It has been over three years since Steve Jobs died.

Since then, books have been written and movies have been made.

Each has celebrated his legacy and aimed to share the secrets he used to build the largest company in the world; things like attention to detail, attracting world-class talent and holding them to high standards.

We think we understand what caused his success.

We don’t.

We dismiss usable principles of success by labeling them as personality quirks.

Image: http://www.dose.com

Working for yourself is full of many perks, but filing taxes isn’t one of them. When tax time comes around, you realize that managing your taxes as a freelancer is a lot more complex than it is for your 9-to-5 colleagues who receive a single W-2 from their employer.

SEE ALSO: What freelancers should know about liability and their assets

As a freelancer or small business owner, it’s up to you to make sure you correctly report your income, file the right forms, count up your business expenses and have sufficient records in the event you’re audited. But while things can be a lot more complicated, there’s also opportunity: freelancers can write off many of their work-related expenses.

Every entrepreneur with a new technology tells me that his innovation will be industry-disrupting, meaning that it will render the existing technology obsolete, and create a new market. Yet truly disruptive innovations, like the smartphone from Apple and the rise of the Internet, are very rare, and are generally unpredicted. So why would any investor ever believe any of these claims?

In fact, as a mentor to entrepreneurs and an investor, I recommend that entrepreneurs avoid using the term disruptive with investors, since many see it as implying extra high risk, a long time for payback, and extensive marketing to build the new market. Yet a win in this department clearly has huge implications for success, and a very real potential to change the world.

While most agencies try to imitate advances in the private sector, the Department of Health and Human Services instead is emulating the process that fuels many recent innovations: startup accelerators.

A startup accelerator is a company that invests in businesses in their earliest stages, funding innovative ideas and offering mentorship to help them get off the ground.

The HHS Idea Lab, the agency’s internal startup accelerator, has two stages: the Ignite Accelerator and the Secretary’s Ventures. The Ignite Accelerator provides employees with funding and mentorship over 6 months to pitch, develop and demonstrate their innovation in a shark-tank-style process. The projects must improve their office, agency or department’s ability to function.

As an entrepreneur looking for professional investors, one of the quickest ways to lose credibility and get rejected is to start with a ridiculously high pre-money valuation. I see it happen often in my angel investment group, and you can see it happen almost every week on the Shark Tank TV show. It’s like trying to sell a home still being built at next year’s dream market price.

Equally bad is professing no valuation estimate at all, asking investors to “make me an offer.” You look like a chump, and probably won’t like their low-ball response. Investors know that valuations at startup early stages are negotiable, but they do expect that smart entrepreneurs understand the top three elements of a startup valuation would include the following.

NEW DELHI: Networking major Cisco said that it will invest a $100 million in India, including $40 million to fund early-stage and growth-stage companies in the country and train 250,000 students by 2020.

The company will collaborate closely with state governments in India on strategic initiatives including the addition of 6 new innovation labs, 3 centres of expertise, funded university collaborations and skills investments, supporting the next phase of the country's digitization plans.

Just in time for election season, you can now feel your U.S.A. pride by watching bald eagles hatch their eggs via a live feed from the American Eagle Foundation.

The eagles in question took up residence in a picturesque tree in Washington, D.C., in 2014, nestled among the Azalea Collection at the U.S. National Arboretum. These birds sure know how to pick appropriately patriotic real estate.

Image: Mr. President and The First LadyPhoto: American Eagle Foundation

Economic uncertainty often hits young companies with a double whammy: Investor money dries up and customers rein in spending. But it turns out that economic downturns are good times to start businesses. First, the filter on ideas is much finer, so if you get going, it probably means that it is a really good opportunity. Second, the company will have a laser focus on building real ROI value. Third, while other young companies that came before may be experiencing declining markets, your company is in the development stage. Fourth, it is a great time to hire great talent since there are fewer good jobs. And finally, there are fewer cars on the road and the commute is better!

(Tech.eu) – For the second year running, Tech Tour has presented its ‘Growth 50’ list at yesterday’s Growth Forum (the organization’s flagship event) in Switzerland.

The list represents 50 of Europe’s fastest-growing tech businesses, which regular Tech.eu readers will no doubt be able to identify as baby EUnicorns, albeit with a light chuckle.

Tech Tour, together with Silverpeak Investment Bank and in conjunction with a selection committee of international investors from firms like Accel Partners, DN Capital, Earlybird and Highland Europe, has researched and evaluated over 175 European private tech companies valued under $1 billion.

