The Entrepreneur's Mentor

Should Our President Be Entrepreneurial?

I watched the Democratic Presidential Debate last night, and found it alternately interesting and frustrating. The format of these discussions does not really allow for true debate on the issues, and the responses of the candidates are canned positions rather than thoughtful on point answers. But, I got to thinking- which of the candidates are entrepreneurial and could be counted on to create visionary initiatives and challenges for our country? Which can offer a strategy that will advance our nation?

Tim Russert asked a few somewhat accusatory questions about individual failures of the various candidates. I wonder whether the American people condemn those who try and fail, or whether, as a people, we should reward for trying. Do we condemn those who run for office and lose, or do we congratulate them for their effort?

Columbia, Ahmadinejad, Free Speech and Leadership

So, what a day it was at Columbia University. Not since 1968 and the student riots has Columbia been the center of such controversy. The decision to have Ahmadinejad speak on campus was totally polarizing and got everyone's attention. Was the decision a good one or a bad one?

Did Columbia show positive leadership or did it slip on a big fat banana peel? Was it wrong to let this terrorism-supporting, Israel-hating, Holocaust-denying demagogue speak freely and openly? It takes a strong, moral, ethical leader to support a principle when in doing so it gives a tyrant a platform to spew venom. Columbia took a bold, unpopular stance and has paid the price with all of the strong criticism it has received. If the speech was allowed because of a belief in free speech for anyone, no matter how heinous the message, then I say Columbia acted as a role model for ethics and values that one hopes to see in a major university.  These ethics and values would be consistent with the vision of a great university as a forum for the sharing and exploration of ideas.

Entrepreneurial Networking

In the last two weeks, I have had the pleasure of meeting four new people that I know are going to be an important part of my business life going forward. They are all very different from each other, but they all have an entrepreneurial, innovative spirit and they all have a vision of how what they do will make the world a better place. I don't know if there is a way for all of us to work on projects together, but I do know that I will work with each of them in some way.

The world is full of people with whom we can work.They represent positive energy and opportunity, synergy and potential. As one of them said to me, if we have the right intentions and we open ourselves to them, good things will come our way.

I think entrepreneurs can meet the right people to help them advance their ideas and businesses if they just open themselves to the possibilities. We are hearing a ton about social networking on the internet. It works in real life too.

Good Hiring and Good Firing

Take a minute to create a matrix.  Using the letters KASH, arrange them in a four box matrix, to look like this.

KA
SH

K is for knowledge, A for Attitude, S for Skills and H for Habits.This can be called your KASH Box.  What happens in many companies is that the boss hires for the left side of the box (skills and knowledge) and ends up firing for the right half (attitudes and habits). What that means is that we often hire someone with the right skills but they don't work out because they don't fit into the culture. They lack the right values. Their behavior is disruptive. SO, what do we do?

Intrapreneurs

The term "intrapreneur" was coined a number of years ago to put a label on those who exhibit entrepreneurial spirit from within someone else's business. There are plenty of people who have many of the traits of the bold, swashbuckling entrepreneurial type but who lack the means or the willingness to risk their means, to start their own business.

These folks use their innovation to help build and transform the company for which they work. They exhibit leadership competencies to push their ideas. And, believe it or not, they may run up against more obstacles, due to the inherent bureaucracy they must battle, than entrepreneurs out on their own.

Intrapreneurs deserve as much credit as their colleagues who go out on their own.