DEFYING GRAVITY
Defying Gravity
The Adventures of a Corporate Entrepreuneur
Polly Courtney and Market Gravity
UK rights: Troubador
UK publication: October 2010
All other rights available
Defying Gravity is the brainchild of Gideon Hyde and Pete Sayburn, founders and directors of recently-formed consultancy Market Gravity, and Polly Courtney, associate consultant at Market Gravity and author of three commercial novels. Unlike a traditional business book, this is a hybrid of fiction and fact. It is an enjoyable page-turner which contains, interspersed between chapters, nuggets of Market Gravity insight, workshop exercises, real-life anecdotes and quotations from a panel of carefully selected ‘corporate entrepreneurs’ including some Market Gravity clients.
The story is based on the collective knowledge and experience of the Market Gravity team, which has worked with a variety of individuals in large corporations to take a concept from ‘vague idea’ right through to launch of a multi-million pound business. The purpose of the book is to share Market Gravity’s expertise in a genuinely engaging way. The fictional content is written by novelist Polly Courtney whilst the ‘real life’ element will originate from the founder members of the company and the panel, all of whom have personal experience in the ups and downs of building new enterprises within
large organisations.
Traditional business books tend to focus on the theory and not the actualities. There is dwindling demand for standard ‘how to’ manuals, as hypotheses and concepts can now be retrieved at the click of a mouse (and the market is saturated). Defying Gravity touches on the real issues that keep a team manager awake at night: ‘How do I deal with the FD’s unrealistic expectations?’ ‘Is there a way I can motivate my over-stretched team?’ ‘What can I do about my back-stabbing colleague who seems determined to make this venture fail?’
Market Gravity was founded in 2009 by Gideon Hyde and Pete Sayburn, two corporate entrepreneurs who were, and still are, passionate about bringing entrepreneurial approaches into the corporate environment. The consultancy specialises in helping FTSE 100 companies to identify new market opportunities, launch brands, build businesses and establish sustainable innovation cultures.
Projects to date include helping to take npower’s Hometeam energy services business from concept to national household brand in under two years; developing and implementing an innovation process within British Gas New Energy and redesigning retirement planning solutions for Standard Life. The Market Gravity team has also worked with BT, Aviva, Lloyds Banking Group, Allianz, Rentokil Initial, Canon and GSK.
www.marketgravity.com
Polly Courtney has two parallel careers. She is a freelance management consultant, working for companies such as Absolute Radio, Bauer Media and Box TV as well as consultancies like Market Gravity, and at the same time she writes popular commercial fiction, published by HarperCollins. She has three novels published to date, with a fourth due August 2010.
www.pollycourtney.com.
