Find Your Lightbulb: How to Make Millions from Apparently Impossible Ideas [Paperback]

“This is a really useful and practical A–Z of how to take a business idea and make it successful.”HotBrandsCoolPlaces.com May 2008

“…the chapters on brand–building, culture and leadership are filled with sensible advice”.Management Today May 2008

"...Harris outlines the means by which he was able to harness technology platforms previously unseen in the retail banking industry..."

Would you love to start your own business but feel daunted by the slim odds of success? Do you dream about making millions but simply don′t know where to start? Find Your Lightbulb answers all these questions, helping you to harness your ability to make millions from nothing more than a simple idea. You don′t need to be superhuman, you don′t need to have funds in the bank – you don′t even need to have an amazing idea in order to get started.

Serial entrepreneur Mike Harris shows you that all it takes is enthusiasm, commitment and a willingness to learn. And Mike should know – he′s spent the past 20 years creating successful businesses from apparently impossible ideas – ideas which everyone told him would never work. With invaluable business advice and case studies from entrepreneurs and innovators on both sides of the Atlantic, this make–it–happen manual will help you fix the odds of success firmly in your favour.

Plug into the collective wisdom of an army of high-achievers and:
* Get started in the most powerful way possible
* Discover how to deal constructively with the inevitable criticisms
* Learn how to find hundreds of successful ideas
* Get your business funded
* Create the most powerful yet often neglected assets possible for your new business
* Discover the one fundamental principle which characterises all successful leaders
* Uncover the best kept secret in business
* Put all of this together in a step-by-step approach to success

PRAISE FOR FIND YOUR LIGHTBULB
'I wish I'd had this book when I was starting out, and I'm glad I have it now.' Richard Reed co-founder Innocent Drinks

'Packed full of no nonsense advice, invaluable insights, and practical exercises - Find your Lightbulb is an indispensable guide to getting yourself on the road to success and staying there.' Jamie Murray Wells, founder of Glasses Direct and UK Entrepreneur of the Year (2006)

'A practical and inspiring guide to turning ideas into cash from a master of customer insight and innovation.' Tim Brown CEO of IDEO - the USA's most renowned design and innovation consultancy

'Anyone with the ambition, determination and passion to build something great should read this book first - it unlocks the secret to financing ideas.' Nigel Grierson, Managing Director, and co-Founder, of Doughty Hanson Technology Ventures (one of Europe's largest Venture Capital firms)

'Mike inspired me when I worked for him with his unique combination of vision, innovation and customer focus. Now he has put it all together in this common sense guide.' Terry Rhodes, co-founder of $3bn mobile phone company Celtel

'All you need to know about customer engagement, leadership, innovation, and culture whether you are starting a new business or transforming an existing organization.' Peter Darbee, Chairman and CEO of California energy Giant, Pacific Gas and Electric

'Mike is one of the great serial entrepreneurs, having built three businesses with market valuations in excess of £1 billion. Mike has led many highly successful seminars at MIT that provoke students to think about the process for delivering breakthrough innovations. His descriptions of
where innovations come from are brilliant.' Henry Birdseye Weil, Senior lecturer , MIT Sloan School of Management

'Mike Harris transformed banking all over the world, not once but twice with his creations of Firstdirect and Egg and in doing so changed my life.' Tony Wyatt - Director Group Manufacturing, Bank of Ireland.

'I've had the privilege of working with Mike as he built 3 iconic, billion-dollar brands. No-one knows more about how to do it and in this book he reveals his secrets.' Rupert Howell, founder of Advertising Agency of the decade Howell Henry Chaldecott Lury and currently MD, ITV

'Mike thinks the way Virgin does and starts with the customer...(In our case even building a spaceship has been approached from a customer perspective as well as a technical one).' Will Whitehorn, President Virgin Galactic

'a pleasure to read and, like Mike himself, motivational, articulate and visionary.' David Squire , business angel, ex-partner Accenture

'Mike has been my mentor for some years now and this book allows everyone to benefit from his advice.' Tom Ilube, Tech entrepreneur: founder of Lost Wax Ltd and co-founder of Garlik

'The gravitas of real corporate experience combined with unique insights into leadership, customer insight and innovation delivered powerfully with passion and clarity.' Meenu Bachan, Serial entrepreneur: founding CEO of the IT skills forum, founder of the Inspired Leaders Network, Inspired Movies and the Seven Secrets Group

'Packed with practical advice which is going to make a real difference to anyone who reads it from a powerful leader who consistently makes the impossible happen.' Tracy Goss, world renowned expert on executive reinvention and business transformation and author of The Last Word on Power

My life as a business leader began 21 years ago when at age 38 I visited Nokia in Finland. Nokia were a very small company then, barely known outside Scandinavia, but I was entranced by their vision of transforming the world of telecommunications by putting a mobile phone in everyone's pocket.

