Who are the Entrepreneurs? Entrepreneurs are the successful Alchemists

Who are the Entrepreneurs?

Entrepreneurs are the successful Alchemists

During Rick Salmon’s visit to Palestine Rick conducted a workshop discussing investment opportunities for entrepreneurs.

I will in this article and the following ones start summarizing my opinions based on Rick’s notes and the discussions in the workshop.

I will start with who is the entrepreneur and what characteristics the entrepreneur should have. (Some found characteristics are based on studies)

The entrepreneur is Alchemist of the modern world. Alchemist is the one who works in Alchemy and according to Wikipedia

“Alchemy is an ancient tradition, the primary objective of which was the creation of the mythical "philosopher's stone," which was said to be capable of turning base metals into gold or silver, and also act as an elixir of life that would confer youth and immortality upon its user”

An Alchemist endeavors to turn base metals into gold while the entrepreneur drives to turn opportunities into successful business. This analogy between the entrepreneurs and alchemists is not only about gold or money it is about the drive to transform the low value into high value.

An Alchemist is committed to what he is doing and is stubborn to turn metals into gold, and the entrepreneur is the same as he is committed to bring his idea to reality and he is a great believer in his idea and stubborn in achieving it.

One of the skills the entrepreneur has is that he can look at positive things and find opportunities instead of barriers or problems and tries to overcome the barriers by utilizing new innovative approaches. This is the same with the alchemist who looks for every new way and tries different opportunities to get the gold.

Although the entrepreneur keeps trying different opportunities sometimes he succeeds and other times he fails, he learns from both the success and the failure and build experience from that and lead his ideas, team and new opportunities into better position. Failures are seen as speed bumps rather than barriers and encourage entrepreneurs to look for options in their approach. Alchemists historically were driven by the creation of gold.The byproduct of their experiments contributed to the humanity countless innovations that may never have been discovered. Alchemists learned from their trial and errors and helped in the formulation of the science of chemistry we know today.

Alchemists faced lot of risks while trying their experiments which is similar what the entrepreneur faces every day in leading his ideas into success and market.

One of the hardest things in the world the entrepreneur tries to do which is harder than combining material to get gold, is creating win-win human relations.  An entrepreneur is an alchemist at combining people together.

Finally, alchemists are crazy as are most entrepreneurs. Both are driven by what could be rather than being limited by what is and has been. This helps them in introducing innovative solution by not thinking as the rest of the others, as Innovation comes from creative with persistence.

To summarize entrepreneurs have the following characteristics:

• Commitment to achieve their ideas (sometimes stubborn , driven and persistent);
• They see and seek opportunities rather than focusing on barriers or what has been;
• They keep trying alternative solutions and learn from results and gain experience
• They are risk takers and treat their failures as learning opportunities
• An entrepreneur is an alchemist at combining people together.

The next article will be: When the Entrepreneur falls in love.

References and Thanks

•           Thanks for Rick Salmon for inspiring me to write this article
•      Thanks for Victor Hwang and Scott Gillespie of T2VC for their feedback and comments

Build a tower, build a team: Marshmallow Challenge

Why Kindergartners Make better entrepreneurs than MBAs: and how to fix it

This article summarized the lessones learned from this challenge in the following points

Lessons Learned:

http://blogs.forbes.com/nathanfurr/2011/04/27/why-kindergartners-make-better-entrepreneurs-than-mbas-and-how-to-fix-it/

• Under conditions of ambiguity, most people fall back on a planning mindset to solve entrepreneurial problems
• A planning mindset can increase your chances of failure because you waste time executing on guesses that are ultimately wrong
• Instead entrepreneurs have to apply an experimentation mindset and tactics to solve entrepreneurial problems (unknown problems or unknown solutions)

In my opinion Entrepreneurship is more an art mixed between experimentation and planning

Ideas vs. Implementation Plans

Entrepreneurs Need Fewer Hot Ideas and More Plans

http://blog.startupprofessionals.com/2011/03/entrepreneurs-need-fewer-hot-ideas-and.html

This article shows that for every idea you think that will make breakthrough in business or technology, it is important to have clear plan and actions to implement this idea rather than just building on the ideas and creating pool of ideas waiting for someone to help you in implementing the idea.
Home work must be done and the best start is with doing some marketing research and technical feasibility.


