Entrepreneurship in India today takes many forms. It ranges from entrepreneurs running neighbourhood stores, to those establishing businesses in emerging cutting-edge areas such as information technology, media and entertainment, and life sciences, to start-up operations related to new national initiatives such as Make in India. One of the things that those successful entrepreneurial ventures have in common is that they address an unsatisfied need. This is written to … [Read more...]
Articles
Frank blogs regularly for the Huffington Post and writes occasional columns and articles for publications such as the International Business Times and The Economic Times of India.
Frank writes on a wide variety of topics that are critical to shaping the future of America and the American dream and to making the United States and the world a better place. These include: Business; education; poverty and inequality; politics and public policy; immigration; manufacturing; innovation; leadership; citizenship; and social commentary.
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“I am extremely positive about the future of America”
Frank F. Islam is an entrepreneur, philanthropist, civic leader and thought leader. Frank has a special commitment to civic, educational and artistic causes. In all of his endeavors, he strives to create opportunities that are sustainable and uplifting for humanity — guided by the virtues of hard work, focus, quality, innovation and kindness. Frank currently heads the FI Investment Group, a private investment holding company that he established in 2007 after he sold … [Read more...]
A “Radical” Proposal for Starting Up Rural and Urban Small Business Engines
Over the past few years the American economy has continued to recover, and this year the American economy has been firing on all cylinders. Because of this, access to capital for businesses of all sizes has increased substantially. As the Federal Reserve noted in a 2017 Report, however, “By 2017, credit flows to small businesses had improved, though they remained below their pre-crisis levels.” Small business access to capital varies considerably. Businesses in certain urban and rural locations … [Read more...]
Time To Increase Government Investment In Small Business
In the first week of October, President Donald Trump donated $100,000 — one quarter of his annual salary for this year — to the Small Business Administration. This money is to be used in a training program to help veterans make the transition to the private sector. President Trump’s donation should be viewed as a generous gesture. It could also be seen as an indication, as SBA administrator Linda McMahon stated in announcing the award, that “he clearly understands the value of small … [Read more...]
American Big Business Stifling the American Dream
In our book Renewing the American Dream published in 2010, we provided the following conceptualization of the American Dream: The American Dream is the opportunity each and every citizen has to realize one’s personal potential and to achieve success, generally measured as economic security. The fundamental elements of the dream are getting educated and working hard in order to have a good job that pays decent wages, provides adequate benefits, puts food on the table, a … [Read more...]
The “Stable Genius” Revealed
Donald Trump has recently re-asserted that he is a “stable genius.” When we first heard Trump’s proclamation we thought he meant he was good at working in a building with stalls for horses. Seriously, we recognize that Trump intended to communicate that he was a rock steady person with a very high IQ. Trump has been bragging about his IQ for some time. We shared our opinion on the President’s IQ in a Huffington Post blog titled “Alternative Perspectives on … [Read more...]
General Eclectic
A Lesson on the Need for Focus from GE. General Electric set the standard for business success in the 20th century. In 1999, Fortune magazine named Jack Welch, its CEO at the time, the best manager of the century. GE was one of the original businesses on the Dow Jones industrial average, established in 1907. On June 26, GE was dropped from the blue chip index, replaced by the Walgreen’s Boots Alliance drug store chain. In the first eighteen years of this new century, GE’s … [Read more...]
Secrets to success for India’s budding entrepreneurs and startups
India is blessed to be the third-largest start-up economy in the world. Unfortunately, there is a curse that comes with that blessing. That is, as indicated in a 2016 report issued by the IBM Institute for Business Value and Oxford Economics, 90 per cent of Indian start-ups fail within five years. The question is what can be done to reduce the number of failures? What are the secrets to success for India's budding entrepreneurs and its business start-ups? There are many. But, … [Read more...]
America’s Economic Dilemma: All Big Business Present But Not All Accounted For
For a large part of the 20th century, the fate and fortune of American big business and its “average citizens” were intertwined. In the 21st century, they are almost completely disconnected. Among the primary reasons for this disconnection are major corporations: offshoring millions of what were good paying American jobs through a process euphemistically called “globalization.” reducing the size of their incumbent workforce significantly through means such as organizational streamlining, … [Read more...]
Indian-American entrepreneur Frank Islam receives UP Ratna award
WASHINGTON: Azamgarh-born Indian-American entrepreneur and philanthropist Frank Islam has been awarded the inaugural UP Ratna award for his contribution as a son of Uttar Pradesh. An Indian American friend, Dr Fazal Khan, received the award on Islam's behalf from UP chief minister Akhilesh Yadav on the opening day of the inaugural UP Pravasi Diwas in Agra on Monday. Islam, who came to the US in the early 1970s to study at University of Colorado, said the "award means much to me and I am most … [Read more...]