Do You Have the Entrepreneurial Mindset?

Startup Sunday

Before I started my own business, I thought the entrepreneurial mindset was exclusive to people like Steve Jobs and Bill Gates, spending hours holed up in a garage working on a game-changing invention. Now that I'm thriving and loving life as a business owner, I have a slightly broader view of what an entrepreneurial mindset is. But I couldn't quite articulate the common threads between me and the multibillionaire entrepreneurs who become household names.

So I was interested to find a discussion of the entrepreneurial mindset in the book Become Your Own Boss in 12 Months by Melinda Emerson, also known as Small Biz Lady and the host of #smallbizchat (where I've been a guest) on Twitter. I'm still in the middle of the book, but hope to have a full review for you next week.

Melinda describes several components of the entrepreneurial mindset:

• Feeling there's always a better way to do things.
• Enjoying being in control.
• Wanting to stand out in the crowd.
• Keeping a positive attitude.
• Being willing to fail in order to eventually win.
• Learning from failure.

We all know people who sit at their desks and gripe about all the better ways to do their job, wishing that they were in charge. That alone doesn't mean they have the entrepreneurial mindset. I think Melinda has put her finger on the key elements: being relentlessly positive, hardworking and unafraid of failure.

In the business life of every entrepreneur, there will be days (or weeks or months) when nothing seems to go your way. You lose a key client or a promising partnership or employee. You remember how nice it was to get a paycheck every Friday instead of having to scrape for every dollar you make. These are the times when the entrepreneurial mindset saves you with the promise of better days ahead.

I'm pretty risk averse, to be honest, and I don't like to fail. (Who does?) But I am relentlessly positive, as any of my friends can tell you, and pretty darn stubborn. So when I encounter a challenge or setback, it makes me even more determined to succeed in the end. It's not so surprising that these qualities would combine to make me a successful entrepreneur

What are the elements of your personality that could fit into the entrepreneurial mindset? Are there parts of the equation that you'd add?

Photo by perpetualplum via Flickr

Comments

[Hannah]

I think I definitely have the qualities of a trailblazing entrepreneurial within the context of my expertise which is really a specialization in deception and nothing more. The key to being a good [read: deceptive] entrepreneur, is to have what other people create at as low a cost to myself as possible, bending all the rules possible in order to obtain it without detection, and to subsequently devalue the intercepted materials through the tireless dissemination of "truthiness" throughout public relations strategies so that the source is not recognized much less appealing to my competitors. That way, I have taken full, unwarranted possession of a steady flow of refuse into the market that nobody would steal much less buy unless they had no alternative because I had also robbed them of the ability to discern quality; also in a successful bid to disguise the fact that I am not the actual source of these highly profitable entrepreneurial ventures. Why pay people for their labor when we can tap into the lucrative Chinese market and get it for free at zero expense to ourselves?

[Melinda Emerson "Smallbizlady"]

Katherine-- I think you have captured the entrepreneurial mindset perfectly which is the most important ingredient of being a small business owner. It's also one of the 7 Essential Principles of Small Business Success. I can't wait to read your full review of Become Your Own Boss in 12 Months.

Melinda Eemrson
@smallbizlady

[Andrea Lloyd]

Another key business strategy that is in the height of fashion these days is to overcharge the customers you do not like for second-hand merchandise. Always gouge the ones you dislike, heaping on the delivery and postal charges to tripple your profits. If he customer is sick or desperate, you can quadruple your profits without detection! Then you can keep notes on the purchase histories of your least favorite clients; effectively owning an inventory of what they keep in the privacy of their family homes, and spread malicious rumors about their greed in your press releases if they fail to spout feminist dogma, to try paint the maligned customers as financially irresponsible for being too generous with you during heir illness. How *dare* those wretched sick people buy used clothing and furniture??!!!!!

[Karen]

I have been in business for myself for 8+ years (although I am just getting around to establishing a web site.) It was a choice made out of a desire to be home more with my 3 kids, not an active "I want to own my own business" choice. But a conversation with a friend and colleague recently made me realize that, in fact, I LOVE being a consultant. I love the thrill of identifying, cultivating and landing a new client, which is similar to that high of landing a new job, except that it happens more often. You get that lovely honeymoon feeling of learning and being able to contribute new ideas over and over again.

I also love not having to answer to anyone but myself (and my clients.) The thought of a personnel evaluation is enough to make me never want to enter the full-time workforce again. (although it has a detrimental effect on my abilty to play nicely in the sandbox with my spouse sometimes.)

I love that I get to choose my clients to align with my personal beliefs (I work in the non-profit world and offer non-material consulting services). I love that I am sought out as an expert in the community. I love to be able to walk away from meaningless and time-consuming office chatter (although there are times when that dynamic is useful, even to a consultant, who may be trying to ascertain the lay of the land.) And most of all, I love the flexibility of being able to end my relationship with a client when the job is done, or continue it in another form if the relationship has been working well.

The one downside is the need to constantly be on teh search for additional clients, so that you know where your paychcek will be coming from. I am fortunate in that I mostly retain clients for long-term, multi-year projects, which helps with the cash flow.

I am curerntly contemplating throwing my hat in the ring for a phenomenal full-time job which would a crowing glory in my career, but it would be incredibly hard to walk away from being my own boss.

[Katherine]

Hannah and Andrea -- It sounds like you've had some bad experiences dealing with entrepreneurs. I am sorry it's left you bitter, but please don't paint us all with the same brush! And I can tell you that in every sector of business you will find people who don't deal honestly and fairly. It's hardly limited to startups. -- Katherine

[Andrea Lloyd]

Katherine, nobody is being bitter- this is reality we are talking about. Grownups acting like infants and poisoning us all in the process!