Entrepreneurship is a path that you can access from different roads. Entrepreneurship have the objective of creating “wealth”. The roads to entrepreneurship may be different from one entrepreneur to another. Once you are on the path it is more about the way you travel on it, than how you started.
Many business articles have been declaring since at least 5-6 years, that entrepreneurs don’t have a special gene for risk. They claim that entrepreneurs are simply rich kids who come from wealthy families. 1 2 3
Obviously, all these articles are written by professional writers, not by entrepreneurs.
You will find many sites and even political organisations (usually left leaning) sharing images like this:
I am not denying the role of luck, as you can see me explaining in this quote below.
Anyone who’s successful has to start by saying they were lucky – Eric Schmidt. Luck do include being born into a rich family or having rich friends.
Or the role of wealth, as i wrote in my article few years ago : Entrepreneurs Gene or Rich Kids with Money.
Also there is an eternal debate on whether entrepreneurs are made or born, and obviously wealth has it’s role in fulfilling dreams. But, to say that businessmen are simply rich kids that were fed with a golden spoon is absurd.
Maybe the biggest issue, is understanding the term entrepreneur. What is the difference between a businessman and an entrepreneur.
Knowing the answer to that gives you a clear view. In essence there is no difference, it is just a different use of terms in specific industry/conditions.
From this perspective, can we say businessmen are rich kids from wealthy families ?
Absolutely not, the businessmen that were born wealthy are a minority. There are entrepreneurs from all walks of life, some were born poor, some middle class and some wealthy. Some started small and then grew, others failed few times before succeeding, and others got lucky. Of course there are entrepreneurs that are struggling and there a lot that failed at least once.
Throughout the years i got to know many entrepreneurs from different backgrounds … And you do have a lot of different types of entrepreneurs.
Entrepreneurship is easier for the wealthy !
You don’t have to have an IQ of 140 to figure this out. (check your business IQ).
Yes entrepreneurship is easier when you have a big disposable income, or at least an amount of money that you can simply risk with no regrets.
This is something that business writers will not tell you about, because they are just paid writers. I am telling you this from experience.
Projects cost money, and any project or business you start is a risk, you risk losing time and you risk losing money.
For most, time is not correctly valued, and the main issue is money. Thus if you have the possibility to lose money with no much regrets, you would probably take the risk if you are an entrepreneur. Thus yes, entrepreneurs take business risks, that others don’t.
This is not a personality issue as much as how much you can risk. I personally have taken risks on new projects lately that i would have not done so few years back. Simply because i am ready to lose a certain sum now, that i wasn’t few years back.
To sum it up, money that you can lose is great, and helps you take the plunge and become an entrepreneur (or launch new projects).
