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7 Strategies for Expanding Your Entrepreneurial Mindset - EMP

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Having an entrepreneurial mindset is a key factor in supporting and sustaining the innovation that is critical to generating new business growth.

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3 Steps to Cultivate an Innovator's Mindset

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If you want to move up the corporate ladder, you need to do more than meet deadlines and produce strong results. Employees who quickly move up often have an innovator's mindset. These people ultimately position themselves as valuable assets by questioning assumptions and pushing their organizations to stay competitive.

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What Business School Won’t Teach You About Entrepreneurship | Entrepreneur

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Entrepreneurship is often glamorized, but the real journey is far more complex than what business school teaches.

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5 Ways To Develop An Entrepreneurial Mindset

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Learn how to foster innovation, resilience, and opportunity-spotting through everyday approaches that build entrepreneurial mindsets.

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Thomson, Donald Sexton, John A. Hornaday, Calvin Kent, Karl Vesper, Thomas Monroy, Robert Folger, Constant, Douglas

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CHAPTER 4 The Entrepreneurial Mindset in Individuals - ppt download

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Chapter Objectives Studying this chapter should provide you with the entrepreneurial knowledge needed: To describe the entrepreneurial perspective To present the major sources of information useful in profiling the entrepreneurial perspective To identify and discuss the most commonly cited characteristics found in successful entrepreneurs To discuss the “dark side” of entrepreneurship To identify and describe the different types of risk entrepreneurs face as well as the major causes of stress for these individuals and the ways they can handle stress To examine entrepreneurial motivation © 2007 Thomson/South-Western. All rights reserved. 4–2

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Mastering modern entrepreneurship | Steve Blank (Author of The Four Steps to the Epiphany)

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It's hard to make decisions in an uncertain world. But according to UVA Darden School of Business Professor Saras Sarasvathy, a pioneer in entrepreneurial thought at the University of Virginia, we can learn from expert entrepreneurs on how to move forward and build the future we want.

In the latest episode of the Hidden Brain podcast, "Innovation 2.0: How Big Ideas Are Born," Sarasvathy shares the five habits of expert entrepreneurs she discovered through studying their thought processes and decision-making during the initial stages of launching new ventures. These habits are the foundation of her groundbreaking concept, effectuation.

Effectuation: A New Approach to Entrepreneurship

Professor Sarasvathy, a rockstar at the Darden School of Business, upends the traditional view of entrepreneurship that relies on prediction. Her theory, effectuation, focuses on "non-predictive control."

"Effectual thinking," says Sarasvathy, "is a way to minimize reliance on predictive information while making decisions under great uncertainty. You achieve this by constantly dividing the world into things within your control and things outside your control. You strategically ignore the uncontrollable and leverage what's in your control to shape and co-create the future. This approach results in the creation of entirely new realities."

The Five Habits of Effectuation

One habit of expert entrepreneurs is the Bird in Hand Principle. Think of the founders of Airbnb, who started with a spare bedroom and an air mattress, or the inventors of Post-It Notes, who transformed a not-so-sticky glue into a highly profitable product line for 3M. These examples demonstrate that you don't need a grand idea to begin. Instead, you can start with resources already within your control - your bird in hand.

Whether you're a budding or seasoned entrepreneur, a manager, or simply someone looking to navigate the increasing uncertainty of the world, tune into the April 29th episode of the Hidden Brain podcast to learn more about the five habits of expert entrepreneurs: The Bird in Hand, the Affordable Loss, the Lemonade, the Crazy Quilt, and the Pilot in the Plane Principle.

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Breaking Down the Five Habits of Expert Entrepreneurs with Saras Sarasvathy

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It's hard to make decisions in an uncertain world. But according to UVA Darden School of Business Professor Saras Sarasvathy, a pioneer in entrepreneurial thought at the University of Virginia, we can learn from expert entrepreneurs on how to move forward and build the future we want.

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Entrepreneurship Research

Our team of entrepreneurship researchers from UC Berkeley and UC San Francisco recently completed a study of the personality, mood, and human factors that are common among entrepreneurs. Our findings are presented in the report entitled Are Entrepreneurs Touched with Fire?", which you may download below.

Sincerely,

Michael A. Freeman, M.D.
Clinical Professor of Psychiatry, U.C. San Francisco School of Medicine

Sheri Johnson, Ph.D.
Professor of Psychology, U.C. Berkeley

Paige Staudenmaier
Research Assistant, UC Berkeley

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Information on Micheal A. Freeman, M.D., a Psychologist, Psychiatrist, and Consultant based in Marin County, California.

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Kinetic Thinking Styles: A tool for developing entrepreneurial thinking

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In this paper, we introduce a set of instructional tools (Kinetic Thinking Styles framework) focused on developing entrepreneurial thinking by stimula...

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The Entrepreneurs: The Relentless Quest for Value

by Derek Lidow, Columbia University Press, 2022

Forget the myth of the hermetic genius working in the garage on the next world-changing startup. It's time to upgrade that thinking and pay more attention to how much entrepreneurial innovation is woven into the fabric of daily life.

So says Derek Lidow, a Princeton professor and former corporate executive. Lidow is the author of The Entrepreneurs: The Relentless Quest for Value, which analyzes the factors that give rise to entrepreneurs-and, in turn, the important social changes brought about by their innovations. In a nod to the thinking of the political economist Joseph Schumpeter, Lidow writes that entrepreneurship is "a vastly underappreciated, potent force of social change."

Drawing on thousands of years of entrepreneurial history, from "the Neolithic bead-producing people of Wadi Jilad" to Marie Tussaud, Lidow argues that social trends have been central to invention. It was the development of a materialistic class of consumers that enabled entrepreneurs such as Josiah Wedgwood to mass-produce fine branded products in the 18th century. And the evolution of urban centers at the turn of the 20th century allowed Harry Selfridge to create the idea of the modern department store by innovating ways to attract and serve customers.

Lidow underlines that entrepreneurs, counter to conventional wisdom, don't go it alone. His notion of "entrepreneurial swarming" holds that it is often groups of enterprising people who collectively transform society through reinforcing behaviors.

"Much of the world we live in today was created by swarms of entrepreneurs relentlessly innovating," he writes, pointing to the chipmaker Robert Noyce. Noyce partnered with a group of like-minded technologists in Silicon Valley in the late 1950s to create the integrated circuit that would become the foundation of the Information Age.

As key drivers of innovation, clusters of entrepreneurs spread knowledge rapidly and pressure peers to adopt new skills and technology. They are, according to Lidow, a force more powerful than the "invisible hand." In his parlance, their power is more akin to an "invisible shove" toward ever-accelerating progress.

Lidow codifies this innovative shove, arguing that entrepreneurs invent and create enduring change in one of three ways: by scaling supply, scaling demand, or scaling simplicity.

The first category includes those who scaled up their supply by devising an efficient system and then repeating it. In the late 1700s, the enterprising coin-maker Matthew Boulton, for example, leveraged his superior knowledge of metalworking to create a new process for producing coins quickly and uniformly-spawning countless societal changes. This included the swarm of entrepreneurs in the early- to mid-1800s who conceived the modern railway.

