Last week I read a great article over at Entrepreneur.com. Written by Andrew Yang, it’s titled “We’re Bringing Unsexy Back to Entrepreneurship.”
I work in a world where the subtext to what we do every day is how we’re going to become the Next Big Thing. That’s not just my company, it’s the whole culture. Every developer’s got a big idea. Every tech startup wants to do something cool. Fourteen of the people you talk to every day have a simple idea that’s sure to be the next billion-dollar unicorn.
It’s a long way from where I came from. For a few years when I was a kid, we lived on a small farm on the edge of a small town in Idaho where my kid sister and I milked our cow by hand every morning and every night. Later we moved a few blocks “into town” but we kept the farm because my dad was a landscaper and we needed somewhere to park the trucks. Back then I was insistent that I wouldn’t work on Saturdays when I took over the business so I could play with my kids, but my vision didn’t extend much further than that.
So given my background as The Kid Who Smelled Like a Cow for the whole of sixth grade, I suppose it’s no surprise that I’m drawn to an article about the unsexy side of entrepreneurship. But I can’t help it.
Andrew starts out by talking about how he was talking to the founder of Chobani yogurt a little while back, then gives a series of “sexy’ entrepreneurship characteristics juxtaposed against “unsexy” ones. He wraps it up by saying that “it’s important to bear in mind that only 1 percent of new businesses receives venture capital (and would be appropriate for it). It’s the other 99 percent of businesses that create most jobs, employ most people, put yogurt in the fridge and make the world go round.”
And he’s spot on. One of the things I struggle with most as I write this blog is the feeling that I’m writing for the ivory tower, writing things that a few MBAs who are all excited about in big-E Entrepreneurship might read but that most people who really make our economy work will never see.
Another thing I struggle with is the sense that the 99% of entrepreneurs don’t need to hear anything I have to say. Collectively, they already know it.
Now, I’m not about to sit here and tell you that the average Joe could cogently describe the causes or effects of the economic dysfunction of western capitalism. He doesn’t have a clue, and he’s really not interested in helping you figure it out either. Most people work hard, trying to get their jobs done quickly and properly so they can go home and do something more important.
Because work isn’t the reason we’re here. In the end, an iPhone is just a phone and a venture fund is just a bunch of money unless they’re helping people live better lives. It’s time more CEOs and Chairmen of the Board started seeing their businesses as a way to help their employees earn a living so they can go home and do something more important.
