Two 16-year-old high schoolers from Rockville made history this spring with the release of their own book—a book about entrepreneurship, intended for Generations Z and Alpha to
help them develop business skills in today’s world.
The teens, Fenley Scurlock and Jason Liaw, know a little something about business. Best friends since the age of 6, they each started small businesses before they even entered high school, with Fenley producing and selling soap while Jason’s business improved company websites.
“Growing up, these are both really curious, ambitious kids, and they’ve got really complementary personalities,” says Kimberly Abbott, Fenley’s mother. “It’s
been nice to see the projects that they’ve gotten up to over the years, whether it’s experiments in our kitchen or building things in the basement, or whatever it is. They’ve been doing this together since they were 6.”
Abbott recalls Fenley telling her when they were at Barnes & Noble together that she would one day see his book on the shelves.
Fast-forward to Fenley and Jason writing “Down to Business,” their book about entrepreneurship, at age 12—Abbott helped connect them to a person in the book
industry and the boys began writing their proposal which was picked up by Penguin Random House.
Though the idea was always there, it was the pandemic’s arrival in 2020 that pushed the boys to get it started.
“That was a time when we really quickly realized that especially in online school, a lot
of things we were learning weren’t really reflecting the things that we had learned throughout our entrepreneurial journey,” Jason says.
Jason adds that the boys felt it was important for their peers to have access to the tools of entrepreneurship, not just for business, but to aid personal development and life skills across career paths.
With everything shifting online during the pandemic, it also provided the perfect opportunity to conduct interviews for their book and correspond with business leaders from home rather than coordinating trips to meet with them all over the country.
Using their personal experiences and the advice from CEOs and business leaders, they crafted the book into a format that would be kid- and teen-friendly.
“Our goal was to kind of distill down their experience into actionable steps and do so in a context and in a in a medium that would make it easy for Gen Z to understand and appreciate it,” Fenley says.
The book launched in March at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C., and contains advice from 51 industry leaders for aspiring entrepreneurs, making history as the first business book of its kind written by teens for kids of all ages.
“Our inspiration originally for the book was to really draw upon the generations before us, and their expertise when it comes to business, and kind of merge their experiences and their skills with our passion and drive. And really, in doing so, write a book that will provide
the advice that we wish that we had had starting out,” Fenley says.
The book is also notable for its emphasis on diversity. Half of the business leaders represented in the book are women, and the book features a strong theme of the importance of diversity to create a successful business.
It’s a topic that the boys feel passionate about and speaks to a generation that’s bringing more diversity to various career fields with each passing year.
“Diversity is something which only improves business and only improves any entrepreneurial endeavor, and that is what we feel. By gathering a diverse group of perspectives, you can therefore bring people from all different worldviews and backgrounds [together]. And that, in turn, results in all the better ideas, and more, different skills you can combine to create a good team,” Fenley explains.
Now, the teens are working on promoting their book and sharing the knowledge they aggregated with the younger generations by going to events across the country.
They’ve visited schools and spoken in front of business leaders at events across the country, and their journey is just beginning.
Fenley is a rising junior at Stanford Online High School, based in California. Jason is a rising senior at Poolesville High School in Maryland. They are looking forward to what comes next.
