The Entrepreneurial Mind

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Chapter Two
The Entrepreneurial Mind: Crafting

a Personal Entrepreneurial Strategy
The secret of those who amaze the world is that they regard nothing to be
impossible.
Henry David Thoreau
American philosopher, 18171862
Results Expected
Upon completion of this chapter, you will be able to
1. Determine whether being an entrepreneur would enhance your life and feed your
creative energies.
2. Discuss the critical aspects of the entrepreneurial mindthe strategies, habits, attitudes, and behaviors that work for entrepreneurs who build higher-potential
ventures.1
3. Describe the characteristics of various entrepreneurial groups.
4. Develop concepts for evaluating a personal entrepreneurial strategy and an apprenticeship, and be able to discuss the entrepreneurs creed.
5. Utilize a framework for self-assessment, and develop a personal entrepreneurial strategy.
6. Initiate a self-assessment and goal-setting process that can become a lifelong habit of
entrepreneurial thinking and action.
7. Assess the oneworld case study.
Entrepreneurs Are Leaders
professional with the ability to scale the enterprise

(the manager).
This old notion has given way to what we have
sensed all along: Effective entrepreneurs are internally motivated, high-energy leaders with a unique
tolerance for ambiguity, a keen eye toward mitigating
Until quite recently, a distinction was often made between the individual with the vision, skill, and mindset to start up a high-potential venture (the entrepreneur) and the typically more seasoned, risk-averse
The authors would like to thank Frederic M. Alper, a longtime friend and colleague and adjunct professor at Babson College, for his insights and contributions
to this chapter, in particular the graphic representation of entrepreneurial attributes and the development of the QuickLook exercise to develop a personal
entrepreneurial strategy.
1
J. A. Timmons, The Entrepreneurial Mind (Acton, MA: Brick House, 1989).
33
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The Entrepreneurial Mind for an Entrepreneurial World
risk, and a passion for discovery and innovation.

These leaders create or identify and pursue opportunities by marshalling the diverse resources required to develop new markets and engage the
inevitable competition. More than ever, we are convinced that the creation and liberation of human energy resulting from entrepreneurial leadership are
the largest transformational force on the planet
today.
The power of a single leader can be profound,
and nowhere is this more true and relevant than in
entrepreneurship. Perhaps what is most exciting
about entrepreneurial leaders is that in the aggregate, their alert actions have fueled a worldwide
revolution that continues to define and shape our
social, economic, and environmental frontiers.
Three Principles for Entrepreneurial

Leadership
People dont want to be managed, they want to be led.
Ewing Marion Kauffman
One of the most extraordinary entrepreneurial leadership stories of our time is that of the late Ewing
Marion Kauffman, who founded and built Marion
Labs, a company with over $1 billion in sales, and
then founded the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation. Kauffman started his pharmaceutical company,
now one of the leading companies in the world, in
1950 with $5,000 in the basement of his Kansas City
home. Previously he had been very successful at another company. Kauffman (or Mr. K. as he preferred) recalled, The president first cut back my
sales commission, then he cut back my territory. So I
quit and created Marion Labs.
With the acquisition of the company by MerrellDow in 1989 (becoming Marion, Merrell Dow,
Inc.), more than 300 people became millionaires.
Thirteen foundations have been created by former
Marion associates, and the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation is one of only a dozen or so foundations in America with assets of over $1 billion.
The two-pronged mission of the foundation is to
make a lasting difference in helping youths at risk
and encouraging leadership in all areas of American
life.
The following are the core leadership principles
that are the cornerstone of the values, philosophy,
and culture of Marion Labs and now of the Kauffman
Foundation:
Treat others as you would want to be treated.
Share the wealth that is created with all those

