The Intelligent Entrepreneur

By: Bill Murphy Jr.

Narrated by: Fred Berman, L. J. Ganser

Length: 12 hrs and 35 mins

Publisher's summary

Written with the cooperation of Harvard Business School, here is an instructive and inspiring book for anyone who dreams of starting a highly profitable business.

In 1998, three Harvard Business School graduates - two men and one woman - turned down six-figure salaries at big corporations, bet on themselves, and launched their own new companies. By their 10-year reunion, their audacity had paid huge dividends. They'd made many millions of dollars, created hundreds of jobs, and left their mark on the world.

The three entrepreneurs: Marc Cenedella (TheLadders.com), Marla Malcom Beck (Bluemercury.com), and Chris Michel (Military.com, Affinity Labs).

Based on dozens of interviews with highly successful entrepreneurs, Harvard Business School professors, and HBS alumni, The Intelligent Entrepreneur tells the compelling and instructive story of how these three young founders developed ideas, assembled teams, built ventures, and achieved their dreams. Along the way, they learned that starting great companies requires much more than a ferocious work ethic or good timing. Their hard-won insights distilled into 10 key rules that will help anyone become a successful entrepreneur. What they teach you at Harvard Business School is that intelligent entrepreneurship can be learned. In that spirit, Bill Murphy Jr. uses a unique combination of vivid storytelling and lucid instruction to tell would-be entrepreneurs how to improve their odds of creating dynamic, lasting businesses.

This audiobook includes an exclusive roundtable discussion with Marc Cenedella, Marla Malcom Beck, and Chris Michel.

©2010 Bill Murphy (P)2010 Audible, Inc

Critic reviews

• Audie Award Winner - Best Business/Educational Audiobook, 2011

"This is an excellent, thought-provoking overview of entrepreneurship... that uses actual cases to describe the challenges of starting a business and realizing success." ( Booklist)

"Narrators Fred Berman and L.J. Ganser split the narration, chapter by chapter, with one delivering the true-life accounts of three entrepreneurs who attended HBS while the other delivers the theoretical lessons to be learned from attending HBS." ( AudioFile)

Total Waste of time

It's total waste of time, did not find any point to listening it. And HBS reference's was irritating. I wish I had a refund for this. What a waste of time and money.

Great Storytelling, So-So Instruction

What did you like about this audiobook?

The author of this book is a great storyteller. I enjoyed how he captured the daily lives of the three entrepreneurs at the center of this book. I felt like I was peeking into their lives, and often felt like I was watching a Hollywood movie in my head, because of his well-crafted descriptions.

The two speakers both did a fine job, but I'm left wondering why there were two. Switching between two speakers just left me wondering why switch. I would more understand a switch between a guy and girl, given the context of one female and two male students. But again, my puzzlement has nothing to do with the performances. They both did great jobs.

Does the author present information in a way that is interesting and insightful, and if so, how does he achieve this?

As great as the storytelling was, though, I was overall disappointed with the book, in regards to how it billed itself. If the description had said that this was just a book telling the story of 3 typical graduates of Harvard Business School, I would give it a much higher rating, but the author proposed that he's distilled the wisdom of the school into

Do you have any additional comments?

So, to repeat in summary, if you want a great story about 3 Harvard MBAs as they struggled with life after Harvard Business School, and found their ways to starting their own companies, then buy this book. It will be very inspiration to you, and really helps to portray an accurate picture of the life you better be prepared to lead if you decide to become an entrepreneur.

But, if you want some repeatable rules to guide you, get this book for the reasons above, but make it a higher priority to check out books in the Lean Startup space. A friend of mine who is a more-recent grad from HBS says that that is getting a lot more attention at HBS now. Lean Startup also has a strong following in Silicon Valley, and at tech schools like MIT and my alma mater, Carnegie Mellon.

Slow/Tedious/novelistic-minutia" vs Meat & Veggies

so much expectation...too much disappinment...quit at ch 4...better-stuff out there

too-too many descriptive details vs REAL "Business-Advice"...even 125 speed it's ho-hum

UBU...Model Success...a GOOD OUTLINE better than LOOSING 12-HOURS on "this 1 book"

HBS promotional material

I purchased this book under the premise that I would be inspired, that if these three entrepreneurial examples could do it, so could I. Well, the book follows three Harvard Business School Graduates, all who graduated at a similar time and all who started dot com business and of course overcame obstacles and were ultimately successful. I suppose if I graduated from HBS, I would be able to relate. I would have much preferred the book if three entrepreneurs with entirely different educational, social and economical advantages/disadvantages were studied, that way, the likelihood of identifying with at least one character would be higher. I just hoped to walk away with even a glimmer of inspiration, but I did not. I would recommend this book to those who are curious about HBS, how the school is run, its pros & cons and are interested in capturing a portrait of their student alumni.

Well, half of it was okay

Didn't care for the stories/case studies. Yes, we've all been told that a good book has point, example, point, example, but Mr. Murphy, give your audience some credit for having the ability to understand a concept. Also, L.J. Ganser could back off of the intensity in his delivery. I think that was part of the problem with the half of the book that he read, the stories/case studies. His delivery sounds disingenuous and I felt like I was plugged into a commercial.

And like other reviewers here, I felt the constant referral to Harvard Business School was tiresome.

Story time with Bill

I'm hours in and he has yet to get to the point. So far it's simply a bunch of stories of entrepreneurs that have yet to have any significance. Save your money. This book is a complete waste.

If you buy it, only listen to the last 1-2 chapter

Any additional comments?

Way way to much story to get through in order to get to the 10 points.

I nice sales pitch for HBR but...

The is clearly a sales pitch for HBR. And much in the fashion of Harvard, the protest that this book is valuable because of the reams of research cited before writing this dry study of a topic that requires spirit and enthusiasm. Like most things Harvard, the spirit has been drained out and we are left with a meaningless study of dry numbers and points that any high school student would gloss over as obvious and fundamental.

Don't waste your time and money

I did not a thing or being inspired by this book. After listening for 4 hours, I really think it's a waste of time, money and effort.

Marketing Material for Harvard Business School

Would you try another book from Bill Murphy and/or Fred Berman and L. J. Ganser ?

I would not buy another book written by Bill Murphy

Has The Intelligent Entrepreneur turned you off from other books in this genre?

No, Although I would not buy one by this author

What didn’t you like about Fred Berman and L. J. Ganser ’s performance?

The narration seemed boastful and arrogant

Any additional comments?

I wish that I had read the reviews before buying this book. Many people's comments are that this feels like marketing material for Harvard Business School. After several hours I stopped listening as I have no plans to attend HBS but I did want to learn from these people's business experience.