Image: http://venturebeat.com 

For many in the innovation field, the hardest task is listening—real listening, deep listening. To listen without building a mental model or rushing to a conclusion is a cultivated skill. To listen to a person’s summary of your product or service and honor their experience as the only experience that matters is not only a great courtesy, but it can be a competitive advantage; that is, if you are willing to collect feedback from a lot of customers and apply adaptive intelligence.

The hardest part is just listening.

In the Design Thinking methodology of innovation, the first major phase is empathy. Empathy is defined by Merriam-Webster as “the feeling that you understand and share another person’s experiences and emotions: the ability to share someone else’s feelings.”

Image: http://www.innovationexcellence.com 

Much like a traditional sin, it is hard not to commit at least one error. So do not assume sinning means failure; just make sure to learn

I have been an entrepreneur, advised entrepreneurs, and invested in entrepreneurs for a few decades now. At this point in my life, pattern recognition has kicked in and I can see when a startup is about to make a big mistake.

So, I have compiled a list of the seven deadly sins that I have noticed most entrepreneurs commit.

Anyone thinking about applying to business school knows that it's an intimidating process. Meticulously crafting admissions essays, seeking out the perfect letters of recommendation, and taking the GMAT or GRE are all stress-inducing, and that's not even including the process of figuring out which schools you'll officially be applying to.

Image: Harvard Business School/Facebook 

A new non-partisan study on entrepreneurship gives some credence to the tech industry’s stance that American innovation benefits from robust immigration.

The study from the National Foundation for American Policy, a non-partisan think tank based in Arlington, Va., shows that immigrants started more than half of the current crop of U.S.-based startups valued at $1 billion or more.

Image: AppDynamics CEO and founder Jyoti Bansal says he had to wait seven years to for his green card. AppDynamics 

Lori Greiner has seen hundreds of pitches from entrepreneurs on "Shark Tank," but she's also been regularly giving pitches herself since patenting her first invention in 1997.

With more than 400 inventions and 120 patents to her name, as well as a hands-on approach to a diverse portfolio of investments in small businesses, Greiner has worked to become a reliable salesperson to some of the world's biggest retailers, like Bed Bath & Beyond and Target.

Image: "Shark Tank"/ABC "Shark Tank" investor Lori Greiner. 

When John Chambers became chief executive officer of Cisco Systems in 1995, the world had barely entered the modern information age. About 18 million American homes were online, but only 3 percent of users had signed onto the World Wide Web. Amazon.com had just started, calling itself “Earth’s biggest bookstore.” And President Bill Clinton’s White House had only a year earlier gone online.1

Image: http://www.mckinsey.com 

"Are we doing a real tour?" WeWork cofounder Miguel McKelvey asks as he enters the lobby of the company’s first residential building. "Then we have to start outside."

I follow him back the way he came, through revolving doors, to a plaza near the entrance of the building, which is in Manhattan's Financial District near the New York Stock Exchange. "First you have to imagine that Hurricane Sandy just happened, and this place was under eight feet of water," he says as we view the 27-floor skyscraper.

In an age of big data, having tech skills is important, but the pendulum might be starting to swing the other way. More companies are requiring a mix of technology and people skills, and 2016 is being called the year of the hybrid job.

In an analysis commissioned by Bentley University, researchers examined 24 million job listings, looking for key skills across nine industries. They found that employers want multifaceted employees who possess hard skills such as database technology, coupled with traditional soft skills like communication and collaboration.

Looks like ARCH Venture Partners is gearing up for its ninth fund, with aims to raise $400 million, according to a regulatory filing. The Chicago-based early stage venture firm has a deep history in tech and life sciences investments – with some notable recent plays like Illumina offshoot Grail, Harvard 3D printing spinout Voxel 8, and Doug Williams’ brainchild Codiak Biosciences.

If you ask Hal Gregersen, innovation is one of the most important factors of success in the enterprise, and that's especially true for IT. In his MIT lecture series, he coaches attendees from around the world on how to stay curious and ask the right questions.

If having happy, engaged employees is a goal of most businesses, is flextime the simple solution for getting there? Workplace experts admit offering flexible schedules comes with benefits, and a lot of employees say it's important to them. But before you let your employees make their own hours experts say companies need to know the potential pitfalls.

Image: : Flickr user Garry Knight