who have contributed to it at all levels.
Give back to the community.
There are many legendary examples of Mr. K.
practicing these principles while growing Marion
Labs. There was the time when he had sent his
young chief financial officer to Europe to negotiate
a supply contract with a major German company.
When the CFO returned, he proudly showed Mr. K.
the incredibly favorable terms he had extracted
from the supplierwho he had determined badly
needed the business. From his point of view, he had
cleverly won the contract by being a sharp and
tough negotiator.
After reviewing the situation and the agreement,
Mr. K. blasted the CFO: This is a totally one-sided
contractin our favorand it is terribly unfair.
They wont be able to make any money on this, and
thats not how we treat our suppliers, or our customers. You get back on that plane tomorrow, apologize to them, and then create a deal that works for
usand lets them make a reasonable return as
well.
Stunned, the CFO sheepishly returned to Germany to work out a contract that met with Mr. K.s approval. Less than two years later, a worldwide supply
crisis forced that German supplier to reduce its customer shipments by over 90 percent. Mr. K.s fairness
principle had not been forgotten: Marion Labs was
the only American company that continued to have
its requirements filled.
As simple as these principles may be, few organizations truly, sincerely, and consistently practice
them. It takes a lot more than lip service or a standalone profit-sharing plan to create an entrepreneurial
culture like this. Consider the following unique characteristics at Marion Labs and the Ewing Marion
Kauffman Foundation:
No one is an employee; everyone is an associate.
Even at $1 billion in sales, there are no formal
organizational charts.
Everyone who meets or exceeds high performance goals participates in a companywide
bonus, profit-sharing, and stock option plan.
Benefit programs treat all associates the same,
even top management.
Managers who attempt to develop a new product and fail are not punished with lateral promotions or geographic relocation, nor are they
ostracized. Failures are gateways to learning
and continual improvement.
Those who will not or cannot practice these
core principles are not tolerated.
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EXHIBIT 2.1
Comparing Management and Leadership
Creating an Agenda
Developing a Human
Network for Achieving
the Agenda
Execution
Outcomes
Management
Leadership
Planning and budgetingestablishing detailed

steps and timetables for achieving needed results,
and then allocating the resources necessary to
achieve these results
Organizing and staffingestablishing some
structure for accomplishing plan requirements,
staffing that structure with individuals, delegating
responsibility and authority for carrying out the
plan, providing policies and procedures to help
guide people, and creating methods or systems to
monitor implementation
Controlling and problem solvingmonitoring
results versus plans in some detail, identifying
deviations, and then planning and organizing to
solve these problems
Producing a degree of predictability and order,
and having the potential of consistently producing
key results expected by various stakeholders
Establishing directiondeveloping a vision of

the future, often the distant future, and strategies
for producing the changes needed to achieve
that vision
Aligning peoplecommunicating the direction by
words and deeds to all those whose cooperation
may be needed to influence the creation of teams
and coalitions that understand the vision and
strategies, and accept their validity
Motivating and inspiringenergizing people to

overcome major political, bureaucratic, and
resource barriers to change by satisfying very basic,
often unfulfilled human needs
Producing change, often to a dramatic degree,
and having the potential of producing extremely
useful change
Source: Reprinted with the permission of The Free Press, a Division of Simon & Schuster Adult Publishing Group, from A Force for Change: How
Leadership Differs from Management by John P. Kotter. Copyright 1990 by John P. Kotter, Inc. All rights reserved.
The ultimate message is clear: Great companies

can be built upon simple but elegant principles; and
all the capital, technology, service management, and
latest information available cannot substitute for
these principles, nor will they cause such a culture to
happen. These ideals are at the heart of the difference between good and great companies.
Timeless Research
A single psychological model of entrepreneurship has
not been supported by research. However, behavioral scientists, venture capitalists, investors, and entrepreneurs share the opinion that the eventual success of a new venture will depend a great deal upon
the talent and behavior of the lead entrepreneur and
of his or her team.
A number of myths still persist about entrepreneurs. Foremost among these myths is the belief that
leaders are born, not made. The roots of much of this
thinking reflect the assumptions and biases of an earlier era, when rulers were royal and leadership was
the prerogative of the aristocracy. Fortunately, such
notions have not withstood the tests of time or the inquisitiveness of researchers of leadership and management. Consider recent research, which distin2
guishes managers from leaders, as summarized in

