The Skills of Business

A quick Google search of the term, ‘business book’ returns more than 3.5 billion pages – dear Lord! Even narrowing that down to a quick search on Goodreads returned greater than 270 titles, and that from a list compiled in 2008. So let us state the obvious and observe that there are lots and lots of business advice books out there.

If there are criteria for the consumer in choosing one or a few from all these titles, it would seem fair that these would be the basic questions: Is the book clearly written and understandable? Is it general enough to apply to the vast array of businesses out there, while still being specific in its advice regarding success in the marketplace? Finally, to put it bluntly, does the author know what s/he is talking about?

Well, last things first. Ehab Atalla clearly knows his field. He states in The Skills of Business that he has, ‘started 34 different businesses in 15 different industries from scratch.’ Before anyone makes a snide remark along the lines of, If he’s so good at business, why didn’t he just stick to one or two?; that actually speaks to one of Atalla’s principal pieces of advice. Stay flexible. Concentrating on just one market niche risks all your potential income and net value on the business cycles within that niche.

The Skills of Business equally passes the clarity and generality tests. Both the diagrams and Appendices provided (e.g. Global Trade, Supply and Demand Curves) would be understandable by anyone with say a 3.0 GPA on their high school diploma. No MBA required—and isn’t that a relief? Indeed, Atalla even provides stock suggestions and it was with equal relief that I noted he mostly goes for exchange traded funds (ETFs) and the bluest of the blue chip stocks—low volatility and likely dividends. That tells you a lot about a business writer. He is not trying to con anyone with a get-rich-quick scheme. Rather, Atalla lays out all the steps you must take, right down to how to create an invoice.

As stated at the outset, there are literally tonnes of business books available. The Skills of Business will make a fine addition to your personal shelf.