Copyright thehindubusinessline
Getting from zero to one is one challenge. Many entrepreneurs don’t realise that the bigger challenge is going from one to ten. It is often fun in creating but nurturing, building and scaling requires discipline, determination and development on the part of the entrepreneur(s) and the necessary transformation of the way the business is run and managed. A significant number of books in this genre glamourise entrepreneurship, celebrate successful entrepreneurs or talk about a few core themes — founder’s mindset, fund-raising, start-up methodologies and frameworks, autobiographical or semi-autobiographical stories of success or failures’ life’s lessons. Scaling-up too has been covered but it usually talks about it only from the point of a start-up or founder. This book focuses on those who want to or work in a scale-up enterprise and what human skills need to be understood and mastered in order to survive and thrive in what is often a chaotic, undisciplined and fast-changing environment. Sometimes, when you read a book, you quickly form an impression of the book (and perhaps the author?). The first impression that this book gives is – precise, pragmatic, experience-based and a ‘let’s not waste time, let’s get on with it’ kind of approach. The introduction to the author gives us an idea. “Vidya Murali has been working in the UK’s leading tech businesses, including Amazon, and high-growth scale-ups such as Deliveroo. Having grown up in India before moving to the UK in 2006 and completing her MBA at the University of Cambridge, Vidya brings unique perspective as a woman of colour and an introvert navigating high-growth and fast-paced business environments.” The cover design and the way the content is written and presented though, gives it a bit of a textbook feel (more on this later). Lack of maturity The book is neatly structured and the table of contents give the reader what to expect. The why behind the book explains the author’s motivation. When she took the plunge to join scale-ups, she was surprised by the fun dynamism but also shocked by the lack of maturity and not finding logic in people’s behaviour! No one else in her target group (those seeking to join scale-ups, HR leaders in such companies, scale-up founders and coaches) should suffer this fate, she decided, hence this book. She is also aware of today’s attention-challenged reader so she offers a helpful hack in Chapter 3 on how to read the book including what to focus on! (Maybe a QR code leading to an online audio summary might help attract a different set of reader-listeners). The topics covered include the fundamental decision of whether a scale-up is right for you, what to expect and how to navigate life in a scale-up, the toxic patterns and challenges, and drawing from her own personality type and life experiences, how to survive and thrive when you are different. In order to make it more relatable for the reader she has helpfully provided (i) questionnaires (e.g. scale-ups suitability assessment on pg. 41), frameworks and models (e.g., personal introduction template on pg. 91 or her emotional superpower practice framework, TOSTRI, pg. 147) plus a lot of How to’s generously peppered throughout the book and (ii) stories of struggles and of thriving in Part IV with coaching questions for the reader. The final chapter Turning your insights into practice succinctly synthesises all the previous plus pushes the reader into action mode. All in all, quite helpful for the focused reader. Understanding issues I mentioned a textbook feel earlier on in the review. Here’s why. I wish the author had given more examples of either individuals or companies. You find some names interspersed through the book. For example, Karthik in Chapter 1 or Julie, Paula and Steve in Chapter 10 on pg. 47, 48 and 54 respectively. It might have been easier for a reader to understand an issue when the chapter starts with the situation of an individual. For instance, Chapter 10 could have started with Julie, an early employee who rises to the level of CTO as the business grew, her inability to see the big picture or think strategically and how it affects senior level technology hires and finally the company itself. That story would have helped the author segue into the key issues she wants to discuss in that chapter. Similarly, the way the book is formatted makes one feel that it is styled more like an internal note for training, learning and development. Then again, it is a matter of individual style and this author has by and large chosen a particular set format for every chapter. That said, the book is a practical educational resource for navigating the world of start-ups which are scaling up. The issues and challenges listed, the practical problems mentioned, why it happens as also ways to understand it and handle it better, speak of the author’s lived experiences. Carefully read and assimilated, it provides a willing reader-learner ways by which s/he can think about and apply meaningfully if and when they decide to enter the world of scale-ups. Book Details (The reviewer is an IIMA alumnus and an entrepreneur, advisor and angel investor) You can find the book here. Published on November 5, 2025