It seemed an impossible dream at the time but their enthusiasm was intoxicating. I was inspired to give up my comfortable existence as an IT strategy consultant and begin to live out my own dream of founding a new company.

In the last 21 years I have actually managed to create four new businesses, and enjoyed every minute of it. Two of these businesses have been credited with transforming an entire industry. All have been acclaimed for their high levels of innovation. Three have achieved values in excess of a billion pounds. To do this I had to learn fast - I knew little or nothing about business when I started.

I want to pass on what I have learned to a new generation. We desperately need more entrepreneurs; they are the driving force for the wealth creation and innovation that powers our society and keeps our economy competitive. Anybody who is bright, determined and committed can be a successful entrepreneur. Most new entrepreneurs learn the skills of growing new businesses as they go along, but you can dramatically shift the odds of success in your favour by learning from others.

In the last few months I've interviewed more than thirty entrepreneurs and innovators on both sides of the Atlantic. I've looked at the great entrepreneurial successes of the past like Microsoft, Apple, Google, Virgin and Dyson. I've looked at some of the UK's recent success stories like Innocent Drinks and Glasses Direct. I've covered companies from very large to very small, all united by one thing: somebody had an idea and was determined to implement it despite being told by the experts it would never work.

I've boiled this collective wisdom down to nine principles of success and turned them into a practical, simple to use step by step approach illustrated with examples, case studies and quotes. It's a book which almost anyone can use to find their own lightbulb - to discover an idea worth millions and make it happen, even if everyone tells you it's not possible.

Mike Harris

Find Your Lightbulb combines Mikes 20 years of invaluable experience from the front line of big business, as well as exclusive "I wish I′d known′ advice from leaders in the field of innovation and entrepreneurship. So whether you′re stuck on finding an idea, getting funding, or creating a brand, this guide can help you on your way to success, fixing the odds in your favour.

If ever you needed a reason to take charge of our future, this is it.

"Find your Lightbulb is an indispensable guide to getting yourself on the road to success and staying there."
—Jamie Murray Wells

"Mike inspired me when I worked for him with his unique combination of vision, innovation and customer focus. Now he has put it all together in this common sense guide."
—Terry Rhodes

"Mike thinks the way Virgin does and starts with the customer. (In our case even building a spaceship has been approached from a customer. Perspective as well as a technical one)."
—Will Whitehorn

"Packed with practical advice which is going to make a real difference to anyone who reads it from a powerful leader who consistently makes the impossible happen."
—Tracy Goss

Would you love to start your own business but feel daunted by the slim odds of success? Do you dream about making millions but simply don′t know where to start?

Find Your Lightbulb answers all these questions, helping you to harness your ability to make millions from nothing more than a simple idea.

You don′t need to be superhuman, you don′t need to have funds in the bank – you don′t even need to have an amazing idea in order to get started. Serial entrepreneur Mike Harris shows you that all it takes is enthusiasm, commitment and a willingness to learn.

And Mike Should know – he′s spent the past 20 years creating successful businesses from apparently impossible ideas – ideas which everyone told him would never work.

With invaluable business advice and case studies from entrepreneurs and innovators on both sides of the Atlantic, this make–it–happen manual will help you fix the odds of success firmly in your favour.

Mike Invites you to plug into the collective wisdom of an army of high–achievers:

• Get started in the most powerful way possible.
• Discover how to deal constructively with the inevitable criticisms
• Learn how to find hundreds of successful ideas.
• Get your business funded.
• Create the most powerful yet often neglected assets possible for your new business.
• Discover the one fundamental principle which characterises all successful leaders.
• Uncover the best kept secret in business.
• Put all of this together in a step–by–step approach to success.

Mike Harris was the founding CEO of telephone bank Firstdirect and internet bank Egg; he created two one–billion pound businesses and was credited worldwide. In between these commitments, he was chief executive of Mercury Communications, then the main competitor to BT, where he created an iconic brand and built a multi–billion pound consumer business. He was also chairman of mobile phone company Mercury One–2–One during its early years. One–2–One was bought by T–mobile for $10 billion in 1999.
He is currently chairman and co–founder of digital identity experts Garlik – a company which was created in 2005 in order to give individuals and their families more power over the way their information is used in the digital world. It has the inventor of the World Wide Web – Tim Berners–Lee – on  its advisory board.
Mike is also chairman of innovation at the Royal Bank of Scotland. he was a regular speaker at mid–career MBA courses at the MIT Sloan School of Management between 1996 and 2006 and he often speaks at public seminars and runs private workshops on leadership, innovation and entrepreneurship. His clients have included O₂, IBM, Colt, Intel, Oracle, Adobe and EDS.