Exhibit 2.1. It is widely accepted today that leadership is an extraordinarily complex subject, depending
more on the interconnections among the leader, the
task, the situation, and those being led than on inborn
or inherited characteristics.
Numerous ways of analyzing human behavior
have implications in the study of entrepreneurship. For example, for over 40 years Dr. David C.
McClelland of Harvard University and Dr. John W.
Atkinson of the University of Michigan and their
colleagues sought to understand individual motivation.2 Their theory of psychological motivation is a
generally accepted part of the literature on entrepreneurial behavior. The theory states that people
are motivated by three principal needs: (1) the
need for achievement, (2) the need for power, and
(3) the need for affiliation. The need for achievement is the need to excel and for measurable personal accomplishment. A person competes against a
self-imposed standard that does not involve competition with others. The individual sets realistic and
challenging goals and likes to get feedback on how
well he or she is doing in order to improve performance. The need for power is the need to influence others and to achieve an influence goal. The
need for affiliation is the need to attain an affiliation
See J. W. Atkinson, An Introduction to Motivation (Princeton, NJ: Van Nostrand, 1964); J. W. Atkinson, Motives in Fantasy, Action and Society (Princeton, NJ:
Van Nostrand, 1958); D. C. McClelland, The Achieving Society (Princeton, NJ: Van Nostrand, 1961); J. W. Atkinson and N. T. Feather, eds., A Theory of
Achievement Motivation (New York: John Wiley & Sons, 1966); and D. C. McClelland and D. G. Winter, Motivating Economic Achievement (New York:
Free Press, 1969).
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EXHIBIT 2.2
Characteristics of Entrepreneurs
Date
Authors
Characteristics
1848
1917
1934
1954
1959
1961
1963
1964
Mill
Weber
Schumpeter
Sutton
Hartman
McClelland
Davids
Pickle
1971
1971
Palmer
Hornaday and
Aboud
Winter
Borland
Casson
Gartner
Begley and Boyd
Caird
Roper
Thomas and Mueller
Lee and Tsang
Risk bearing
Source of formal authority
Innovation; initiative
Desire for responsibility
Source of formal authority
Risk taking; need for achievement
Ambition; desire for independence, responsibility, self-confidence
Drive/mental; human relations; communication ability;
technical knowledge
Risk measurement
Need for achievement; autonomy; aggression; power;
recognition; innovative/independent
Need for power
Internal locus of power
Risk; innovation; power; authority
Change and ambiguity
Risk taking; tolerance of ambiguity
Drive
Power and authority
Risk; power; internal locus of control; innovation
Internal locus of control
1973
1974
1982
1985
1987
1988
1998
2000
2001
goalthe goal to build a warm relationship with

someone else and/or to enjoy mutual friendship.
Other research focused on the common attitudes
and behaviors of entrepreneurs. A 1983 study found
a relationship between attitudes and behaviors of
successful entrepreneurs and various stages of company development.3 A year later, another study
found that entrepreneurs were unique individuals;
for instance, this study found that what is characteristic is not so much an overall type as a successful,
growth-oriented entrepreneurial type. . . . It is the
company builders who are distinctive.4 A study of
118 entrepreneurs revealed that those who like to
plan are much more likely to be in the survival
group than those who do not.5 Clearly the get-richquick entrepreneurs are not the company builders;
nor are they the planners of successful ventures.
Rather it is the visionary who participates in the dayto-day routine to achieve a long-term objective and
who is generally passionate and not exclusively

profit-oriented.
Academics have continued to characterize the
special qualities of entrepreneurs. (See Exhibit 2.2
for a summary of this early research.) As participants
in this quest to understand the entrepreneurial
mind, in January 1983 Howard H. Stevenson and
Jeffry Timmons spoke with 60 practicing entrepreneurs.6 One finding was that entrepreneurs felt they
had to concentrate on certain fundamentals: responsiveness, resiliency, and adaptiveness in seizing new
opportunities. These entrepreneurs spoke of other
attitudes, including an ability to activate vision and
a willingness to learn about and invest in new techniques, to be adaptable, to have a professional attitude, and to have patience. They talked about the
importance of enjoying and being interested in
business, as well as the business as a way of life.
Other attitudes they spoke of included a willingness
N. Churchill, Entrepreneurs and Their Enterprises: A Stage Model, Frontiers of Entrepreneurship Research: 1983, ed. J. A. Hornaday et al. (Babson Park,
MA: Babson College, 1983), pp. 122.
4
N. R. Smith and John B. Miner, Motivational Considerations in the Success of Technologically Innovative Entrepreneurs, in Frontiers of Entrepreneurship
Research: 1984, ed. J. A. Hornaday et al. (Babson Park, MA: Babson College, 1984), pp. 44895.
5
J. B. Miller, N. R. Smith, and J. S. Bracker, Entrepreneur Motivation and Firm Survival among Technologically Innovative Companies, ed. N. C. Churchill et
al., Frontiers of Entrepreneurship Research: 1991 (Babson Park, MA: Babson College, 1992), p. 31.
6
J. A. Timmons and H. H. Stevenson, Entrepreneurship Education in the 80s: What Entrepreneurs Say, in Entrepreneurship: What It Is and How to Teach
It, ed. J. Kao and H. H. Stevenson (Boston: Harvard Business School Press, 1985), pp. 11534.
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to learn about and invest in new techniques, to be

