I love Coursera.

I can't believe they offer such high-quality and diverse course offering by world-leading experts for free. I feel like a kid in a candy store when I look over their course offerings. Recently I enrolled in a short course offering called Grow to Greatness: Smart Growth for Private Business, Part 1 by Edward D. Hess.

The course is, in part, based upon a recent book on the same topic by Edward Hess:

I tried to order the book through the usual online book retailers but there has been a run on the book as a result of the course offering so I ordered from Stanford's bookstore. The cost with shipping was competitive with all other online bookstores as I followed a discount link from the course to the book. One reason why professors would want to teach an online course via Coursera would be because of the significant jump in book sales that it produces.

Regarding the course, I would recommend it to entrepreneurs for two reasons. First, it discusses issues related to growth and in the first set of lectures it offered some excellent discussion on the perils of growth and what it takes to grow. Mr. Hess has spent a long time studying growth so it is useful to hear him speak on this issue. Second, Mr. Hess is a very dynamic lecturer so does a good job of holding your attention and interest. This cannot be said for many lecturers even though they may be a world-leading expert on a topic. I've spent time trying to fight off sleep listening to some lecturers. This is not the case with Mr. Hess. He makes a real and obvious effort to keep the viewer engaged. So thumbs up for this course so far, and thumbs up for Coursera.

By the way, it is not to late to enroll in this course as you can enroll after the start date.