What’s Wrong with Today’s Entrepreneurism — An HBR interview with Dan McGinn, HBR senior editor and author of the forthcoming article “Too Many Pivots, Too Little Passion: What’s Wrong with Today’s Entrepreneurism.”
I’d encourage you to listen to the whole interview, which is very interesting and provides honest insights about the state of entrepreneurism and the lean/light startup movement.
Highlights:
- When we think of the entrepreneurs we admire most, they fought for a long time to get their product out to the world. These “lean/light startup” companies aren’t focused on persevering, but pivoting.
- Some entrepreneurs seem like they just want to be an entrepreneur and they dont care what the idea is. Is there a cult of the entrepreneur?
- These books and the launchpad for entrepreneurs, which is an American Idol like process, are processes focused on the venture capitalists, not the customer.
- If you look at Amazon or Facebook, they had much slower starts without the pressure to perform for VCs.
- There are a lot of beneficial suggestions behind the lean startup – get your idea in front of customers early, be able to be flexible and switch gears, don’t focus on vanity metrics but if a customer will buy your product.
- We focus so much on tech startups but they don’t actually create that many jobs.
- Shark Tank, a TV show, is an interesting reminder that so much of the economy and the small businesses that people want to start have nothing to do with tech or the web.
Hila Mehr 