What's an entrepreneur?........
Colin Thompson
Managing Partner Cavendish/Author/International Speaker/Mentor/Partner
Ask the question "Are entrepreneurs born or made" - with the various contributors to the article having different opinions about this. One suggests that entrepreneurship is down to luck, another saying that it can be taught, and another (himself an entrepreneur) believes entrepreneurs are born.
Our own view is that defining 'entrepreneurship' is something of an academic exercise because being successful in enterprise needs people to know how to run a business as much as it needs people who are entrepreneurs.
In fact, many successful entrepreneurs never start up or run their own enterprise in their entire life...they are just entrepreneurial and enterprising, and this is what sets them apart in whatever their chosen career is. Think artists, musicians, research scientists and surgeons, where you will find examples of some very entrepreneurial people who are pioneers and trailblazers, instinctive and creative, and definitely entrepreneurial - but not necessarily in business - or with any business acumen at all.
And many entrepreneurial people start up in business - often several times - and end up failing every time. Not because they aren't entrepreneurial enough, but because they don't know how to run a business.
Now here's our definition, for what it's worth.
An entrepreneur is a daring, instinctive and imaginative individual who sees things that other people don't, is capable of solving problems quickly,...and who has learned how to run a business properly.
OK, this may or may not add anything useful to the debate, and it's just our opinion. But an opinion based on around twenty years of working with business start ups (and failures) and business owners and observing what makes people more (or less) entrepreneurial than others.
In fact it could be argued that it's unhelpful and maybe even dangerous to 'pigeon-hole' entrepreneurs, in an attempt to encourage more people to start a business. The early mortality rate in new business start ups is already too high - a consistent fact that has never changed over twenty years. Encouraging more of the wrong people to start up will simply add to the failure rate.
But where this exercise may be more helpful is in identifying people who should not start in business at all - or at least not yet if they aren't ready. Identifying the key factors, skills and ingredients which are lacking or missing before someone starts up can help to put some of the vital nuts and bolts in place, which will increase the chances of survival and dramatically cut the failure rate.
In some ways it's true to say that entrepreneurs are born, with enterprising and inquisitive characteristics ingrained in their DNA. But in other people these traits are missing and it's difficult to teach them when they are just not in their genetic make up. In the same way that you can't teach some people to paint, to play the piano, or to swim to any great effect (if at all) - there are others who don't need to be taught at all, other than in helping them to excel and become among the very best at what they do.
On the other hand its also true that entrepreneurs can be 'partly-made' and trained in some aspects of entrepreneurship and enterprise, especially in how to run a business effectively, ethically and legally.
The key point in all of this, however, is in understanding that the business owner who is going to succeed, needs a combination of entrepreneurial traits, business management skills (especially financial) and the technical ability needed to deliver what their business supplies in its market - whether a bookkeeper, chef, carpenter, interpreter, website designer etc.
It is a rare beast who has all of these ingredients in the right combination, and in most successful businesses that combination is either blended amongst the partners and other team members of the business, or the missing skills are bought in from the outside - such as from an accountant, consultant/coach/mentor, or other specialist adviser.
There are many traits and characteristics which entrepreneurial people tend to possess (or have learnt) and which generally make them better at running their business - too many to mention in this short article. Here are a few examples:
1) They are incurably curious. They look under the rocks and behind the trees where no-one else would look and find things that others don't.
2) They don't suffer fools. They are very quick at spotting time-wasting or crap employees and quickly weeding them out - maximising the time they have to run their business productively without distraction.
3) They avoid self admiration. Believing and admiring their own unrealistic, over-inflated sales targets and over-ambitious forecasts is a serious flaw in many business owners who are not true entrepreneurs.
4) They push their customers...but not too hard. They understand the difference between selling by persuading rather than selling by pressure.
5) They can see round corners. True entrepreneurs have an uncanny knack of seeing, predicting or knowing what's coming next.
Entrepreneurial individuals can instinctively spot the hidden traps and dead-ends, as well as the opportunities and profitable avenues that most others in business never seem to see. In other words their educated, measured guess will be right more times than it is wrong. Being in the right place at the right time is one thing, but recognising when you are there at the time is another thing altogether.
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There's very little luck involved, its more about being confident, well-informed, well-advised and having that daring streak.
How many of these entrepreneurial traits do you recognise in yourself?
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Dr Colin Thompson
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