Business professors on the back roads... in search of stories we can use to translate MBA strategy frameworks for owners of small and medium-sized businesses. To date, we've visited nearly 100 small and medium-size businesses. We try to set a meeting with the owner or a general manager with significant operational and strategic oversight responsibility, and we usually start by just asking for the story of the business. From there, our visits usually turn in to a conversation in which the three of us ask questions about pricing, positioning, strategy, organization, succession, or other topics, depending on what strikes us as interesting. The people we've met are, without fail, creative and energetic, passionate and thoughtful, interesting and driven.