adaptable, to have a professional attitude, and to
have patience.
Many of the respondents recognized and endorsed the importance of human resource management; one entrepreneur said that one of the most
challenging tasks was playing a leadership role in attracting high-quality people, imparting your vision to
them, and holding and motivating them. Other entrepreneurs focused on the importance of building an
organization and teamwork.
A number of respondents believed that the ability to conceptualize their business and do strategic
planning would be of growing importance, particularly when thinking five years ahead. Similarly, the
ageless importance of sensitivity to and respect for
employees was stressed by a chief executive officer
of a firm with $40 million in sales and 400 employees: It is essential that the separation between
management and the average employee should be
eliminated. Students should be taught to respect
employees all the way down to the janitor and accept them as knowledgeable and able persons.
A consulting study by McKinsey & Co. of
medium-sized growth companies (i.e., companies
with sales between $25 million and $1 billion and
with sales or profit growth of more than 15 percent
annually over five years) confirms that the chief executive officers of winning companies were notable for
three common traits: perseverance, a builders mentality, and a strong propensity for taking calculated
risks.7
One company that has taken pains to establish
good interpersonal relationships is Verisilicon. How
do you attract people in China? Wayne Dai, founder,
chairman, president, and CEO of Verisilicon Holdings, has a simple rule: Hire two people who are paid
the salary of three people to do the work of four people. He continues:
How do you retain people in Shanghai? I tell people if
you come, I will give you a down payment for an apartment. We dont hire fresh graduates. They dont know
what they are doing. You must have changed jobs before
but not many times. I will only hire someone if everyone
likes him. You have to make your employees think more
about a career path.
Its working, since everyone volunteers to do overtime [which you cannot compel in China]. Turnover is
less than 5 percent. We financed an eight-day trip to
Hong Kong and Taiwan, which is cheaper than paying
7
37
for overtime. We hold a party every month for whoever

has a birthday. Little things matter a lot.
Little things create loyalty. Dai points out: I do

small things like showing students how to shop and
cook Chinese food if they are in the U.S. You cannot
get loyalty without trust, so I trust people and care
about them. Listen to the people around you and
trust them.
Converging on the Entrepreneurial Mind

The entrepreneur is one of the most intriguing and at the
same time most elusive characters in the cast that
constitutes the subject of economic analysis.
Professor William Baumol
Department of Economics, NYU
Desirable and Acquirable Attitudes,

