The Small Business Life Cycle: A No-Fluff Guide to Navigating the Five Stages of Small Business Growth

by Charlie Gilkey

Small businesses have their own unique growth patterns. Each of the five stages of the small business life cycle has its own strengths, challenges, inconvenient truths, ways forward, and catalytic moments.

Genres: Business, Nonfiction

84 pages, Paperback

First published March 28, 2013

About the author

Charlie Gilkey helps people start finishing the stuff that matters. He's the founder of Productive Flourishing, author of the forthcoming Start Finishing and The Small Business Lifecycle, and host of the Productive Flourishing podcast. Prior to starting Productive Flourishing, Charlie was a Joint Force Military Logistics Coordinator while simultaneously pursuing a PhD in Philosophy. He lives with his wife, Angela, in Portland, Oregon.

Reviews

[Lisa Woodruff · Rating 5 out of 5]

Watch my full YouTube video review here: https://youtu.be/MC9sr5iwVpk

The July book reviews are books that discuss the nuts and bolts of building a business. I also share some of the mentors I have chosen as I grow my own small business. Some of the books are from other business founders. Also check out the final Monday of every month when I share books from female business founders.

I bought this book when I wanted to learn about the different stages of a small business, and how to effectively move from one to the next. This book walks through five simple stages in small business. I share some of the ways this book helped me navigate these challenges in 2018 and 2019 when I kept chasing my tail fixing new problems and feeling like I was not making traction. This book also helped me to understand how to transition from riding a rocket ship solo to managing a team and creating for long term stability.

[Joshua · Rating 5 out of 5]

Clarified a lot of things going on in my business and made me feel like I wasn't losing control.

[Sarah Sayre · Rating 1 out of 5]

This just felt like a summary of other literature about a few problems that arise in small businesses. The author did not provide any real world solutions. It was a bit odd that they mention 6 and 7 figure businesses at one point.. those CEOs are not reading this book and the fact that everything else is written towards an amateur business owner just felt odd. The impression I got from this book was to ignore the appropriate policies and procedures needed to run an effective business, pick something you are interested in, fail a bunch of times, figure out what works, and then do that lol There are significantly better books on business strategy out there.

[Cristina · Rating 5 out of 5]

Mistakes are welcomed

“Fail, and fail often.” That was refreshing to read. Found my own permission to keep exploring options and figuring out what works.

[Christopher Johnson · Rating 4 out of 5]

The thing about this book that is remarkable is that it provides you with a nuanced vocabulary to describe the reality of having had a business that either grows or doesn't grow.

Having a very well defined and precisely thought out rubric of 'what stage' something is in is the big contribution here. It's a short book and any business owner will find resolve to run things correctly.

Charlie Gilkey is a former Army Logistics guy, and he draws on the precision he had to help describe how business is working.

Reading this book can give almost any business a tactical roadmap to success.

[Kate Arms · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a quick read, a high level overview of predictable patterns in the growth of a successful business with a focus on what the dangers are at each stage and how to move to the next stage. A good preview for anyone thinking of starting a business.

[Andrae Palmer · Rating 4 out of 5]

Good book. List out the various stages a small business goes through and how to navigate through them. If your just starting or thinking of starting a small business this is the book for you

[Cory Huff · Rating 5 out of 5]

Very handy quick reference for understanding what problems your clients might actually be dealing with.