Visionary Business: An Entrepreneur's Guide to Success

This breakthrough book shows you not only how to envision and create success, but also how to build a truly visionary business: one that supports its employees, the community, and the environment. A combination of Richard Bach’s Illusions and Tom Peters' In Search of Excellence, Visionary Business describes the quest for entrepreneurial success as being far more than the ability to be financially savvy. It tells the story of entrepreneur Marc Allen’s unlikely rise to success. Told as an anecdotal tale of wisdom, Allen makes clear from the start that he learned as he went and that his secret to success lies not so much in management élan but in practical grace and humble persistence. In this story, Allen's steward/mentor, an older investment specialist named Bernie, teaches him the ways of ethical and socially responsible business. Together, they direct Allen's fledgling attempts into a thriving corporate success, founded on principles as diverse as Eastern and Western spirituality, simple kindness, mysticism, and market savvy. Allen summarizes his experience in the “Twenty-five Principles and Practices of Visionary Business.” He discusses the value of benefits and profit-sharing programs; the importance of hiring passionate people; management by goals rather than by crisis; why money, while essential, is secondary; how opportunities lurk within every adversity; why an employee handbook is a powerful tool for success; and how some understanding of a higher power can provide guidance and inspiration.