Habits, and Behaviors
Many successful entrepreneurs have emphasized
that while their colleagues have initiative and a takecharge attitude, are determined to persevere, and are
resilient and able to adapt, it is not just a matter of
personality. It is what they do that matters most.8
Although there is an undeniable core of such inborn characteristics as energy and raw intelligence,
which an entrepreneur either has or does not, it is becoming apparent that possession of these characteristics does not necessarily an entrepreneur make.
There is also a good deal of evidence that entrepreneurs are born and made better and that certain attitudes and behaviors can be acquired, developed,
practiced, and refined through a combination of experience and study.9 In addition, although not all attitudes, habits, and behaviors can be acquired by
everyone at the same pace and with the same proficiency, entrepreneurs are able to significantly improve their odds of success by concentrating on those
that work, by nurturing and practicing them, and by
eliminating, or at least mitigating, the rest. Painstaking effort may be required, and much will depend on
the motivation of an individual to grow; but it seems
people have an astounding capacity to change and
learn if they are motivated and committed to do so.
Testimony given by successful entrepreneurs also
confirms attitudes and behaviors that successful entre-
D. K. Clifford, Jr., and R. E. Cavanagh, The Winning Performance (New York: Bantam Books, 1985), p. 3.
Determining the attitudes and behaviors in entrepreneurs that are acquirable and desirable represents the synthesis of over 50 research studies compiled for
the first and second editions of this book. See extensive references in J. A. Timmons, L. E. Smollen, and A. L. M. Dingee, Jr., New Venture Creation, 2nd
ed. (Homewood, IL.: Richard D. Irwin, 1985), pp. 13969.
9
D. C. McClelland, Achievement Motivation Can Be Developed, Harvard Business Review, NovemberDecember 1965; D. C. McClelland and David G.
Winter, Motivating Economic Achievement (New York: Free Press, 1969); and J. A. Timmons, Black Is BeautifulIs It Bountiful? Harvard Business
Review, NovemberDecember 1971, p. 81.
8
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preneurs have in common. For example, many wellknown successful Chinese entrepreneurs like Ji Qi of
Ctrip, Ding Lei of 163.com, Zhang Jindong of Suning
Group, and Zhang Yue of Changsha Broad Air Conditioning mention the following attributes as the key
elements of their success: (1) they are passionate
about their work, (2) they are proactive, taking actions to solve problems immediately, (3) they work
step by step, and (4) they try to live virtuously.
New Research. While Baumols observation

will resonate far into the future, we are fortunate to
have the Praeger Perspectives series, a 2007 threevolume set of research that focuses on entrepreneurship from three angles: people, process, and place.
This series brings together insights into the field of
entrepreneurship by some of the leading scholars in
the world and adds validation, new perspectives, and
further debate to the complex questions that surround the entrepreneurial mind and entrepreneurial
process. We have drawn on this work liberally in this
edition of New Venture Creation.
The first volume, people, takes a broad view of entrepreneurship as a form of human action, pulling together the current state of the art in academic research with respect to cognitive, economic, social,
and institutional factors that influence entrepreneurial behavior. Why do people start new businesses?
How do people make entrepreneurial decisions?
What is the role played by the social and economic
environment in individuals decisions about entrepreneurship? Do institutions matter? Do some
groups of people such as immigrants and women face
particular issues when deciding to start a business?
The second volume process, proceeds through the
life cycle of a new venture start-up by tackling several
key steps in the process: idea, opportunity, team
building, resource acquisition, managing growth, and
entering global markets. It is clear from the work in
this volume that we have (as we alluded to earlier)
learned a tremendous amount about the entrepreneurial process over the years.
The third volume, in the series examines place,
which refers to a wide and diverse range of contextual factors that influence the entrepreneur and the
entrepreneurial process. Chapters in this volume address entrepreneurship in the context of the corporation, family, and franchise. The research examines
the impact of public policy and entrepreneurship
support systems at the country and community level
and from an economic and social perspective. In addition, the volume looks at the technology environment and financing support structures for entrepreneurship as context issues.
We will also be referring to the exciting and
provocative work of Professors Stefan Kwiatkowski
and Nawaz Sharif, editors of the Knowledge Caf series on Intellectual Entrepreneurship and Courage to
Act. This text, the fifth in Kwiatkowskis series, provides further insight into the entrepreneurial mind-set
involved in creating new intellectual property and
knowledge creation ventures. We are especially
swayed by their work and valuable insight on courage
as a vital aspect of entrepreneurial behavior, and we
have incorporated that into our dominant themes.
Undoubtedly many attitudes and behaviors characterize the entrepreneurial mind, and there is no
single set of attitudes and behaviors that every entrepreneur must have for every venture opportunity.
Further, the fit concept argues that what is required
in each situation depends on the mix and match of
the key players and how promising and forgiving the
opportunity is, given the founders strengths and
shortcomings. A team might collectively show many
desired strengths, but even then there is no such
thing as a perfect entrepreneuryet.
Seven Dominant Themes