Titans of the second category, scaled demand, include cultivators of desire like Wedgwood, Selfridge, and the American PR pioneer Edward Bernays, who coined the phrase "public relations" and created the industry. Through carefully cultivated propaganda campaigns, Bernays convinced wide swaths of folks in the US to support the country's efforts in World War I and, later, stimulated broad demand for products such as bacon and tobacco.

Entrepreneurs who capitalized on innovations such as the modern cash register and integrated circuit constitute the category of scaled simplicity. Lidow traces this thread through the technology pioneers of the 20th century, including Digital Equipment Corporation founder Ken Olsen (creator of the minicomputer) and Dan Bricklin (inventor of the modern spreadsheet). These entrepreneurs and others like them (think Steve Jobs) found a way to translate technologically complex items into inviting tools through the development of a clear, user-friendly interface. They made the purpose of their inventions obvious and easy for the consumer to access.

But entrepreneurship is a two-way street-and Lidow doesn't shy away from exploring some of its damaging history. "We must acknowledge the contributions of entrepreneurs even as we hold them accountable for the problems they have caused," he states, noting that "we have been naïve in our understanding of how entrepreneurship works and why forces beyond [entrepreneurs'] control lead them to act in ways that are not considerate of others, particularly noncustomers."

Readers seeking easy tips for becoming a successful entrepreneur may be disappointed, because Lidow's historical journey is far more descriptive than prescriptive. (They might be better served with a classic of this field, like Peter Drucker's Innovation and Entrepreneurship.) But, at a time when many of our best-known entrepreneurs of recent years are reckoning with the unintended consequences of their innovations, Lidow has crafted a useful perspective on the "quest for value" at the heart of most entrepreneurial adventures. The Entrepreneurs nudges us to appreciate those successful actors who have capitalized on broader change, created material improvements in how we work and live cooperatively, and left a legacy for others to build on.

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by Derek Lidow, Columbia University Press, 2022 Forget the myth of the hermetic genius working in the garage on the next world-changing startup. It's time to upgrade that thinking and pay more attention to how much entrepreneurial innovation is woven into the fabric of daily life.

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The success of any leader largely depends upon having an entrepreneurial mindset. So what does it take to develop such a mindset?

Here are a few fundamental traits that constitute being entrepreneurial.

1. Being curious

This lays the groundwork for innovative solutions. If you are not curious then you are not a starter.

Continuously look for improvements.

2. Seeing challenges as opportunities

Find growth opportunities in situations where others consider them as impossible.

Having belief in endless opportunities

3. Being passionate

Bring passion to most mundane jobs and make them interesting

Filter out BS & sacrifice feel-good times

4. Having an ability to map value to solutions

Map solutions for a bigger cause/purpose

5. Lead by following & be a fierce loyalist

Lead by "Following" others. Surround yourselves with great minds,

Be loyal to your mission

Be loyal to the people you look up to, as well as your followers

6. Risk everything to enjoy the 2 states

Failure → Is a lesson and a stepping stone to solving another problem

Success → Is a lesson and also a stepping stone to solving the bigger problem

7. Be able to articulate & tell fantastic stories

Yes, they create memorable stories too.

You are blessed, If you have "all/most" of the above qualities. Else, if you are surrounded with such personalities then cherish their bond, preserve, and grow upon them.
"Entrepreneurial personalities find happiness in their journey, whereas the destination is just another milestone"
#entrepreneurial #Leadership #problemsolvers #innovate #growth_mindset

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The success of any leader largely depends upon having an entrepreneurial mindset. So what does it take to develop such a mindset? Here are a few fundamental traits that constitute being entrepreneurial.

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The success of any leader largely depends upon having an entrepreneurial mindset. So what does it take to develop such a mindset?

Here are a few fundamental traits that constitute being entrepreneurial.

1. Being curious

This lays the groundwork for innovative solutions. If you are not curious then you are not a starter.

Continuously look for improvements.

2. Seeing challenges as opportunities

Find growth opportunities in situations where others consider them as impossible.

Having belief in endless opportunities

3. Being passionate

Bring passion to most mundane jobs and make them interesting

Filter out BS & sacrifice feel-good times

4. Having an ability to map value to solutions

Map solutions for a bigger cause/purpose

5. Lead by following & be a fierce loyalist

Lead by "Following" others. Surround yourselves with great minds,

Be loyal to your mission

Be loyal to the people you look up to, as well as your followers

6. Risk everything to enjoy the 2 states

Failure → Is a lesson and a stepping stone to solving another problem

Success → Is a lesson and also a stepping stone to solving the bigger problem

7. Be able to articulate & tell fantastic stories

Yes, they create memorable stories too.

You are blessed, If you have "all/most" of the above qualities. Else, if you are surrounded with such personalities then cherish their bond, preserve, and grow upon them.
"Entrepreneurial personalities find happiness in their journey, whereas the destination is just another milestone"
#entrepreneurial #Leadership #problemsolvers #innovate #growth_mindset

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The success of any leader largely depends upon having an entrepreneurial mindset. So what does it take to develop such a mindset? Here are a few fundamental traits that constitute being entrepreneurial.

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What They Don't Teach in Business School about Entrepreneurship

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8 min read

Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.

Ask would-be entrepreneurs why they are pursuing that path, and you're likely to get answers like these: "I want to do something good for the world," or, "I want to do something that's mine," or, "I want work that makes me happy."

Over the past five years, I've heard those answers -- or some variation of them -- from more than 250 students in my entrepreneurship courses at Princeton University and from many of the more than 100 entrepreneurs I've counseled about their startups. But these declared motives, worthy as they may sound, are rarely what really drives entrepreneurs who ultimately succeed. Dig deeper, and you'll often find motives that are far messier -- selfishness, revenge, fear of failure, a need to prove oneself to a seemingly unloving parent and many other things that most people would be reluctant to admit, if they were even aware of those motives in the first place.
Related: Entrepreneurs Turn the Classic Theory of Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs on its Head
An entrepreneur I know well failed at several startups, one after the other -- until he discovered the power of revenge and a thirst for recognition. Previously, he had launched each of his startups to capture opportunities, but he kept failing, because other entrepreneurs wanted those same opportunities more than he did. Subsequently, as an employee of an internet media company, he designed some software and devised a business model that would go on to revolutionize the company's business.

But after a year-long struggle with the CEO, he was fired and watched as the company took off, largely as a result of his contributions. Motivated now by a burning desire to avenge his treatment and to win recognition for his originality, he launched a company that competed in the same space as his former employer. Within five years, his new company captured a significant share of the global market and now has a value of over a billion dollars.

Uncovering and understanding those deeper motives is the first step toward becoming a successful entrepreneur or discovering that you are not cut out for its punishing demands -- the personal sacrifices, inevitable setbacks, relentless work, crushing time pressure, financial uncertainty and sleepless nights faced by 99 percent of entrepreneurs. You need to know whether your motivations are strong enough to carry you through an experience that can certainly be exhilarating, but also exhausting, calling on your deepest reserves of personal strength.

