Inc. Magazine

Jack is a generous guy, and you could see that from the start. Aware of others and his place in the room, emotionally attuned, successful, too. He is ex-military, served in Afghanistan, now an Inc. 5000 entrepreneur—and, at the time I met him, painfully aware of the plight of civilian Afghan contractors who had worked for the U.S. and were left targets of the Taliban, as it reasserted its unforgiving theocratic rule over the country. He was 8,500 miles away from those people when we met, but they preoccupied him, and he asked me if I knew anyone who could help. He needed to find the resources to exfiltrate some of those contractors and their families, who were on the run and would otherwise face a very certain and cruel fate.…

EXPERT ADVICE FROM INC.’S INNER CIRCLE Imagine walking into a dentist’s office and seeing a broken chair in the waiting room with a hand written sign that reads, “Don’t Sit Here.” Not once, but twice. That’s the gloomy experience that inspired Doug Hudson, 54, to give the dental industry what he saw as a long-overdue cleaning. After getting fitted for a mouth guard at a New York City dentist in 2016, Hudson returned weeks later to find that that chair still hadn’t been fixed. “I had just paid $500 for the device I was picking up,” he says. “In that moment I thought, I know we can do better.” To do that, he launched Tend, a chain of chic and consumer-obsessed dental clinics, in 2019. At the time, Hudson was the CEO of…

Anjula Acharia Founder and CEO of A-Series Management & Investments When someone pitches me a business idea, first I want to know whether they’re trying to solve an actual problem. So many people want to convince me that they’re solving a problem that doesn’t exist. From there, I want to know why they’re the best person to solve it—and how they’re going to do it. That’s why I invested in ClassPass founder Payal Kadakia more than a decade ago. When Payal came to me, she was very clear and concise in answering those questions. She said, “Look, it’s really hard to book these classes. People don’t have a place to find alternatives. As a fitness junkie, I know how to solve this problem because I deal with it all the time.” And then…

For more than 20 years, Mary Powell has worked to make renewable energy scalable, first as CEO of Green Mountain Power, which specializes in wind and solar power, and now as CEO of Sunrun, a provider of solar panels and Ford Motor Company’s EV charging partner. Plere she shines a light on the future of renewable energy, and where entrepreneurs can plug into the trends. —T.C. What problems are facing the energy business right now? Our grid is built forthe worstcase scenario—when consumption reaches a once-in-adecade peak. So it’s inefficient economically: We have to generate more electricity than we need, and lose about 60 percent of that energy to waste. How can entrepreneurs fix that problem? As more buildings become energy generators rather than pure consumers, we will need a scalable software solution to…

Between 2014 and 2017, I worked with private investors and public shareholders on both sides of the political aisle to solve the Greek debt crisis. That inspired my new book, Free Market: The History of an Idea. I want entrepreneurs to learn from my experience, and embrace the idea that free markets need good government, and that good government can be shaped by private enterprise. Case in point: In the 1620s, two of England’s most important entrepreneurs and economic thinkers, Edward Misselden and Thomas Mun, persuaded the British government to help domestic shipping companies compete with the Dutch through subsidies and protection. The strategy worked: By the end of the 19th century, British merchants were global shipping leaders and their government exited with a profit. COURTESY COMPANY (POWELL); COURTESY PUBLISHER (BOOK)…

Whether you’re a bear or a bull, there’s no denying that the past year’s economic volatility has been tough on business. If interest rates keep rising and inflation persists, the tumult may continue. Such chaos presents a big opportunity for savvy entrepreneurs. We talked to Jim McKelvey of Square, Brett Keller of Priceline, and others who have led their companies through tough times and emerged better for it. Follow their sharp insights to get ahead. • Enjoy the Discounts Economic downturns are “a sale for entrepreneurs,” says McKelvey, 57, the co-founder of payments platform Square. “It might not be the best time to open a coffee shop, because there are a lot of coffee shops, but if you’re trying to invent something that the world hasn’t seen before, then downturns are basically when…