Book Review
When I read the following message in my LinkedIn Inbox on Monday morning regarding my book, it literally made my (Mon) day 🤩 and a week. It was candid feedback 😊 from Y Gopi Rajendra about my book.
All people who have read the book have given positive feedback. That really gives me a good sense of satisfaction and accomplishment. When the book is sold with no marketing, you really feel good. The icing on the cake is when you receive such feedback, including several 5-star reviews on Amazon.
I wanted to say a special thanks 🙏to you people in my network, like Gopi, who took the time to write back to me to give candid feedback. I appreciate your time and efforts in writing me a few sentences.
All Project management professionals, aspiring and novice PMs, students, startup founders, leaders, and even team members – this book will give practical insights about how to handle daily project management and leadership in your sphere of work. I am sure you will not regret reading lessons from my decade of experience in project management.
And yes, I would also like to know what else you could have liked to see in a similar book.
My book – “Supercharge Your Project Management skills” is available on Amazon India at – https://tinyurl.com/mr46pau6, Amazon US at – https://tinyurl.com/wcb8apm8, Amazon UK at – https://tinyurl.com/ycxy99ku
With a good number of 5🌟reviews on Amazon, I am sure this book is going to help all project managers.
Cybersecurity Tips for Startups and SMBs
It can be argued that startups are the future of business.
These smaller companies have perfected the idea of identifying a unique concern and working hard to solve it. Unlike the more prominent companies, most startups excel in not wanting to do it all at once. They would instead take one concept and work around it, making life easier for people on that front.
With the growth of the technology industry, we have also seen the emergence of many startups. More of these businesses are also coming up in other sectors.
If the cybersecurity concerns that they face are not adequately addressed, we might see them going out of business faster than they came in.
Why Startups Should Stay Alert
When hackers strike, they are going for the biggest payday that they can manage. This is why it is not uncommon to see them go after the more significant companies most of the time.
However, this is where it is easy to get things wrong.
When Yahoo lost the details of over 3 billion accounts to hackers, it made the news. The same was true for Uber, caught in the middle of a messy business where about 57 million details of riders and drivers were exposed.
It can be argued that we only heard about those because of the sheer size of those companies.
However, every day, there is a small company experiencing a breach that we do not hear about. The data supports this, too, showing that 43% of all cyber-attacks are targeting small businesses.
That number is not as gloomy as knowing that 83% of small business and startup owners do not even have the funds to deal with the after-effects of a cyberattack. It is, thus, little surprise that 60% of small businesses will go out of business within six months of suffering a cyber-attack.
If nothing is done, we might lose more of these small businesses than we can get back.
Staying Safe
All small business and startup owners should know that staying safe is not just the role of the IT staff. Everyone on the payroll should understand what they have to do to ensure they are not the weak link to make the breach happen.
Poor password habits are usually to blame in most cases. Passwords should not be shared indiscriminately, and they should be as reliable and secure as possible. Do not forget to enable additional measures like two-factor authentication.
Businesses should also consider downloading a VPN, antivirus, antimalware, and other security-oriented software for increased protection.
The former provides quality encryption against network snooping and data hijacking. The later will step up security against malicious files that would have been downloaded over the internet. Antimalware will also keep internal networks safe from infected external drives.
Finally, everyone should know about phishing attacks. Since they account for 90% of all data breaches, they are not to be taken with levity.
ZERO To ONE
ZERO to ONE – By Peter Thiel
Recently, I again read this international bestseller after a few years. Its really a wonderful book.
As per the author, founders should ask one or more of the following seven questions related to their startup/business. If you don’t have good answers to these questions, you will run into lots of “bad luck” and your startup may fail.
1️⃣ The engineering question
Can you create breakthrough technology instead of incremental improvements?
2️⃣ The timing question
Is now the right time to start your particular business?
3️⃣ The Monopoly question
Are you starting with a big share of a small market?
4️⃣ The people question
Do you have the right team?
5️⃣ The distribution question
Do you have a way to not just create, but deliver your product?
6️⃣ The durability question
Will your market position be defensible 10 and 20 years into the future?
7️⃣The Secret question
Have you identified a unique opportunity that others don’t see?
If you nail all seven, you’ll master fortune and succeed. Even getting five or six correct might work.
Tesla nailed all seven, making it the most valuable company in a short time.
What is your view? Do you have any other points to add that might be secret sauce???