You could of course invest a great deal of time and money in therapy, but most ordinary entrepreneurs have very little of either. Besides, you don't necessarily need to resolve whatever issues underlie your motives. You only need to know what those motives are so that you can guard against their excesses. You can start by undertaking a simple exercise that I often use with aspiring entrepreneurs and students.

First, ask yourself why you want to be a successful entrepreneur. You've probably answered this question many times before, either for yourself or friends and family, and you've also likely come up with the usual platitudes. Nevertheless, write them down. Then ask and answer some deeper and far more specific questions.

1. What fundamental desire or fear would success as an entrepreneur satisfy?

This question, too, produces some answers that recur over and over. For example, many people fear being humiliated in the eyes of a parent or rival. Others discover that they have a deep drive for power or status. They are deeply motivated by the wish to have no one ever tell them what to do or to have a group of people become highly dependent on them.

Many other people's deepest motives are driven by challenging childhoods -- economic hardship, for example, or an alcoholic or abusive parent -- and their deepest wish is to never again feel the way those challenges made them feel back then. Still others have had their deepest motives formed by any of the many possible permutations of family dynamics.
Related: 5 Signs From Childhood That You Were Destined to Be an Entrepreneur
2. What makes me so mad I can't control myself?

Perhaps there are certain names or labels that make you flash into anger. Someone casually says something that suggests you're lazy or inconsequential and you erupt. That eruption is an indicator that you're getting close to a core motivation you don't fully understand.

Suppose, for example, that you're infuriated when what you regard as your unfailingly diplomatic touch is seen by someone else as toadying or spinelessness. Your anger is out of all proportion to the offense. Why? Perhaps as a child you were the peacemaker in a family ridden with conflict -- a valuable role that you are constantly driven to recapture. Maybe there is some other deep reason. But the point is that your hair-triggers can tell you a lot about yourself, if you're willing to pursue the clues they provide.

3. When I was child what made me happiest?

Like anger, joy can also point us toward our deepest motives. But if you ask people a generic question about what makes them happy, they will either name transitory things like a good meal or a sunset or long-term experiences like enduring relationships, family life or spiritual satisfaction. Localize the question to childhood, however, and the indelible memory of specific situations that made you deeply happy, and you can begin to hone in on highly specific motives.

Maybe it's as simple as constantly wanting to recapture the feeling you had when you made the winning goal in an important soccer game. Or perhaps it's as complicated as the enormous relief you felt when your parents reconciled after a trial separation. But whatever it is, it will get you closer to uncovering what really drives you.

4. How would I feel if I failed?

If the answer is "as long as I felt I had given it my best, I could accept failure," then the chances are your motivation is not strong enough. The psychological consequences of failure must be significant enough to drive you to overcome, without hesitation, the hardships and traumas you will encounter. There must be nothing that is more important, otherwise you are likely to abandon the effort when the going gets really tough.

And it's far better to find that out about yourself before you lose money, waste precious years of your life and destroy a lot of valued relationships along the way. That doesn't mean you shouldn't join a startup where you can exercise skills you're proud of in exchange for some kind of payback. It just means that you probably shouldn't be a founder, but you can certainly be part of a team.

5. Would someone whose wisdom and guidance I value see my motives the same way I do?

Once you have examined and recorded what you believe motivates you, seek out a trusted advisor, someone who knows you well, who has seen you in action in a variety of situations, who can be counted on for candor and is willing to ask probing questions. Do their perceptions about what really drives you align with yours? If not, then revisit your self-questioning and try to resolve the difference.

As you will clearly understand when you complete this exercise in self-discovery, your strongest motivations arise from the things that are the source of your happiness or that protect you from primal fears. You therefore inevitably have a totally selfish reason for wanting to be an entrepreneur. There is no shame in that, and there is much to be gained by identifying it and admitting it to yourself. If you don't acknowledge it, you're likely to feel ambivalent about success and, as a result, sabotage yourself.

Does that mean you should adopt a "looking out for number one" philosophy and steamroller anybody who gets in your way? No, just the opposite. The most challenging requirement for entrepreneurial success is the constant need to change your leadership style as your business grows and changes.

Without a powerful motivation you will not make the required changes in yourself and master the tricky balance of being selfish enough to be a driven entrepreneur and selfless enough to lead people to sign up for your dream.
Related: 5 Antidotes to Overwhelm In Your Life And Business

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5 Questions to Help You Find Out Why You Really Want to Be an Entrepreneur

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8 min read Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own. Ask would-be entrepreneurs why they are pursuing that path, and you're likely to get answers like these: "I want to do something good for the world," or, "I want to do something that's mine," or, "I want work that makes me happy."

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Huff Post: 15 Signs of An Entrepreneurial Mindset

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Huff Post: 15 Signs of An Entrepreneurial Mindset

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True success of an entrepreneur comes not from their ideas, but from their inner mindset and character traits. It takes a certain type of leader to endure startup life and persevere past the hurdles that will inevitable lay ahead in their efforts to inspire disruption or bring a new innovation to life.

See if you have the inner makings of an entrepreneur at heart with these top 15 signs of having an entrepreneur mindset:

1. Whether you like to work into the wee hours of the night or the early a.m. at dawn, you tend to be the most productive when the rest of the world is asleep.

2. Hearing that something has yet to be done remarkably excites you rather than turn you away from an idea.

3. From embracing new apps and gadgets to inventing your own DIY solutions, you enjoy finding new ways of doing things or making existing solutions better.

4. Your desk, bedroom, fridge and house are scattered with sticky notes, journals, random papers or scribbles of ideas and random thoughts.

5. The greatest thing since sliced bread or Christmas morning to you is when you wake up in the middle of the night with a brainwave or new idea.

6. You likely always maintain a full plate of projects and commitments because being involved in just one thing never seems to satisfy you.

7. Sparks fly and you can talk for hours on end when you meet a like-minded colleague that shares in your passion.

8. You never seem to like to take the easy route when approaching any task or problem.

9. When faced with a challenge you are oddly invigorated and driven to work harder.

10. From dressing bold, to trying new detours on road-trips, or forever being that kid found wandering away from the path to explore, you are not inclined to go with the crowd.

11. When you hear a wild new concept your first reaction is "cool!"

12. You rarely ever take breaks and if anything you need to be pressured by family and friends to take time off.

13. Even when you step away from work your mind is always racing.

14. You wear your passion on your sleeve and put your whole heart and head into your projects.

15. Most important, you never answer a question of why you are doing something with the words "because everyone else is doing it."

The greatest asset of an entrepreneur mindset is a leader's yearning to discover new possibilities combined with their unwavering work ethic and drive to overcome challenges. Entrepreneurship is not always the easiest journey, however with the right motivation and passion you can have the unique experience of something from nothing. This is truly an entrepreneur's most impressive talent!

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15 Signs You Have an Entrepreneur Mindset

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True success of an entrepreneur comes not from their ideas, but from their inner mindset and character traits. It takes a certain type of leader to endure startup life and persevere past the hurdles that will inevitable lay ahead in their efforts to inspire disruption or bring a new innovation to life.