Nothing that sends you to the grave with a smile on your
face comes easy. Work hard doing what you love. Find
out what gives you energy and improve on it.
Betty Coster, Entrepreneur
A consensus has emerged around seven dominant

themes, shown in Exhibits 2.3 and 2.4.
Commitment and Determination Commitment and determination are seen as more important
than any other factor. With commitment and determination, an entrepreneur can overcome incredible
obstacles and also compensate enormously for other
weaknesses. PayEasy, one of the most profitable and
reputable e-commerce start-ups in Taiwan, has been
around for almost a decade. Its founder and now general manager, Bill Lin, will always remember how
bad things were at the beginning. What makes Lin a
great entrepreneur is the fact that the failure did not
stop him. Instead the failure became the cornerstone
of PayEasys success. Lins expertise is in Internet security. Because of his background, he paid a lot of attention on the security of the payment gateway during the early days of PayEasy, neglecting content
development and after-sales service. However, he
soon realized his mistake, and Lin and his team
pushed forward innovative packages and enhancements to improve users online shopping experience.
Lin also learnt that a successful e-commerce business
has to be developed with the local environment and
people in mind, and at the right time. PayEasy is now
a partner with Taiwans largest chain store, 7-Eleven.
Under the PayEasy scheme, customers can order
goods online and pick them up at a designated
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EXHIBIT 2.3
Seven Themes of Desirable and Acquirable Attitudes and Behaviors
Theme
Attitude or Behavior
Commitment and determination
Tenacious and decisive, able to recommit/commit quickly

Intensely competitive in achieving goals
Persistent in solving problems, disciplined
Willing to undertake personal sacrifice
Immersed in the mission
Courage
Moral strength
Fearless experimentation
Not afraid of conflicts, failure
Intense curiosity in the face of risk
Leadership
Self-starter; high standards but not perfectionist

Team builder and hero maker; inspires others
Treats others as you want to be treated
Shares the wealth with all the people who helped create it
Honest and reliable; builds trust; practices fairness
Not a lone wolf
Superior learner and teacher; courage
Patient and urgent
Opportunity obsession
Leadership in shaping the opportunity

Has intimate knowledge of customers needs and wants
Market driven
Obsessed with value creation and enhancement
Tolerance of risk, ambiguity, and uncertainty
Creativity, self-reliance, and adaptability
Motivation to excel
7-Eleven store within 24 hours, and make payment at

the same time. Lins success with the tie-up leverages
on the availability of local resources, and the ease and
popularity of online shopping.
Total commitment is required in nearly all entrepreneurial ventures. Almost without exception, entrepreneurs live under huge, constant pressures
first for their firms to survive start-up, then for them
to stay alive, and finally for them to grow. A new ven-
Calculated risk taker

Risk minimizer
Risk sharer
Manages paradoxes and contradictions
Tolerates uncertainty and lack of structure
Tolerates stress and conflict
Able to resolve problems and integrate solutions
Nonconventional, open-minded, lateral thinker (helicopter mind)
Restless with status quo
Able to adapt and change; creative problem solver
Quick learner
No fear of failure
Able to conceptualize and sweat details
Goal and results oriented; high but realistic goals
Drive to achieve and grow
Low need for status and power
Interpersonally supporting (versus competitive)
Aware of weaknesses and strengths
Has perspective and sense of humor
ture demands top priority for the entrepreneurs time,

emotions, and loyalty. Thus commitment and determination usually require personal sacrifice. An entrepreneurs commitment can be measured in several ways
through a willingness to invest a substantial portion of his or her net worth in the venture, through a
willingness to take a cut in pay because he or she will
own a major piece of the venture, and through other
major sacrifices in lifestyle and family circumstances.
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EXHIBIT 2.4
Core and Desirable Entrepreneurial Attributes
The Nonentrepreneurial Attributes
Outer control
DESIRABLE ATTRIBUTES
Being "macho"
Invulnerability
Intelligence
Knows it all
Creativity and
innovativeness
CORE ATTRIBUTES
Courage
Commitment and
determination
Leadership
Tolerance of risk,
ambiguity, and uncertainty
Creativity, self-reliance,
and adaptability
Motivation to excel
Capacity to inspire
Perfectionist
Values
Impulsiveness
Energy, health, and

emotional stability
Counter-dependency
The desire to win does not equal the will to never

