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Who becomes an entrepreneur? Insights from research studies

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Re: Who becomes an entrepreneur? Insights from research studies

#31

Post by herbst »

Nevermark wrote: post #27

Working on my second startup. I have clinical depression, ADHD and OCD. The depression is an endless battle through a muddy swamp. I have to endlessly game it with exercise, sleep, supplements. I would give anything to not be held back by that. I somewhat envy the manic benefits of Bipolar! That sounds so much better than just regular depression! /h But my ADHD is high functioning. My mind constantly jumps from topic…

I feel you. Depression and ADHD is what I credit for my 'independent work personality' a burnout was what made me quit the job I always wanted about 8 years ago. And 3 'companies' later my main pain in life is bookkeeping.

I am not risk seeking, but definitely a non conformist. I think the main thing that drove me to be entrepreneural is the lack of a choice, for not 99% properly working people, in the traditional working market.

Re: Who becomes an entrepreneur? Insights from research studies

#32

Post by metafunctor »

jaggederest wrote: post #26
shon wrote: post #20

It’s an interesting article. In my view, Non-conformists start companies. Possibly aggressive non-conformists most of all. In my personal case, I made many questionable choices, including turning down a job at Microsoft in the nineties (would have been better financially) and leaving multiple great jobs (one of which afforded me corporate apartments in Honolulu and London) to risk everything multiple times to start m…

Not especially non-conformists - non-conformity is merely a symptom. As you say, risk seeking behavior, resulting from the actual cause: "poor risk assessment" - ties right in to difficult childhood, mental health issues, and the market misjudging you (all causes or signs of trauma and being outside the norm). I say this as someone with an appetite for trying new things, being non-conformist, and adventure sports - c…

In my experience, most successful entrepreneurs are usually quite good at accurately assessing risks. They are simply more capable and willing to embrace certain risks in pursuit of greater rewards in the future.

Re: Who becomes an entrepreneur? Insights from research studies

#33

Post by drusenko »

metafunctor wrote: post #32
jaggederest wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not especially non-conformists - non-conformity is merely a symptom. As you say, risk seeking behavior, resulting from the actual cause: "poor risk assessment" - ties right in to difficult childhood, mental health issues, and the market misjudging you (all causes or signs of trauma and being outside the norm). I say this as someone with an appetite for trying new things, being non-conformist, and adventure sports - c…

In my experience, most successful entrepreneurs are usually quite good at accurately assessing risks. They are simply more capable and willing to embrace certain risks in pursuit of greater rewards in the future.

Agreed. I think the dominant entrepreneurial trait isn’t risk taking, it’s optimism.

Re: Who becomes an entrepreneur? Insights from research studies

#35

Post by jossclimb »

bruce511 wrote: post #3

Which just goes to show that all the studies in the world don't mean a whole lot :) I guess it depends on your definition of "entrepreneur" - does it count if you only found 1 company? But from where I stand I pretty much fail all the "high probability" criteria, no troubled past, no mental health issues, no previous employment history, no bad-childhood, and do on. Arguably I'm "well rounded" (for some definition of…

Age can be a key factor too. I asked a VC once what were the key things they looked at. They came out with the expected answers, passion, vision , plan of execution and then said age. I expected they meant a someone in their early twenties to be then be told 'nope', if some middle aged industry vets walk in they immediately sit up in their chairs a little more.

Re: Who becomes an entrepreneur? Insights from research studies

#36

Post by jossclimb »

I tell you what its not, being a great engineer. That can help in someways in understanding the technical aspects, but the amount of startups I know who have written incredible clean code with beautiful architecture who have run out of funding compared to the folks who wrote a janky frankensteins monster which they sold to customers, is very high.

Re: Who becomes an entrepreneur? Insights from research studies

#37

Post by [deleted] »

batmaniam wrote: post #30
paxys wrote: post #5

If you study 10 entrepreneurs you will find 11 different paths they took in their journey. While this is a good read, the advice to everyone looking for the "secret sauce" to starting a successful venture remains the same – there is none. You can try to emulate Steve Jobs or Mark Zuckerberg or whoever else all you want. The moment you idea meets the real world you will be in completely unfamiliar territory with no op…

The secret sauce is generational wealth. People whose parents are extremely well off have a larger chance at succeeding in building their business. Not only does their parents have money, but also the right connections at that wealth level. They basically manufacture their own luck, and their money buys time and labor to get their product first to market. Sometimes the average joe can taste certain components of that…

[deleted]

Re: Who becomes an entrepreneur? Insights from research studies

#38

Post by mjfl »

jossclimb wrote: post #36

I tell you what its not, being a great engineer. That can help in someways in understanding the technical aspects, but the amount of startups I know who have written incredible clean code with beautiful architecture who have run out of funding compared to the folks who wrote a janky frankensteins monster which they sold to customers, is very high.

correct. writing "clean code" is for pedants at big orgs.

Re: Who becomes an entrepreneur? Insights from research studies

#39

Post by ZephyrBlu »

jossclimb wrote: post #36

I tell you what its not, being a great engineer. That can help in someways in understanding the technical aspects, but the amount of startups I know who have written incredible clean code with beautiful architecture who have run out of funding compared to the folks who wrote a janky frankensteins monster which they sold to customers, is very high.

I think this is highly dependent on your product.

If you're selling an API, you probably cannot afford to have a shitty API design because no one will want to use your API.

If you're selling a B2B product, you can probably have a shitty architecture because it's all internal and B2B app are generally lower scale.

Though in saying that I would expect that B2B products like Snowflake and other 'deep tech' products require good engineering, otherwise the product just wouldn't work.

Re: Who becomes an entrepreneur? Insights from research studies

#40

Post by glass3 »

batmaniam wrote: post #30
paxys wrote: post #5

If you study 10 entrepreneurs you will find 11 different paths they took in their journey. While this is a good read, the advice to everyone looking for the "secret sauce" to starting a successful venture remains the same – there is none. You can try to emulate Steve Jobs or Mark Zuckerberg or whoever else all you want. The moment you idea meets the real world you will be in completely unfamiliar territory with no op…

The secret sauce is generational wealth. People whose parents are extremely well off have a larger chance at succeeding in building their business. Not only does their parents have money, but also the right connections at that wealth level. They basically manufacture their own luck, and their money buys time and labor to get their product first to market. Sometimes the average joe can taste certain components of that…

>They basically manufacture their own luck

VC does not only offer money but also connections. Even more so does YC and their startup school. If that's not enough, a unicorn is waiting to combine kickstarter.com and a social network to allow people to monetize their connections.

The limiting factor is the willingness to give up the comfort of a 9-5 job. In a world of working spouses, one partner can always risk their career, especially when the children have grown up a bit.

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