Nature vs. nurture is a common debate, none less so than in the circles of entrepreneurship. Can anyone really be an entrepreneur?
The simple answer is: Yes, they can. The more complicated bit is, if they want to.
What do I mean by that? Well, I've been lucky enough to meet entrepreneurs from many different countries and many different walks of life. Looking across the set of them I can tell you that some were male and some female. There were also a grand mix of: introverts, extroverts, heterosexuals, bisexuals and homosexuals, engineers, marketeers, sales people and lots of others besides. Was any one group more successful than an other? No. Was there any education level, ability, disability common to the success of each? No.
What made the entrepreneurs stand out from the crowd was their attitude. The ones that had the drive to make things happen, in their own way, to their own vision. Those were the ones that made things work. this wasn't a mindset that dwindled even in the face of overwhelming odds, failure or dissent. They accepted the challenges and moved forward, regardless.
Some of those entrepreneurs have gone onto great things by anyone's measure and some have smaller more local success. In each case those have changed the world by bringing their own dreams to life.
To do so, many of them sought mentoring, guidance, training and advice. I myself reskilled and retrained, even reinvented my approach 5 or 6 times in my first company which lasted 14 years.
Whether these entrepreneurs were planners, thinkers or doers was irrelevant. They all found a way. They all looked for tools when they needed them, and when none existed or could not be found made things happen anyway.
What must be remembered of course is that some of these entrepreneurs did things very, very quickly and some did them more slowly. It is only with the benefit of hindsight that I can say of my own journey which bits were which. With time being our most precious commodity, it can sometimes seem frivolous to learn lessons the hard way. But for some situations and people that can be the best way to do it.
Can anyone be an entrepreneur. Yes! What are you waiting for? #liveyourdreams