Chapter 1. e world

'Thirty years ago MBA students dreamed of running General Motors; ten years ago they dreamed of working at Goldman Sachs; five years ago it was McKinsey. Now they dream about running their own company,' Antonio Borges, dean of the leading European business school INSEAD, told us.[] There was nothing dreamy in his manner, no wistfulness for a departing era. Dean Borges is not the wistful type. This, looking out over the forest of Fontainebleau on a Fall evening in 1999, was a simple statement of reality.

Dean Borges is right. This is the era of the entrepreneur. What began in the entrepreneurial melting pot of Silicon Valley as a dream for a select few has become a worldwide phenomenon. For growing numbers of young people, creating ...

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