The Harbour Pilot

We all have an understanding of the world, meaning an understanding of what humans are, how they behave, how they act in groups, the institutions of society… These views are heavily influenced by our experiences and the people with whom we interact. One of the strong influences is the education system. The education system is largely a codification of abstractions that are believed to be valid and/or useful to students as they progress through life. Ideally, one would like to think that our understandings would be refined with greater experience and knowledge – one of the original goals of an advanced education. Unfortunately, the reverse happens.

Education and Perception

In part, the brain is a network of concepts that are wired up through experience and training. I call this a mental map. Repeated reinforcement of a specific set of facts or train of thought results in the invocation of this dominant mental map whenever the world needs to be understood.

A chemist, for instance has a training in dealing with interactions of molecules which obey specific laws and processes. There is a tendency for a chemist to view other areas of the world in a similar fashion – looking for well-defined objects that obey rules of interaction.

Accountants, statisticians, and economists are trained in applied mathematics. They tend to view the world through the lens of their training, seeking numbers, accepting the proposition that there is some measure of truth in numbers. Their errors can be egregious.

Psychologists are trained in various (and mutually contradictory) understandings of personality, behaviour, and mind. Such formulations bias their grasp of human interactions significantly.

Which brings us to the real target – business education. In a commerce or M.B.A. program, there is a core curriculum that is used. Included typically are such things as economics-micro and macro, accounting, marketing and its use of statistical techniques, operations management, with its use of equation optimization, and lastly, finance. Finance tends to dwell heavily these days on the modeling of investment decisions using portfolio theory, matrices and other moderately advanced mathematics. The assumptions buried in these disciplines bias the business trained brain. The assumption is that one can exert control over business functions through the use of these techniques. No question, they have their place. There is also a price to be paid.

Thinking Outside the Box

One of the favourite cliches some years ago was the argument that business training placed the mind in a box of its own training. It proves difficult to re-appraise the world from other understandings of human beings and their forms of organization. This is unquestionably true – it is almost axiomatic. Few have either sufficient experience or sufficient intellect to avoid this trap – I stress few. The business community as a whole has embraced such training, requiring it in their executives, forming strategy that is built on it, and stifling the creativity in their organizations in deference to such training. Following a course that is in contravention to such accepted wisdoms is perilous to ones career.
I’ve encountered a number of very bright people, with enormous personal talents, who are unsuccessful in such training. They tend to disagree with the theories advanced by business professors – in fact, they appear to reject most of what they are presented. They are argumentative, contentious, and sometimes if pushed, offensive. Isn’t that interesting?

Here are some of the characteristics of entrepreneurs

• a desire for independence and control over their work product and work environment
• some resistance to authority figures
• high energy level, accelerating when challenged
• they site trust in themselves, and not externally

The personal qualities most needed for success both in business schools, and in larger business organisations, are those that successful entrepreneurs are likely to lack.

Fundamentals of the Entrepreneur

Entrepreneurs tend to not exist in such boxes. Oh, its not that they don’t have boxes, they are just different boxes – ones that can carry the seeds of their own destruction.
Looking over the list of personality characteristics offered above (4 of a list of more than twenty such items), we can see the roots of a very different world view. In my experience, entrepreneurs react badly to received wisdom. Tell me that every one knows that the sky is blue, they will frown, and ask why you say that. Suggest that they slow down and be patient, they will first tell you that they are working too slowly as it is, and if you push it, will actually become hostile. If you value your eardrums, do not suggest that some other entity has some reasonable control over their work environment – they will reject this utterly.

An entrepreneur’s view of human beings is that they assert control over their environment, and shape it to match their needs. They do not hold passive people in high esteem, although they tend to view many in society as, passive – children, in fact. Their higher drive and initiative levels lead them to frequently take a disdainful view of many in society.

Their views of many societal institutions (structures that embody rules – government, education, politics, religion, the press) tend to be critical, as they hamper peoples ability to control their own lives. They also view authority as an attempt to limit options that should be available to people who are prepared to take on responsibility for themselves.

Their value systems make them distrustful of many of societies segments. They value effort, persistence, loyalty, creativity, self-control, self-sacrifice in pursuit of a goal, honesty, trustworthiness, and courage. They are relatively unaccepting of those who fall short in these aspects of virtue.

These are not executives in a multi-national – in fact they have difficulty existing as employees in even a moderate sized organization. Nor are you likely to find them in a professional practice, subscribing to the shibboleths of a governing body.

In case you are developing the idea that these are anti-social, ethically challenged people – nothing could be further from the truth. They have higher than average levels of energy and agreeableness, they are frequently the core of charitable and non-profit organizations in their communities, and are often the first to lend a hand when it is truly needed by either society or an individual.

Bear in Mind

Entrepreneurs are the creative spark of the business community, but are rarely found in the hallways of a bureaucratic corporation.

Question for Us All

Do our organizations provide an environment where entrepreneurs can breathe at all?