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When a hopeful entrepreneur asks me advice on beginning a startup, my advice is always the same: Don't do it. It's awful.

That is not the full truth. The reality is that it's difficult to start and run a business. It's a tremendous investment that takes time, effort and capital. Your focus is always on the business. Fantastic highs give way to horrible lows. It causes drastic mood swings (that might seem irrational to others) and extreme financial stress that few really understand. If someone one is going to make it, they won't listen to my suggestion and will move full-steam ahead.

If this is the path you go down, there are a few things you should expect.
Uneven Work/Life Balance
I've always struggled with the work/life balance ratios that people often refer to. I genuinely love the challenges that come with creating a business, so I guess you could say I've never worked a day in my life. How is that for balance? But in all seriousness, I am almost constantly thinking about work, whether I'm running, reading, with friends or out with my girlfriend. In the back of my head, I'm going over checklists, thinking up new strategies or applications of new technologies. This can make relationships difficult, as you're always ducking out to take a phone call, canceling dates or are unable to totally focus on on someone. On the flip side, I'm free to make my own schedule, stepping out to take care of personal things or work remotely if I need to.

As an entrepreneur, you can't silo work and your personal life. You have to prepare for the meshing together of these worlds, which is why I generally try to structure my day. Working out in the mornings and getting pre-made meals have both been huge helps. There have been several times where I've had to jump on a flight with fewer than three hours' notice. Getting the things that are most important to you out of the way first thing and automating when possible can really lower stress levels.
An Always Moving Finish Line
There are going to be times where it feels like everyone is trying to prevent you from getting to where you want to be. It is easy to get discouraged and swayed. Entrepreneurs must go into what I call "cut-throat mode." You need to navigate politics, get buy-in and ultimately arrive at your goal. Chances are, until that goal is achieved, you won't be happy. And even when that happens, a new goal will inevitably appear to embark upon. To compound matters, there may even be multiple goals at the same time. This can ultimately make it challenging to have fun or do social activities with non-entrepreneurs because there is always something more important, in your mind, to do. After all, time is money, and both can be the difference between success and failure.

To tackle this, try breaking your goals into manageable pieces so they are more actionable. Understanding everything that needs to happen and having a plan for how you will accomplish each step eases the burden.
Always Being 'On'
As an entrepreneur, you always need to be thinking about how your business is perceived by the mainstream. Because of this, you always need to be "on." You don't have the luxury of disclosing issues or problems. In order to protect and propel your organization, your guard always needs to be up - prepared to spin negatives or take advantage of opportunities when they appear. For example, responding to questions like "How is the business going?" is incredibly complex. I always stay positive and keep in mind who is asking. You never know who you are going to meet or what they might know. Make sure you are representing yourself and your company well.
Inevitable Stressors
Most humans fail over and over, and this is generally a good thing as long as you learn from it. However, when running a business, there are a lot of dependencies, and ensuring the bottlenecks you are creating are solved can cause a lot of pressure and stress. For example, missing payroll is a very realistic possibility for most startups. Whatever the situation may be, you are the one who is generally responsible for fixing the problem, and chances are you will not always have the answers.
Is It Worth It?
Being an entrepreneur is one of the best and worst things I've decided to do. I've learned more than I could have imaged and have been faced with challenging situations I never thought I would have to go through, but I've also had a ton of fun. If I could choose a different career path, I wouldn't. It's not for everyone, but if you are the type of person who, after reading this, still wants to pursue creating your dream company, good for you. Just remember it will most likely be the hardest thing you've ever done, but with perseverance, you might just pull it off.

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4 Factors to Consider Before Becoming an Entrepreneur

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When a hopeful entrepreneur asks me advice on beginning a startup, my advice is always the same: Don't do it. It's awful. That is not the full truth. The reality is that it's difficult to start and run a business. It's a tremendous investment that takes time, effort and capital.

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You don't need me to tell you that leadership and entrepreneurship are all the rage these days. It sort of makes sense since they go hand in hand: Entrepreneurs start businesses and leaders run them, right?

That's what I used to think.

The problem is that entrepreneurs and leaders have another thing in common: Neither one is actually a job. And that might very well explain why Millennials have all the makings of a great entrepreneurial generation but have failed to deliver on that promise.

It was fascinating to see an infographic comparing The Case For and Against Millennials as the Greatest Entrepreneurial Generation. In addition to being the most educated and business-savvy generation, there's been quite a groundswell of media hype linking Gen Y with entrepreneurship, at least in theory.

Unfortunately, the Millennial generation is also the most indebted, unemployed, and underemployed in decades. Not only has the labor force participation rate plummeted among that age group, so has entrepreneurship. If that's news to you, you'll find more on the subject, including plenty of links to the data here.
Related: Success Is Never an Accident. It's a Choice.
While economists and statisticians might come up with all sorts of theories and excuses for this extraordinary gap between reality and perception, I've got a somewhat different take. I don't think a lot of people understand the true meaning of the word entrepreneur.

My go-to online dictionary describes an entrepreneur as "a person who starts a business and is willing to risk loss in order to make money" or "one who organizes, manages, and assumes the risks of a business or enterprise." Note the common keywords business and risk. If there's no real business or risk, you're not an entrepreneur.

The problem is all the media hype. First, there's the persistent entrepreneurial drumbeat, not to mention the common memes that corporations are evil and you won't get ahead working for someone else. And the growing trend toward government safety nets among western countries certainly doesn't hurt.

So instead of getting a job and building a career, large numbers of people are finding ever-more creative ways of hiding the fact that they're unemployed, all the while telling themselves it's OK since they're entrepreneurs building their brand, platform, presence, following, or some other such nonsense.

Look, you probably don't want to hear this but if I don't tell you, who will? Entrepreneur is not a job. Leader is not a job. Social media guru is not a job. If there's no real expertise, no real product, no real business, no real risk, and no real prospect for return on investment, you're not working. And you're not an entrepreneur, either.
Related: Get Some Real Advice For God's Sake
If you want to be an entrepreneur someday, here's an equation you should print out and attach to your mirror, computer screen, smartphone, or wherever your eyeballs spend most of their time:

Entrepreneur + Capital = Products + Customers = Business.

Don't take my word for it. Look at every successful entrepreneur on the planet. That's the equation that got them there.

Evan Spiegel is the CEO of Snapchat. That's his job. It's a real company with a real product, real employees, and real investors. And I bet what he really identifies with is the cool ephemeral messaging app the company he co-founded came up with. Which is how they managed to attract hundreds of millions of extremely engaged users and raise more than half a billion dollars in venture funding.

John Mackey is co-CEO of Whole Foods. Healthy food has always been his passion but the way he built his company - to serve all its major stakeholders - is unique. He wrote a book about it called Conscious Capitalism. I seriously doubt if Mackey thinks of himself as a great entrepreneur but as the co-founder of a great company that showed the world a new and better way to do business.

I can go on but I think you get the point. These guys have jobs. Real jobs. They have products. Real products. And they have real companies that do real business.

