Official Review: Startup Blueprint by Robert Andrews

[CCtheBrave]

[Following is the official OnlineBookClub.org review of "Startup Blueprint" by Robert Andrews.]

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3 out of 4 stars

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Startup Blueprint, 7 Skills For Founders, Builders And Leaders, by Robert Andrews, is a non-fiction, self-help book about how best to approach starting your own business. Although the book isn’t very long (136 pages), it’s packed with helpful insights and practical advice about becoming an entrepreneur. The author takes readers through a series of interviews with successful startup founders and CEOs, and guides them through answering tough questions about whether or not they have what it takes to be a successful business owner.

Startup Blueprint is split up into seven chapters in total, and each chapter focuses on an overarching theme that aspiring entrepreneurs should keep in mind. Some of those themes are the power of persuasion, being ambitious in your endeavors, and the importance of fostering strong leadership capabilities. Andrews also includes quotes and advice from memorable leaders in history, such as John F. Kennedy and Norman Schwarzkopf. The book is peppered with the authors own tidbits of advice, as well.

Overall, there are a lot of great qualities to Startup Blueprint that make it a worthwhile read. Throughout this ‘how-to’ book, Robert Andrews made sure to include interviews of successful entrepreneurs from many different walks of life, of different gender, and with varying degrees of success. This diversity of experts lent strength to the advice that each startup founder gave, and allowed readers to see the parallels among each of their advice. Oftentimes, the cornerstone ‘skill’ or ‘lesson’ of one expert would be supported and/or mentioned by another.

Another great aspect of this book is that the content draws readers into questioning their personal motivations, abilities, and shortcomings of being a startup founder. In fact,Startup Blueprint will be a great read for anyone who is thinking of starting a business but isn’t’ quite sure what that might entail. After reading first-hand accounts of success and failure, readers will naturally begin to question why they want to start a business, what they’re willing to sacrifice, and what their goals and definitions of success truly are. A great example of this is seen in a quote by Robert Andrews himself:

In most walks of life, being branded a “failure” is something to be ashamed of. Sure, getting business wrong and shutting up shop can be embarrassing, and extremely hard to take. But experienced entrepreneurs know that their every failure is an opportunity to learn and to improve. Each wrong step sets you on the right path. So, go on – fail, fall down, get back up, use your slipups to make a success.

The best quality of this book, in fact, is the abundance of motivational content, such as this, spread throughout the text. The fact that the lessons imparted by experts have been tested and tried is very apparent. As a reader and aspiring entrepreneur, myself, I appreciate that the main takeaways are not just fluff or hollow speeches, but they’re principles that many startup founders use every day.

Despite all of these wonderful aspects of Startup Blueprint, there are still some flaws that are quite distracting. The main issue that I have with this book is formatting. Unfortunately, the copy of the book that I received was not convenient or truly compatible with my phone, eReader, or tablet. The pages within this book were formatted as two-page spreads instead of single pages. This meant that I couldn’t scroll from one page to the next. Instead, I had to read two pages, side by side, and awkwardly scroll left to right before I could scroll up or down. While this isn’t a big issue on a laptop, it made reading on any other device an absolute pain in the neck. I constantly had to zoom in and out and scroll left and right before I could move on to the next set of pages. Moving from one page to the next quickly became a hassle. The copy of Startup Blueprint that I received didn’t have a cover, either. Although this isn’t a big issue, it was a bit disappointing, as an avid reader, to not be able to view such an important stylistic part of a book that I’d decided to read. Unfortunately, these issues detracted from my reading experience.

All in all, though, I happily rate Startup Blueprint 3 out of 4 stars. The content and advice in the text are practical, helpful and very clear, and the author used simple language that anyone can follow without getting caught in the weeds of business jargon. Aside from the distracting formatting issues, I enjoyed reading Startup Blueprint, by Robert Andrews. I appreciated his careful research into the topic, as well. I would recommend this book to anyone looking to delve into the world of startups, particularly those who are looking to do so as smartly as possible.

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Startup Blueprint
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