While the Nation Slept: The Struggle of Innovative Small Business in the U.S.

About this book

This book takes a closer look at small businesses but not all of them. It focuses on a particular set of them small innovative firms the gazelles of the small business family. Like the fast light and agile member of the African antelope family these fleet-footed and rapidly growing small firms attempt to take an idea from invention through research and testing to development of a marketable product design or service. Along this continuum such firms create jobs expand the economy support families and introduce new products. They also encounter a daunting set of problems and obstacles in this remarkable journey. All small businesses face problems. The main street barber hardware store or grocery owner restaurateur clothier mechanic electrician individual working out of his or her home and other small businesses all face problems. They metaphorically ride the rough ocean of the economy in a small rowboat battered by waves larger than they are. In general however high technology entrepreneurs face even more complex and baffling obstacles as they enter uncharted waters to bring new ways of doing things to market. This is not a value judgment in favor of some small firms and against others. All small businesses contribute to the economy. Many of the recommendations presented in this book could apply to all small businesses not just these gazelles. But these rapidly growing firms when they finally hit the product cycle create jobs at a rapid rate introduce new and unique products designs and methods into the economy and transform our existence. This book focuses on those firms and their journey.