If you want to be a successful entrepreneur, don't start out wanting to be one. Start out with a customer problem and a product that solves it. Get capital. Make the product, market it, win customers. Someday you'll wake up and realize what you've become: a guy who took a risk, started a business, and made money. An entrepreneur.
Related: To Be Successful, Do Only What You Do Best

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You don't need me to tell you that leadership and entrepreneurship are all the rage these days. It sort of makes sense since they go hand in hand: Entrepreneurs start businesses and leaders run them, right? That's what I used to think.

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Image credit: Snapwire Snaps

Ashton Kutcher made headlines at SXSW this year when he announced the launch of a new investment fund with business partner Guy Oseary. But Kutcher and Oseary are not new to the startup game. In fact, Kutcher made early investments in Uber, Airbnb, and Spotify, showing a keen eye for investing in promising startups. When CNBC 's Maria Bartiromo asked Kutcher what he looks for in new companies, one of his answers was "extraordinary entrepreneurs."

What creates an "extraordinary entrepreneur" in the eyes of an investor? As Founder and CEO of Foxwordy, a startup that is the first private social network for lawyers, as well as a member of one of the largest angel investor groups that invests in Silicon Valley startups, I've found there are key qualities that attract investors' attention and lead to strong, lasting investor/entrepreneur relationships.
Related: 10 Traits All Successful Entrepreneurs Share
Here are seven key attributes of extraordinary entrepreneurs:

1. Strategic

When it comes to your funding strategy, there are three schools of thought. One approach is to take only those investments you currently need, while the other approach is to take as much investment as you are able to get. Yet another approach is forget fundraising and focus on building the best business you can and the money will come. While there are pros and cons to each approach, what's important is to figure out which one makes sense for your venture and stick to it. Defining your strategy in advance helps avoid setting yourself up for unmet expectations or taking your eye off the ball when it needs to be on the product or the business.

2. Frugal

Whatever funding you have must be used wisely. Spend your investors' money as if it were your own. Even better, have it be your own. I am a strong believer in the importance of entrepreneurs investing their own money into their own companies, and it is something investors are bound to appreciate and respect. WhatsApp, for example, hardly spent any of the $8M they raised from early investors, because they didn't need to, although they certainly could have. Spend when you need to do so and save when you don't.

3. Expert

Investor Mark Birch explains that prior domain expertise is not always a prerequisite to startup success. However, Birch cautions, "You can't simply Google and Wikipedia your way to expertise, it requires time, research, talking to knowledgeable people and digging deep into the guts of the matter."

Indeed, if you are new to your startup's industry and don't have the necessary domain expertise, you'll need to invest time in building knowledge and networks, as well as focus on making key hires that bring domain expertise to the table. Zipcar founder Robin Chase, for example, talked about how she started a car company, yet knew nothing about cars. She made a smart move by hiring a VP of Operations who had deep experience with Hertz.
Related: How to Attract VC Investors
4. Decisive

Investors want to see that you have the backbone to deal with the difficult decisions that inevitably will arise. From having to fire family members to deciding whether to expand from a single location to multiple locations, entrepreneurs face tough calls on a routine basis and how you deal with those decisions demonstrates your leadership abilities.

5. Transparent

Authentic communication is imperative to building trust in any relationship, especially between entrepreneurs and investors. Provide transparency via regular reporting and be sure to share the ups as well as the downs. Investors know how challenging it is to build a new business and open, honest communication about challenges and successes is key.

6. Persistent

You've heard it before and it's true: never give up! Investors want to see determination. In fact, how you deal with setbacks can be the very thing that sets you apart in the eyes of investors.

Richard Branson says, "many venture capital investors evaluate potential partners on how they reacted to a failed business, seeing it as a test of character, rather than a mark against them." The "key," according to Branson, is how entrepreneurs bounce back.

7. Open to advice

Don't be afraid to connect with potential investors for input and advice. Many investors are entrepreneurs themselves and have immense knowledge and experience to share. Rather than demonstrating uncertainty or lack of knowledge, asking for advice shows a willingness to learn and consider multiple points of view. Doing so may also open the window of opportunity for funding. As Datanyze CEO Ilya Semin noted, "If you want advice, ask for money. But if you want money, ask for advice."

Is there a secret formula to being an "extraordinary entrepreneur"? Probably not. But adopting these seven attributes can certainly help you get recognized for the entrepreneur you are. Moving forward, demonstrating these key qualities will go miles towards ensuring the ongoing relationships with your investors are amazing.
Related: 5 Qualities Angel Investors Want in Founders

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7 Attributes of an Extraordinary Entrepreneur

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Ashton Kutcher made headlines at SXSW this year when he announced the launch of a new investment fund with business partner Guy Oseary. But Kutcher and Oseary are not new to the startup game. In fact, Kutcher made early investments in Uber, Airbnb, and Spotify, showing a keen eye for investing in promising startups.

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Five years ago, Amy Wilkinson was attending a birthday party in New York City when she looked around at the prominent guests and saw several well-known entrepreneurs. They included the founders of Google, eBay, and Gilt Groupe.

That got Wilkinson, a fellow in the White House Trade Office at the time, thinking. She wondered what had made these entrepreneurs successful when so many others had failed.

"I decided to study the most successful entrepreneurs to figure out what skills they had in common," says Wilkinson, a lecturer at Stanford Graduate School of Business. Thus began her research odyssey: 200 interviews with leading entrepreneurs, including the founders of LinkedIn, Spanx, Chipotle, and Airbnb.

After analyzing nearly 10,000 pages of interview transcripts, more than 5,000 pieces of archival and documentary evidence, and some 4,000 pages of academic research, Wilkinson teased out six skills shared by the most successful entrepreneurs and wrote a book about them. Wilkinson says extraordinary entrepreneurs are "creators" who aren't necessarily born with an ability to build and scale companies successfully. They work hard and exploit these six skills:

1. Find the Gap

Steve Ellis wanted to create a Mexican fast-food restaurant that was, at the same time, the antithesis of fast food: made-to-order with high-quality ingredients. In founding Chipotle in 1993, he also created a new dining category - fast casual. This ability to see opportunities and unmet needs that others don't and then find innovative ways to fill them is what innovative enterprises do, Wilkinson says.

2. Drive for Daylight

In the same way race car drivers keep their eyes fixed on the road ahead while seeking opportunities to pass a competitor, successful entrepreneurs focus on the future, unconcerned about the constraints of their "lane" or the position of their competitors. Chobani yogurt founder Hamdi Ulukaya, for example, took his company from zero to $1 billion in annual revenue in five years by making decisions with an eye toward the future. That included buying and rehabbing a decaying yogurt plant despite having only a few thousand dollars of available cash. Today, Chobani Greek yogurt sales are about half of all yogurt sales nationwide.

