Sally Percy is a journalist who delves into business issues and has written a book that in the Italian version is entitled Business leader of the third millennium, from Yvon Chouinard to Elon Musk, the lessons of those who are transforming the world in which she analyzes the entrepreneurial stories and philosophies of entrepreneurs, both of universally known names, those who lead emerging companies around the world.
The book, published in Italy by Apogeo (181 pages, 20 euros) is a skilful overview that helps to understand the true meaning of doing business in recent years, through the stories and the approach to entrepreneurship, leadership, innovation of the selected entrepreneurs, Percy gives substance to concepts often watered down by rhetoric such as being ready to take on challenges, Holding on, knowing how to surround yourself with people with high skills, knowing how to delegate, knowing how to welcome suggestions and advice, asking questions, having mentors, doing business thinking about the environment and social impact. All concepts that take shape in a very personal way in the words and experiences of the entrepreneurs that the author has chosen to tell in her book.
Champions and up-and-comers
The second part of the book is perhaps the most inspiring for startups because it tells the stories of emerging entrepreneurs, what Percy defines as the next generation. Here she tells the stories of the Italian Lucrezia Bisignani who developed Kuka in Africa to promote training and entertainment through engaging stories, then there is Mette Lykke who leads Too Good To Go who left Denmark with the mission of reducing food waste to zero, Nthabiseng Mosia, another entrepreneur who comes from Africa but this time linked to the use of solar energy to improve the life of rural areas, the company is called Easy Solar. Also in Africa there is Farmcrowdy led by Akindele Phillips who aims to give new life to the small farmer industry, and then the American Andrea Thomaz who created Diligent Robotics which develops robots capable of working alongside humans, their first product is called Moxi and is becoming very popular in hospital wards in the United States.
The rest of the book is dedicated to stories of champions of entrepreneurship, management, and leadership such as Mary Barra of Geenral Motors, Amazon’s Jeff Bezos , Sara Blakely of Spanx, Rosalind Brewer of Walgreens Boots Alliance, Brian Chesky and the other founders of AirBnb, Joe Gebbia and Nathan Blecharczyk, Yvon Chouinard who founded Patagonia, the hugely popular youtuber MrBeast aka Jimmy Donaldson, Sir James Dyson best known for his innovative vacuum cleaners, Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw , an Indian entrepreneur who invented the biotechnology sector in her country, Elon Musk, Satoshi Nakamoto, the mysterious inventor of bitcoin, Melanie Perkins of Australia’s Canva, Zhang Ruimin of China’s Haier, the Turkish-Germans Uğur Şahin and Özlem Türeci who with their BioNTech played an active role in the development of mRNA vaccines during the covid-19 pandemic, Whitney Wolfe Herd of Bumble, Mark Zuckerberg. A decidedly wide and interesting selection, stories that are very different from each other, especially in their genesis, but which have been able to turn into global successes while maintaining a strong focus on environmental and social impact, the desire to move the boundaries of innovation further and further and, of course, also on economic sustainability.
The author is good at extracting the most important meaning from the experiences of these entrepreneurs, she is good at giving substance to the basic concepts by getting out of the banal rhetoric in which it is easy to fall in these cases by focusing on the human side, on the importance of mistakes, on the importance of learning, on the need to maintain humility and above all on that of setting as a goal to develop something that can contribute to making the world a better place.
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