I found an ‘Entrepreneur Quiz’ at CNN this week, a short eight question survey called ‘’Do You Have What it Takes?“
The purpose of the quiz is to help you determine what your natural aptitude at entrepreneurship might be. It is based on the research of a Harvard professor, successful corporate executives and management consultants.
Usually I score ‘off the boards’ when it comes to entrepreneurship, and always have since I was kid taking ‘interest inventories.’ Interestingly enough, this time my results said I had SOME entrepreneur traits, but hadn’t scored as strongly as possible. I was amused to see which of the questions I got ‘wrong’ and supposedly showed I wasn’t as much an entrepreneur as I’m supposed to be.
One question asked ‘Do you tend to not think before you act?’ It was a simple yes or no question. I said no - I almost always think before I act. Apparently for an ‘entrepreneur’ this is a BAD thing. The explanation provided for that item explained that entrepreneurs usually have a special weakness that allows them to act without consulting their conscience. Apparently it’s a trait that entrepreneurs share with juvenile delinquents, who act first and then think about things later.
Just what every bank wants in an entrepreneur’s loan application and business plan. A lack of conscience. I’m sure our customers would be thrilled to know they were supporting a business that had a lack of lack of concern about them, too.
And of course we have many examples in American culture that show this ‘lack of conscience’ trait to be true, and a trend. Our most revered ‘entrepreneurs’ in the last few years have been our financial and eonomics experts, all the new millionaires who learned how to make a fortune off of all Americans without consulting their conscience. Descriptions of Madoff certainly make him sound more like a juvenile delinquent than a responsible businessperson or entrepreneur.
There was one other question I didn’t answer correctly in order to score well as an ‘entrepreneur.’ The question asked ‘Do you tend to downplay formidable challenges?’ and I answered ‘No.’ The truth is I don’t. I tend to spend a lot of time forecasting what my challenges and obstacles might be so I can tackle every one of them and achieve what I want.
But according to this ‘Entrepreneur Quiz’, I provided the wrong answer there, too. Apparently, you are supposed to be in denial or in total ignorance so that you won’t get discouraged and lose your enthusiasm for your idea. You should be in the dark about the difficulties your ideas and innovations might face, not realistic. That’s why young people are better entrepreneurs, the Quiz says, because they don’t yet know what they don’t know.
So - Today’s Entrepreneurs are supposed to be without conscience and act without implementation planning skills.
No wonder this country’s in trouble.
{ 0 comments… add one now }