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http://blog.startupprofessionals.com/2011/03/entrepreneurs-need-fewer-hot-ideas-and.html

Entrepreneurs Need Fewer Hot Ideas and More Plans

Based on my own experience and feedback from friends, every investor is approached by at least ten entrepreneurs with a “hot idea” for a new business, for every one who has a real “plan” for a new business. That’s why I often say that ideas are worth nothing, until they are put in the context of a business plan and real people committed to executing the plan.
In fact, you can find websites full of ideas, like these “Free Innovative Ideas,” by serial entrepreneur Kim E. Lumbard of CalTech. Or you can find books of free ideas, like “Ideas,” by Matt Schoenherr, providing 101 great ideas for increasing your visibility and profitability. Most investors will tell you that they rarely see a new idea that they haven’t heard before.
I’m sure you all realize that there is quite a distance between a good idea and a good business, or even a plan for a business. Here are a few tips on how to bridge the gap. The first step is to pick one idea (that seems to be the hard part for idea people), and go to work along the following lines:

• Do some specific market research. Scan the Internet for existing patents and some “credible unbiased third party” data that confirms there is really a market for a solution resulting from your idea. Just because you or your friends think it is a great idea or great technology, that doesn’t mean that a large number of customers will buy it.

• Make sure the idea is technically viable. I hear many ideas that sound more like dreams, rather than products. It’s not hard to come up with the idea that a cure for cancer would make a great business, but some things are harder than they look. You need some evidence of a real solution before any business plan makes sense.

• Draft a business plan summary. Rather than starting with a full business plan, I recommend that you start with an executive summary of a couple of pages, or an executive level presentation of maybe ten charts. It’s easier to see the big picture, and find out if your strategy can excite people before you work on a detailed plan.

• Prepare 5-year financial projections. For most people, this is the hardest part, because it forces you to contemplate real costs, prices, delivery, and volumes. Yet these are the elements that make a business, so without them no one can assess the potential for success or failure. Don’t spend time on precision here – that comes later.

• Start your search for key resources. These would include people and money first, and maybe software or manufacturing later to produce and deliver the solution. Other important elements of every business include the name, logo, type of company, licenses, location, advisors, and operational details.

Obviously, some of these can and should be started and executed in parallel, rather than sequentially, depending on your own time and skills. Don’t be surprised if your base idea changes considerably as you learn more about the market, technology, and the sales process. It’s a lot cheaper to learn it early, rather than after spending critical time and money.
If at all feasible, I recommend starting your rollout early with a pilot or “beta” phase, before the main rollout. You will be amazed at how much you learn about the market, the scope of the opportunity, and the real product features required. Iterate at this level to get it right before you try to scale up, or even finalize the plan.
So if you know someone who is always talking about their hot ideas, just suggest, like the investors I know, that they come back for money when they have completed the above steps. The reality is that customers only pay for solutions, and there is no market for ideas. Everyone dreams of having the magic “million dollar idea,” but I haven’t seen one yet.
Marty Zwilling

Google versus Apple

Google versus Apple: Same Exterior, Different Innovation Engines

http://www.business-strategy-innovation.com/wordpress/2011/06/google-versus-apple/

Very interesting article on how two big innovators are very successful but use different innovation approaches. The main point that this article indicates in my opinion that innovation is not about the tool or process the company is using, it is more about how they clearly define their objective, how they communicate the objective and how they implement it without focusing on the external/internal distractions.

Lot of companies fail to copy Google or Apple's innovation techniques because they focus on the tool rather than the objective or vision of their company so they end up with dealing with different techniques or using different tools that are not matched with their objective.