, on the other hand, marches on and gets
Delivering the Goods: An Interview with Best Buy and EIX Founder Dick Schulze
153642 viewsSchulze’s story shows that sometimes opportunity can be found in the rubble of dashed plans -- a message that resonates more than ever today.
Garrey Carruthers: Governor, Entrepreneur, University President
3607 viewsGarrey Carruthers shares his remarkable journey of going from family farm boy to professor, to governor, to entrepreneur and to dean of business school and then president of New Mexico State
Data Analytics Help Entrepreneurs Decide Where to Boldly Go
33692 viewsSpace programs must pick the parts of the cosmos that can and should be explored. Data analytics helps entrepreneurs navigate a universe of possibilities.
Entrepreneurs Don't Get Tenure: Should Their Professors?
12908 viewsSuccessful entrepreneurs must be constantly open to new ideas, adapt to changing marketplaces, reinvent their businesses and occasionally bet the house. At times, they must take their businesses to
FedEx: Obtaining Corporate Sponsored Research
17662 viewsCorporate funding of university research pays off for both the institution and business. Here's How FedEx was approached and agreed to engage in sponsored research.
Connecting Business Research to Practice
20107 viewsMarkets are a strong mechanism that force entrepreneurs to produce outputs that are useful to customers. Ironically and sadly, schools that groom future entrepreneurs too often don’t consider
Perils of Entrepreneurial Philanthropy in Higher Education
29249 viewsBefore funding a building, professorship or scholarship, some due diligence is necessary.
Collaborative Action Exercises Engage Students More Fully Than Lectures and Exams
67737 viewsTraditional classroom lecture/discussion formats, followed by quizzes and exams, don’t prepare graduates for explaining their innovation to real-world skeptics.
A Tech Entrepreneur's Journey: Hard Work and Smart Risks
8588 viewsDavid Bateman, Co-CEO and Founder of SitePro, Inc., has learned the art of launching a great product through hard work and smart risks. His $60 million company makes technology solutions that help
How to Care for Your Team During a Crisis
309804 viewsThis advice from one of our best-read articles in 2020 still rings true for startups, small businesses and family ventures who are trying to hang on until things stabilize.
How to Keep Your Favorite Business From Going Under
39946 viewsWhen a favorite shop, online store or family business struggles because of a crisis, entrepreneurs feel loss and a sense of their own vulnerability. How to help.
Family Businesses Can Help One Another
2201 viewsWhen a favorite shop, restaurant or other business struggles during a crisis, family business owners feel a sense of their own vulnerability. How they can help.
Which Innovations Should You Keep When the Crisis is Over?
134961 viewsIt's time to look at the innovations that helped you survive dark days, and choose which ones are keepers -- as one of our best-read articles from 2020 points out.
Colleagues Celebrate a Leader Who Empowered Others
5503 viewsWhat makes for a great leader, whether it's of a startup or a giant company? These tributes to Best Buy Founder Dick Schulze can point the way.
Professors and Experts: Would You Like Your Articles to be Read?
8568 viewsEntrepreneurship professors and other experts can take a cue from Super Bowl ads to encourage more entrepreneurs to discover and learn from their research.
Entrepreneur Philanthropy: What is the Appropriate Donation for a Named Gift?
7959 viewsThose receiving gifts are often more experienced and skilled at receiving than donors are at giving, thus creating a knowledge gap that can lead to misunderstandings.
For New Research Insights, Study One Family in Depth
2572 viewsStudying a single family firm over time can yield more practical and meaningful insights, and spotlight promising directions for future research.
a16z Brings Thought Leadership to the Valley
26751 viewsThe rise of Andreessen Horowitz holds important lessons for today's tech entrepreneurs and VCs introducing products and services whose benefits are hard to understand.
How SitePro Innovated and Diversified in Times of Crisis
10685 viewsThe pandemic spurred a technology startup to look beyond its customer base and expand to other industries. The innovations are here to stay.
Remembering Gordon Davis, Founder of Management Information Systems
9136 viewsHis innovation has forever changed how we think about, develop, deliver, and manage information technology resources.
How a Distillery Founder and His Investor Went Off the Rails
23854 viewsThe true story of Balcones Distilling shows how shared decision-making can set the stage for turf wars, legal dramas...and far worse.
How Professors Can Become Thought Leaders
11645 viewsResearch a problem that businesses care about – and partner with businesses that can identify the problem and pay for the research.
EIX's Editorial Guidelines for the Use of Generative AI Tools
23898 viewsYou are welcome to use these tools to help draft, revise, and/or expand on submitted articles -- but make sure you understand our rules.
What If Activists Target My Company?
11139 viewsSocial and environmental activism can be a blessing in disguise that helps new ventures find opportunities and older companies innovate.
Persuasive Communication for Crucial Conversations
50560 viewsHere's a free, downloadable book about achieving win/win communication. It's also available as a teaching exercise.
Cash Is Not Always King in Founder/Investor Relationships
44809 viewsKnowledge, reputation, and personal ties can also be leveraged and weaponized, setting the stage for clashes and disruption.
More Than an Entrepreneur: How Best Buy Founder Dick Schulze Saves Lives
16589 viewsAlong with funding worthy organizations and missions through his foundation, Dick Schulze also works behind the scenes to help individuals during a life-threatening health crisis.
Remembering and Learning from FedEx Founder Fred Smith
77211 viewsSmith died June 21, but the 11 management practices he encouraged at FedEx provide timeless wisdom for all kinds of businesses.
Editors’ Picks
Becoming the Best: A Journey of Passion, Purpose, and Perseverance
Best Buy Founder Dick Schulze was once asked if he ever thought about closing Best Buy if it did not meet certain benchmarks for financial returns. Schulze responded with relaxed confidence: "No, there was never a point I would have thrown in the towel; failure was not an option." That quote explains much of what is to be learned from Schulze's book.
Entrepreneurship: A Process Perspective
This is an excellent entrepreneurship textbook. It provides an understanding of the who, what and why of entrepreneurship, including how to assemble resources and launch the venture. It provides guidance on how to run a lasting business and harvest the rewards. Case studies are appropriately used throughout the text to illustrate concepts and techniques.
The Lean Start Up
This book is useful for the one-person start up all the way up to the corporate board launching a new endeavor. It provides a powerful framework for innovation and lean thinking for both current and new entrepreneurs. It provides a method for managing innovation through minimum viable products, evolving them through learning with actionable metrics to achieve successful products and services.
Disciplined Entrepreneurship
By nature entrepreneurship tends to be a chaotic process of trying, failing, inventing and reinventing. "Disciplined Entrepreneurship" provides a useful structure that reduces this chaos, by providing 24 steps to track and progress through the entrepreneurship process. The steps are not simply sequential. Rather, entrepreneurs will go backwards and forwards within the steps as new challenges and obstacles arise. Nonetheless, the 24-step framework works as a useful road map to ensure key activities are not overlooked and the process is well managed.
HBR Guide to Building Your Business Case
Provides excellent tools for pitching a new product or service, proposing a process improvement, or for entrepreneurs seeking funds for a start-up. Shows, with examples, how to crunch the numbers and pitch your idea.
The Hard Thing about Hard Things
Great read for anyone wanting to know the uncomfortable truths about creating and leading a company. Inspiring story from a silicon valley entrepreneur who provides a compelling guide for protecting your start up from self inflicting wounds. Inspirational, insightful and amusing perspectives from someone who has been there.
Author donates 100% of royalties to help women in developing countries gain basic civil rights.