3. Fly the OODA Loop

An acronym for "observe, orient, decide, and act," this framework for rapid decision-making in fast-changing environments was created by Col. John Boyd, a U.S. Air Force fighter pilot, during the Korean War. For entrepreneurs, Wilkinson says, this means continually updating their assumptions and moving quickly from one decision and iteration to the next. David Sacks, PayPal's first COO, told Wilkinson that PayPal's team would look at new features that competitors were building and quickly iterate. When Dotbank.com, for example, gave a $10 bonus to those who signed friends up for its service, PayPal rolled out a similar offer within a week, and added a $10 bonus for the new customer, too.

4. Fail Wisely

"There's a lot of hero worship in startup circles," Wilkinson says, "but they've all failed. Every single person I met with talked about failure."

Successful entrepreneurs understand the key to avoiding more catastrophic mistakes is to make a series of smaller errors. They test ideas in low-risk environments as an inexpensive way of gathering insights to determine whether a product or idea will take off. Some concepts work and some don't, but in either case, the results make creators smarter and more resilient, says Wilkinson.

5. Network Minds

Entrepreneurial success, says Wilkinson, involves solving multifaceted problems with the help of a diverse group of thinkers. They build on each other's ideas to overcome the problems that arise in growing their businesses.

6. Gift Small Goods

Whether it's forwarding a résumé, writing a few lines of code, passing an opportunity on to a colleague, or critiquing a proposal, giving brings rewards. Wilkinson says entrepreneurs who build positive relationships by looking for ways to provide help gain a competitive advantage. "This was a surprise to me," she says. "It's the result of the rapid transmission of information, especially through social networks, so our reputations are 100% known. That forces better behavior."

Wilkinson was also surprised to find the most successful entrepreneurs are not comfortable in their success but instead keep striving. The most successful entrepreneurs tune out naysayers. "These people are building new things and solving new problems all the time," she says. "They have had to learn to get comfortable with being uncomfortable."
Amy Wilkinson is a lecturer in management at Stanford Graduate School of Business. Her book, "The Creator's Code: The Six Essential Skills of Extraordinary Entrepreneurs," was published by Simon & Schuster in February.

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6 skills that all extraordinary entrepreneurs have

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Five years ago, Amy Wilkinson was attending a birthday party in New York City when she looked around at the prominent guests and saw several well-known entrepreneurs. They included the founders of Google, eBay, and Gilt Groupe. That got Wilkinson, a fellow in the White House Trade Office at the time, thinking.

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Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.

Entrepreneurship is a demanding profession. Once you get involved in a business you own a stake in, most of what you do will ultimately have a reflection on your self-image and long-term reputation. Successful entrepreneurs learn how to figure out ways to make a positive impact on the world around them.

Having started over 10 companies and innovating within each, I have identified the six critical factors, or the six C's, that when considered can significantly increase the odds of success.

1. Courage

Courage is the foundation of entrepreneurship. Without courage there is no start and no surmounting of the many obstacles that will undoubtedly surface in the early days of a new venture. Courage is also required to make the key and tough decisions about what strategic direction to take, what team members to hire and who to fire. It's all about making the tough decisions at the right time.
Related: The One Thing That Pushes People to Succeed
2. Conviction

Without conviction you can't muster the energy required to relentlessly work towards your mission, energize those around you and form the type of culture you want to build. These priorities probably will not shift much, as they are at the core of your purpose and belief system.

It is important to realize that to achieve your goals, you must test hypotheses frequently and modify your strategy. To navigate effectively, rely on evidence, listen intently and adjust. Avoid the common failure of entrepreneurs taking the wrong path and ignoring all signals by denying facts and staying the course of their initial misconceived conviction.

3. Capabilities

As an entrepreneur, you must have vision, but how can you carry it out it to win the hearts of customers and beat your competitors? Execution is all about having the right capabilities and that's strongly correlated to the team you assemble and your modus operandi. There is nothing more important then having the right people, creating the right environment and constantly building the right capabilities by developing people and establishing processes and systems to support execution. Also make sure you've got all the required organizational capabilities between you and your senior management team. Any weak link can have an adverse impact on execution.
Related: 7 Attributes of an Extraordinary Entrepreneur
4. Collaboration

Effective collaboration is one of the most difficult principles to implement. It is akin to team sports. It requires that you have the right players, in the right position, seamlessly coordinating with other team members to achieve the intended results. To win, a team must be carefully selected, spend time training and helpful feedback should be provided to members in the spirit of driving continuous improvements. It's the same in business. Entrepreneurs need to provide high velocity feedback and build the right processes to maximize collaboration.

5. Capital

A lot of ventures fail not because the idea behind them is not viable but because the company did not have enough cash to continue finding its way in the market place. Too much capital can make management prone to recklessness and lead to poor decisions and overspending in unnecessary areas and too little can impact the team's execution capabilities and decrease the odds of competing effectively. What is certain is that most ventures underestimate the amount of capital they require because their projections always end up being too optimistic. Stay focused on how to raise or generate enough capital to build a sustainable business.

6. Consciousness

Entrepreneurs need to be extremely sensitive about where they are today, what they've learned from the past and have a clear vision about what their next best step should be going into the future. They also need to be conscious about the obstacles they are facing now, anticipate the next likely challenges ahead and understand the associated risks with each. Proper planning, reflecting and pre-empting is the best way to increase the odds of success.

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Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own. Entrepreneurship is a demanding profession. Once you get involved in a business you own a stake in, most of what you do will ultimately have a reflection on your self-image and long-term reputation. Successful entrepreneurs learn how to figure out ways to make a positive impact on the world around them.

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Opinions expressed by Forbes Contributors are their own.

A lot more people fantasize about starting a successful business than actually do it. And there's good reason for that: the numbers. While they vary from one expert to another, the underlying figures tell us that a lot of small businesses fail - many within the first 18 months. So before you set yourself up for failure, what advice do you need to determine whether becoming an entrepreneur is what you really want in 2015?

At the recent World Entrepreneurship Forum, I spoke with Melinda Emerson, known online as "SmallBizLady." Author of the book, Become Your Own Boss in 12 Months, Melinda was recognized by Forbes as the #1 woman for entrepreneurs to follow on Twitter. She has been a thriving entrepreneur for nearly 15 years, and as you might expect is a champion of small businesses, reminding me that they make up 99% of U.S. employer firms.

Melinda outlined the small business "essentials" below:
Why Do I Want to Start a Business?
Your motivation for starting a business is the foundation that will set you up for success...or not. If you constantly think "if I ran this company, I'd do it better," you may make a good business owner, or you may just want out of a bad job. If your passion solves a problem that someone is willing to pay for, then that's a great start for your business endeavor.
Do I Have the Entrepreneurial Mindset?
Entrepreneurs think a certain way. They are constantly looking for ways to improve upon existing products and ideas. They're willing to take risks (that, in fact, is a large part of running a business), and aren't afraid to try new things. They're motivated by control, freedom, money, problem solving, and creativity. If you are highly risk-averse, you might need to keep your "corporate job.'

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7 Questions To Find Out If You're Ready To Be An Entrepreneur In 2015

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A lot more people fantasize about starting a successful business than actually do it. And there's good reason for that: the numbers. While they vary from one expert to another, the underlying figures tell us that a lot of small businesses fail - many within the first 18 months. So [...]

