Lessons Learned From Entrepreneur Interviews

As part of the recent Mid Term exam, my Maymester 2007 Intro to Entrepreneurship & Innovation class at Purdue University was required to interview an entrepreneur, make a 5-7 minute video of the interview, make a ten minute stand up presentation of their effort in class, and write a paper addressing what they personally learned from their effort. Needless to say, all aspects of this effort have been interesting to say the least.

Teams found out that files over 100 MB couldn’t be uploaded to YouTube. A team during their 10 minute presentation had their video freeze and had to tap dance through the remainder of the presentation. Another team found www.zentation.com the night before the presentations and converted their video to google.video, and utilized Zentation to good effect. Great learning by many.

It is really very interesting to read the papers submitted by each member of the class. Different team members came away with different lessons from the same interview. Without mentioning the firms or interviewees, here are some of the “findings:”

• One founder didn’t believe in teams; he was of the conviction that one team member does all the work and the other members unjustly share in the rewards
• Passion was a word that found its way into most of the findings
• Hard work was another concept often repeated
• Taking risk was another. I would like to add that most often the entrepreneur doesn’t view the situation as being risky; outsiders do
• A contrast between the approach a tenured college professor took to entrepreneurship, and that by someone with their future on the line was made - I’ll leave it to the reader to select which one appeared to be more entrepreneurial
• Openness of entrepreneurs to talk about their experience and share hard-won knowledge was often noted
• The fact that start-up entrepreneurs wear many hats, from mopping floors to pitching investors refuted the often proposed mental image of entrepreneurs driving around with fast women in faster cars (Porsches of course ) while not working very hard
• Don’t be afraid of failure driving home the Guy K. adage that after four failures you’re qualified to start again
• Good employees don’t grow on trees
• Being around people who are entrepreneurs is motivating
• Often the business that was first started does not end up being the core business that brings success
• Hobbies can lead to successful business opportunities
• Fixing a personal problem can lead to very successful businesses
• Something as simple of repositioning common variety pens purchased from Wal-Mart can give birth to a very successful student-ran business (see www.penwish.com e.g.)
• Every contact is an opportunity
• Confuse ‘em you lose ‘em (DP)
• You need to know where your business is going to get its money from
• Get it in writing
• Enthusiasm drives successful entrepreneurs to perform at their peak
• You can start successful businesses after retirement
• You have to adapt to change, both in technology and society
• You have to keep learning, regardless of your age, to stay at least even with the competition
• And the beat goes on - (written during rain delay Indy 500)