Those who subscribe to a traditional definition of 'entrepreneur' will become uncomfortable with the word's ubiquity, says James Hurley.
Sunday Times news editor turned entrepreneur Greg Hadfield, who sold Soccernet to ESPN for £15m in 1999, and until last month worked as head of digital development at The Telegraph, recently suggested the word ‘entrepreneur’ faces an imminent fall from grace. Speaking to an audience of journalists and publishers, he recalled his early career as a writer, when he hadn’t even known how to spell the word; people who started businesses in those days were generally regarded with suspicion, so a voguish term to describe them wasn’t necessary. When Arthur Daley or Del Boy were the archetypal tycoons, it’s hardly surprising if entrepreneurship wasn’t thought of as a respectable occupation.
In the same speech, Hadfield argued that there’s no “dichotomy between being a journalist and being an entrepreneur…you cannot be a good journalist now without being an entrepreneur”. The assertion that journalists, who once thought of advertising as “that thing that made your article shorter”, need to think more about revenue models and the commercial context of their work is a sound one. But if journalists can be entrepreneurs, if blue-chips can look to hire ‘entrepreneurial CEOs’, if even the public sector can claim to be home to entrepreneurship, it’s inevitable that the term has lost some of its currency. A hair-brained scheme and a delusional tendency also seem to be qualifications for the job title these days.
Alan Sugar recently betrayed frustration with the ‘entrepreneurship is the new rock n’roll’ school of thought when speaking at a British Library event. “People shouldn't refer to themselves as entrepreneurs, it’s what people describing you should say,” he said. His prickliness might be evidence that those who subscribe to a more traditional definition of the word have started to feel uncomfortable with its ubiquity.
But even within the traditional boundaries of the word, what does a typical entrepreneur look like? A buccaneering online wizard who has raised millions in venture capital? A serial starter of businesses who oversees a diverse business empire? The truth, according to American academic Scott Shane, is almost always more mundane; entrepreneurship generally involves static or slow growing lifestyle businesses, with the operator earning less money and working longer hours than if they had taken a traditional job. Entrepreneurship is a very common vocation, but the average entrepreneur is a relative failure, Shane says.
Shane’s book, The Illusions of Entrepeneurship, makes for fascinating reading for anyone involved in small business, suggesting that too many entrepreneurs, policy makers and investors operate under a false set of assumptions when it comes to starting and growing businesses. The book was introduced to me by Peter Cullum, the billionaire founder of niche insurer Towergate, profiled here last month. Much-cited qualities such as “passion, determination and commitment” are no match for simply learning the right skills, he says. Coming from a consummate deal maker who insists he had little natural talent for business, it’s advice that’s worth listening to. The notion of the entrepreneur as a ‘rare breed’ may be a myth, but owner-managers who can point to considerable success and a track record of consistent growth are certainly in the minority, and if Cullum is to be believed, skills make the difference. What those in this elite group will want to be called in future is anyone's guess.