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Difference Between A Business Person and An Entrepreneur

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Difference Between A Business Person and An Entrepreneur

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I moonlight as an entrepreneur, and work as an investment professional otherwise. This is not a recent arrangement, but one I have survived since November of 2012. At times my day job requires late evenings and weekends at the office, and when it does not, my startup does. To maintain both, I work a lot. Whether it will payoff is difficult to say, but it has been a terrific education.

Having spent more than a decade studying business models and interviewing entrepreneurs, I assumed a startup would come naturally to me: I was wrong. I benefited to some degree from my background in that I understood the following:

1. Success would require adopting a long time horizon, and committing to a high workload.

2. Most entrepreneurial success stories do not rely on a new concept. Improving on an existing product would suffice.

What had eluded me was that no one cares. That you want to create something wonderful is of little interest to anyone until you have, and it is this period of time that defines the difference between an industry professional and entrepreneur.

People often associate entrepreneurs with brilliance and unlimited creative faculties. There's a certain comfort to be gained by the idea that their success is derivative of talents others lack. But it's not true. These traits are also employed by businesses across the globe. Within the organizations that employ brilliant and / or creative individuals, talent is cultivated and rewarded. Colleagues, compensation, job reviews and promotions provide regular feedback and shine a light on success and failure. As an entrepreneur, these stimuli are lacking. Most of the time you have only your own conviction to rely on.

I believe this is why passion is also frequently listed as a primary ingredient for entrepreneurial success. Here too I disagree. For most, passion is fleeting, and few startups are good ideas if you are only prepared to commit for a period spanning less than a year. In the context of a relationship, passion is often said to require a matching reciprocal effort from both partners to persist. There is no such arrangement with a bootstrap startup. While I don't own a cat, based on what the internet tells me about them, I believe a startup most mirrors the relationship a human can expect with this animal. You provide money, shelter and unconditional love without knowing if you will be acknowledged, clawed or briefly entertained.

So what's the difference between a businessman and an entrepreneur? The ability to persist when no one's watching for an extended duration. Without anyone telling you what to do or compensating you for your progress, how long will your conviction hold?

This is the question that eats at me, and I don't even consider myself a true entrepreneur because I have maintained my day job. I imagine few variables overwhelm an entrepreneur faster than a shrinking bank account. Without another source of income an entrepreneur is forced to work relentlessly until profit is realized. I have had the luxury of avoiding this stress, and yet I still find myself staring at my ceiling from midnight to 7AM on occasion.

What I worry about most is time. As a "businessman" I know precisely what my time is worth. I can measure it twice a month via ACH deposit. I also have the aforementioned stimuli to keep me going. Compare this to the response received in the first year my website went live. I spent 6 months preparing content and recording videos, and I was certain it would be an immediate hit. The site went live on July 4th, 2013 and I announced it via social media on July 30th, 2013 (the first spike in the image below). For the remainder of the year I almost never broke 20 visits a day.

The lack of an audience and coworkers made content creation, posting and sending email notifications (the first one went to 11 people) extraordinarily difficult. I questioned my sanity with increasing frequency throughout the year. In any given month I would convince myself it was a hobby / that I was learning / that money didn't matter / etc. And what is startling about all of these excuses, is that they would be unacceptable to a true entrepreneur. If you don't have a source of income, convincing yourself that your current venture is a hobby or learning exercise to keep going will kill you.

The number of variables that have the potential to eliminate your resolve make the commitment required as an entrepreneur impressive. This extends beyond income to identity. I recently had a conversation with an entrepreneur who told me that his challenge in making the leap was the prestige of his former career track. He was previously a Harvard graduate that worked at Blackstone (a large private equity firm), and he left with nothing more than an idea. Before he could launch, he had to teach himself to code and then build the product. His comment was that when friends / acquaintances asked what he was working on his response was received with an "and that's it?" look. It may not sound difficult, but consider how much easier it would have been to return to Blackstone and continue earning a substantial salary.

(Note: Fortunately it worked out for the former Blackstone employee. Towards the conclusion of our call I asked if he ever missed the scale and scope of the transactions he worked on previously and he replied without hesitation "not for a second." It helps that I believe he now has approximately 200 employees.)

Creativity, intelligence and passion are fantastic attributes, but it's grit that gets you there. I am not saying my website has made it. My startup remains just that. But it now has an audience that I am quite proud of ( testimonials), and I believe it will turn cash flow positive in 2017 (my time excluded). If you believe you can tolerate the uncertainty, I would recommend a venture of your own. It is an illuminating experience. Just remember it doesn't hurt to keep your day job.

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What is the difference between a businessman and an entrepreneur?

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Answer (1 of 133): Hi there! There are already many good answers to this juicy question :) Yet, I think it can be fun to tackle this topic in a more playful way. Let's pretend you wanna start a journey with your fancy motorcycle. How are you gonna drive it?

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In this installment of Serious Business, Inc. senior editor Maria Aspan debates Inc. editor-at-large Leigh Buchanan.

At issue: Are entrepreneurs born, or are entrepreneurs made?

You can listen to individual episodes of Inc. Uncensored, which is part of the Panoply network, or on iTunes, where you can also subscribe. And let us know who you think won the debate by emailing us at uncensored@inc.com

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Serious Business: Is an Entrepreneur Born or Made?

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In this installment of Serious Business, Inc. senior editor Maria Aspan debates Inc. editor-at-large Leigh Buchanan. At issue: Are entrepreneurs born, or are entrepreneurs made? You can listen to individual episodes of Inc. Uncensored, which is part of the Panoply network, or on iTunes, where you can also subscribe.

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Feb. 17, 2016
Neil Kane is MSU's first director of undergraduate entrepreneurship. An experienced entrepreneur, business executive and Forbes contributor, Kane will create a unified entrepreneurship strategy and introduce new programs, courses and initiatives focused on entrepreneurship and innovation.
The traditional career path is an anachronism. Stats show 40 to 50 percent of students entering college in 2016 will be self-employed or will freelance at some point in their careers, according to a study commissioned by Intuit. The economy, students' desires and the world's expectations of students are all very different than what I faced when I graduated college.

I went to work for IBM, one of the largest companies in the world. I fully expected to stay there my entire career. The global economy, technology and social changes have all served to alter the traditional contract between an employer and employee, and no graduate today has expectations of decades-long employment at one company. Five years later I resigned to complete my MBA in Australia, and upon my return, I started my first business - a barbecue sauce company.

Americans revere the entrepreneurial spirit. We celebrate innovators like Bill Gates, Richard Branson and Mark Zuckerberg who have, as Steve Jobs said, "put a dent in the universe." And through their great wealth, they are also able to profoundly affect society by funding the development of treatments for diseases, as Gates does, and tackling social issues such as inner-city education, as Zuckerberg has. Millennials as a group want to have impact, want to pursue their passions and want to be innovators.

There is no better way to prepare students for the world of the 21st century, whether they aspire to work for a large company, start their own business, go into academia or devote themselves to public service than through cultivating their skills in entrepreneurship.

