Be Your Own VC: 10 Bootstrapping Principles to Generate Cash and Keep Control

Half a million businesses are started every year in the US and less than 5 percent will successfully raise outside capital. Ninety-five percent of ideas will have to bootstrap to survive.

A bootstrapped entrepreneur is someone willing to build what they have to, so they can then build what they want to. It’s a powerful mindset aimed at survival above all—even if you decide to go raise money. Bootstrappers are better equipped to work within their means, maintain control of their vision, and maximize their own shareholder value.

In Be Your Own VC, serial entrepreneur and CEO James Benham shares ten business principles and the story of testing them over two decades. He describes how bootstrapping led his tech company to a multimillion-dollar exit and the freedom to build what they love. This guidebook is for innovators with a goal—and those who advise them.

James M Benham is the co-founder and CEO of JBKnowledge, a multinational technology and consulting company he's bootstrapped for over twenty years. From his college dorm room to over 270 employees in the USA, Argentina, and South Africa, he's led JBKnowledge to build industry-leading software for the world's largest insurance companies. James has served as an elected city councilman, an adjunct professor at Texas A&M University, and a Regent on the governing board of Texas Southern University. He is a sought-after keynote speaker, having presented at over four hundred industry conferences worldwide, and hosts a popular bi-weekly podcast. James lives with his family in College Station, Texas.