THIS IS IT

A father and son share their path to business ownership.

In this book, Glenn Edwards and his son Jordan provide a much-needed detour from the usual road-weary guides to self-employment. Combining elements of a memoir, a corporate biography, and business how-to, their work traces the Edwards family’s successful businesses from their inception: Chart Organization, a commercial real estate firm; and Mixology Clothing Company, which sells women’s attire. Mixology, founded a decade ago in New York City, has surpassed $10 million in annual sales, they note, but they make clear that they didn’t ride a bullet train to success; by their own admission, their stories also include half-million-dollar losses. Glenn Edwards (Coming into Your Own, 2017) and his debut co-author include lots of advice (“Learn from your mistakes. And, if you are smart, learn from other people’s mistakes, too”), and also provide lengthy, instructive interviews in Q&A format with colleagues (such as Mixology controller Eugene Parisi), business leaders, and even sports champions (such as mixed martial arts competitor Sensei Nardu Debra). Comprehensive lists of recommended reading make this a handy resource, as do the final appendices, which gather up the specific advice in each chapter as bullet points. At times, the book feels like one is eavesdropping on a business roundtable. Along the way, the authors quote an offbeat collection of figures; for instance, a quote from Socrates appears in the same chapter as one by real estate mogul and Shark Tank panelist Barbara Corcoran, who embraces the melding of best practices and attitude—voicing a theme that the authors agree with, but that doesn’t normally run through a business book: “The difference between successful people and others is how long they spend feeling sorry for themselves.”

A thorough work that provides useful perspectives on entrepreneurship.