Entrepreneurship Begins Before the Idea | The Entrepreneur Before the Enterprise, Part One

THE ENTREPRENEUR BEFORE THE ENTERPRISE

Choice. Autonomy. Preparation. Opportunity. Becoming.

PART ONE: Entrepreneurship Begins Before the Idea

When we talk about entrepreneurship, we tend to begin with the idea.

What problem are you solving? What product are you developing? Who is your customer? What is your market? How will you fund it?

These are all necessary questions. But I have come to believe that they are not the first questions an entrepreneur should ask.

The entrepreneurship journey does not begin with an idea. It begins with an honest self-assessment.

While reflecting on my own journey, I realized that the recurring themes were not centered on my personal and professional successes and failures. Those were outcomes.

What interested me more were the decisions that inevitably led me to those destinations—and, more importantly, the way I chose to respond to every hurdle, opportunity, triumph, and failure along the way.

There was a time when I understood my life primarily through what was happening around me.

As a young man searching for meaning and prosperity, I was extremely externally focused. I measured progress through what I possessed, what I lacked, what opportunities were available to me, how other people perceived me, and what circumstances appeared to stand between me and the life I wanted.

In many ways, I was living and thinking as though life was happening to me.

The danger in that perspective is that it directs an enormous amount of our attention toward variables over which we have very little control:

Other people.
Our environment.
Past circumstances.
Missed opportunities.
Unfair situations.
The decisions of institutions.
The decisions of individuals.

There is certainly value in understanding the external forces influencing our lives. Environment matters. Access matters. Relationships matter. Economics matter. Opportunity matters.

But understanding those forces and surrendering our autonomy to them are two very different things.

It took reaching the lowest point in my life for me to begin recognizing that distinction.

The First Enterprise Is the Individual

Academically and professionally, entrepreneurship is often discussed in terms of identifying opportunities and organizing resources around those opportunities.

But before an entrepreneur can effectively organize resources, there is another resource that must be understood:

The entrepreneur.

What happens when things do not go according to plan?

How do you respond to uncertainty?

Can you remain committed when there is no immediate reward?

Are you willing to acknowledge what you do not know?

Can you identify your weaknesses without allowing them to become excuses?

Do you require external validation before committing yourself to something?

What is your relationship with failure?

What happens when no one is watching?

These questions may not appear on a business plan, but their answers will eventually appear in the business.

A brilliant idea operated by someone unwilling to learn, adapt, accept responsibility, or remain disciplined under uncertainty is still vulnerable.

That is why self-assessment cannot be separated from entrepreneurship.

Before building the enterprise, we have to examine the individual who intends to build it.

Looking Beyond Outcomes

One of the problems with studying successful people is that we usually encounter their stories backward.

We see the company after it succeeds.

We see the investment after it generates a return.

We see the degree after graduation.

We see the promotion after years of work.

We see the opportunity after someone has become prepared enough to capitalize on it.

The visible outcome becomes the story.

But outcomes rarely tell us enough about the decisions that produced them.

When I began examining my own life through this lens, some of my failures became just as informative as my successes. Instead of simply asking whether something worked, I became interested in understanding why I made the decisions that brought me there.

What did I believe at the time?

What was influencing me?

What did I overlook?

Where did I exercise discipline?

Where did I surrender it?

What did I do when circumstances changed?

What would I repeat?

What would I never repeat again?

That is a much different form of reflection than simply categorizing experiences as successes or failures.

It converts experience into information.

And information, when honestly evaluated, gives us the ability to make better choices.

Start With the Person

There is an understandable excitement around entrepreneurship.

People want to discuss ideas, capital, ownership, independence, growth, and wealth creation.

But entrepreneurship will eventually expose the person behind the business.

Your discipline will appear.
Your insecurities will appear.
Your relationship with risk will appear.
Your ability—or inability—to accept responsibility will appear.
Your values will appear.
Your habits will appear.

The business does not replace those things. In many cases, it amplifies them.

So perhaps the first entrepreneurial exercise should not be developing an idea.

Perhaps it should be developing an inventory of ourselves.

An Entrepreneurial Self-Assessment

What do I know?

What don't I know?

What am I willing to learn?

How do I respond when circumstances are unfavorable?

What habits are moving me toward the future I say I want—and which ones are moving me away from it?

And ultimately:

Who is the person attempting to build this business?

Because long before an entrepreneur manages an enterprise, the entrepreneur has to learn how to manage themselves.

And that realization leads to what I believe may be the most overlooked resource available to us:

Choice.

THE ENTREPRENEUR BEFORE THE ENTERPRISE

Choice. Autonomy. Preparation. Opportunity. Becoming.

Part One of Five

This is Part One of The Entrepreneur Before the Enterprise, a five-part series exploring the choices, disciplines, and preparation that shape the entrepreneur before the enterprise takes form.

NEXT IN THE SERIES

The Most Overlooked Resource: Choice

Part Two — Coming Soon