When we teach entrepreneurship, the emphasis is on developing skills, not starting businesses. Of course we support and encourage those students who are passionate about launching the next Facebook, and there are many resources at MSU to help them. Rather the goal is about developing the inter-disciplinary skills that lead to the development of an "entrepreneurial mindset."

The Network for Teaching Entrepreneurship defines the entrepreneurial mindset as the set of attitudes, skills and behaviors that students need to succeed academically, personally and professionally. These include: initiative and self-direction, risk-taking, flexibility and adaptability, creativity and innovation, critical thinking and problem solving. Other definitions include the ability to see opportunities, marshal resources and create value.

To me the term embodies a set of cross-functional life and professional skills that describe someone who is innovative, resourceful and creates value. The entrepreneurial mindset can be applied in many contexts. It applies to employees in large, hierarchical entities, and it applies to community organizers, academics, inventors, doctors, lawyers, politicians, musicians and public servants. In no way is it unique to startup companies, and the skills that are developed are relevant to everyone.

Our premise is that learning the entrepreneurial mindset is a critically valuable 21st century skill. Those who learn it well will have outsized success in their careers - no matter what they choose to do -because by definition they become resourceful and adaptable.

Innovation, a topic that is relevant to every industry, occurs at the intersection of disciplines. Entrepreneurship synthesizes information from across academic specialties and demands that practitioners work with a wide variety of people from different callings. The development of entrepreneurship skills is entirely consistent with the T-Shaped learning model. The entrepreneurial mindset, which incorporates the refinement of valuable professional and life skills, is the horizontal bar on the T.

The skills apply equally to students who want to develop for-profit companies or not-for-profits (or social ventures) or work inside established organizations. And the irony is that traditional employers are telling us that they value these skills in candidates who are applying for jobs that might otherwise appear to not be entrepreneurial. Employers recognize that the innovative spirit, agility, resourcefulness and self-awareness that our students possess are valued in the marketplace.

Just in the last few weeks since MSU's new Minor in Entrepreneurship and Innovation became available, we have had students, in addition to business majors, from computer science, journalism, economics, advertising and chemical engineering sign up, just to name a few. The programs are designed to be inclusive and are open to any undergraduate in any major enrolled in any college.

Entrepreneurism must be practiced to be learned. It is experiential. Just as you can't learn to swim at the library, you can't learn what entrepreneurship is about unless you have experienced it. We are putting programs in place now to add an experiential dimension to our entrepreneurship and innovation curriculum.

And for those students who aspire to start their own business, there is no better time to do it than while they are in college since the cost of doing so goes up an order of magnitude the minute they lose their full-time student status. On campus students have access to facilities (like our ideation center, The Hive), an incubator (The Hatch), mentors, support and funding.

When one talks to young alumni who have started businesses, as I have done a lot, you consistently hear that even if their business failed, they wouldn't trade the experience for anything. There's nothing quite like the personal growth that comes from building a business or pursuing one's passion (which could be to make a movie, produce music, start a news site or launch a new mobile app). I learned the same thing with my barbecue sauce business. Even though the business never flourished, I learned enough so that my next company, which made synthetic diamond, was able to raise more than $18 million from public and private sources. And young alumni tell me similar versions of this story over and over.
Read more about entrepreneurship at MSU
Building a business is hard and most fail. But that's not the point. The point is that in the trying, students develop skills that pay handsome dividends long into their careers - decades in my case. The justification is in the experience, not in the outcome.

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The traditional career path is an anachronism. Stats show 40 to 50 percent of students entering college in 2016 will be self-employed or will freelance at some point in their careers, according to a study commissioned by Intuit. The economy, students' desires and the world's expectations of students are all very different than what I faced when I graduated college.

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First 5 Steps of Entrepreneurial Journey

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First 5 Steps of Entrepreneurial Journey

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Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.

Nobody is born an entrepreneur. Different people take different paths to achieve success, and there is no set-in-stone instruction for becoming one. Entrepreneurs take on a number of different roles and these roles can vary depending on what field you choose to enter.

While there is no perfect guide to entrepreneurship, there are a few steps that should be taken before beginning the endeavor, however. As with most forms of success, one way to achieve your goal is by avoiding mistakes. Following these pieces of advice could prevent you from starting off your life as an entrepreneur on the wrong foot.

1. Have the right mindset.

I often see people who want to be an entrepreneur and can't figure out why their goal isn't working. In the end, they simply aren't thinking like an entrepreneur. The first thing that new entrepreneurs need to know is that failure is likely and success is not given. Understand the risk you are taking, and also understand that you will most likely not succeed immediately.
Related: The 5 Components of the Mindset That Will Let You Live Your Dream Life
2. Be honest with yourself.

The life of an entrepreneur can be great -- you're your own boss, you make the rules, you run the business. However, all of these are easier said than done. Entrepreneurship isn't an easy path. Instead, it is often much more difficult than getting a regular job.

One reason entrepreneurship isn't easy is because, at the end of the day, you can only ever blame yourself. At a corporation you can blame your boss, or perhaps the economy as a whole. As an entrepreneur, you will be looking for a niche in the market that you can fill. Excuses won't cut it in this field. If your business failed, chances are that you researched poorly, you hired the wrong people or you just weren't prepared.
Related: The 7 Golden Rules of Leadership
3. Start thinking.

Just because some college drinking buddies want to open a bar doesn't mean they should. Likewise, just because you've come up with what you think is a good idea doesn't mean it's perfect. There's a lot of research, planning and general deep thought needed to succeed as an entrepreneur. Without proper preparation, your dream business could fail quite quickly.

At the same time, no amount of preparation is going to ensure that your business will succeed. You need to be the one who knows when you're ready. Decisiveness is important to have, but you should have ample preparation before the big decisions need to be made.

4. Find a mentor.

This is one of the most important steps you can take to lay a foundation for success. When you have expert guidance, support, and motivation -- you are 100 times more unstoppable than you are alone. Mentorship allows you to quantum leap straight to the head of the game more rapidly than if you tediously faced down every beginner's hurdle. Avoid pitfalls, mistakes that could cost you your future, and rash decisions by having someone in your corner.
Related: 8 Ways Entrepreneurs Can Find and Get Value From a Great Mentor
I credit having a mentor from the outset as the reason I was able to attain success. It's an invaluable resource for anyone who is serious about getting where they want to go. Get online, get out into the world, connect with the people who inspire you -- especially the one's whose paths you admire -- and develop a working relationship with someone who has done what you want to do. It can change everything.

5. Commit.

Once your business idea is prepared and you're ready to be an entrepreneur, the last thing you need to do is commit. If you truly want to succeed, put in 100 percent effort. Effort will always trump luck and skill, so if you're serious about being an entrepreneur then you should never stop trying.

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The First 5 Steps That Begin Your Entrepreneurial Journey

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Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own. Nobody is born an entrepreneur. Different people take different paths to achieve success, and there is no set-in-stone instruction for becoming one. Entrepreneurs take on a number of different roles and these roles can vary depending on what field you choose to enter.