give up. This is a critically important distinction.
Countless would-be entrepreneurs (and lots of other
types of people for that matter) say that they really
want to win. But few have the dogged tenacity and unflinching perseverance to make it happen. The
founder of Auria Solar, Dr. Tsai, was the general manager of one of Taiwans most successful start-ups,
E-Ton Solar, which enjoyed the highest stock value
among all listed technological companies. Not content
with that achievement, Tsai wants to win again. He
wants to prove that the technologies he and his team
develop at Auria Solar can turn a new page in Taiwans
high-tech industry, especially for the competitive,
market-limited sectors such as the solar energy industry. The desire to win over other technological firms
drives Tsai and his team to test concepts and ideas on
a daily basis.
Time is money, and many Asian start-ups and wellestablished firms do not shut down on national holidays. Instead, employees are scheduled to work on
shifts during important occasions. Tsai once personally supervised a routine text on the Lunar New Year
holiday, when most people in the country were celebrating, because he was keen to have the production
line for testing and manufacturing ready when his employees came back to work after the holiday.
Delta Electronics is widely known as one of Taiwans giant companies. Delta started with making
small components. Power management technologies
were acquired externally and developed internally as
Being antiauthoritarian
Delta expanded. Today, Delta employs diversified

technologies in nearly all fields of tech product design
and manufacturing, and is a leader in the green technologies industry.
Bruce Cheng, the founder of Delta Electronics, is
well-known as a humble and pragmatic entrepreneur
who pays tremendous attention to social development
issues such as community education and protecting
the environment. The company has been around for
nearly 40 years. Delta Electronics started from a very
small company that focused on electronic components and grew to become the giant conglomerate it is
today; it works closely with some of the worlds top research universities such as MIT, and is a world leader
in various technological developments.
Delta faced many challenges in its history, but the
company rose to the occasion each time. The mass
production of the Ni-H cell presented one such challenge. After the team at Delta had perfected the Ni-H
cell, they needed automation machines for mass production. However, competition was stiff and nobody
was keen to sell their second-tier machines to Delta.
Faced with this setback, the Delta team decided they
would develop their own automation machines. In the
months of hard work that followed, the team accumulated experience, research, and expertise, and
drove itself relentlessly to develop its technological
capacity. That hard work has earned Delta the reputation of being a producer of high-quality automation
machines and systems today. As one saying goes,
When you fall on the ground, dont be anxious to
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stand up immediately. First, look around and see if

there is anything to pick up even before you put your
head up. The Delta story teaches us that success
cannot be defined by the lack of failure; even in the
face of major setbacks, success can come with the
right attitude and determination.
Entrepreneurs are intensely competitive: They
love to win and love to competeat anything! The
best of them direct all this competitive energy toward
the goal and toward their external competitors. This
is critical; founders who get caught up in competing
with peers in the company invariably destroy team
cohesion and spirit and, ultimately, the team.
Entrepreneurs who successfully build new enterprises seek to overcome hurdles, solve problems, and
complete the job; they are disciplined, tenacious, and
persistent. They are able to commit and recommit
quickly. They are not intimidated by difficult situations; in fact, they seem to think that the impossible
just takes a little longer. However, they are neither
aimless nor foolhardy in their relentless attack on a
problem or obstacle that can impede their business.
If a task is unsolvable, an entrepreneur will actually
give up sooner than others. Most researchers share
the opinion that while entrepreneurs are extremely
persistent, they are also realistic in recognizing what
they can and cannot do, and where they can get help
to solve a very difficult but necessary task.
Courage As we noted earlier, we are indebted to
Stefan Kwiatkowski and Nawaz Sharif for their insightful and thoughtful work on Courage as an important dimension of the entrepreneurial mind-set.
Although we added courage as a subcategory in the
previous edition of this text, we did not do it justice.
In his research essay titled What the Hell, Lets
Give It a Try, Kwiatkowski asserts that courage is not
simple bravery resulting from deficient information
about a given situation, nor pluck anchored in feelings of invulnerability. Courage rather has its source
in broadly understood knowledge, experience, and
integrity of the courageous individual. To prove his
point, Kwiatkowski Googled core and desirable entrepreneurial attributes combined with entrepreneurship. Results of that search, and two other
searches also conducted in March 2005, are depicted
in Exhibit 2.5.
Hence, as we continue to converge on the entrepreneurial mind, we have included and elevated
courage to the second of what are now seven themes.
We see courage having at least three important aspects: first, moral strength and principles. This
means the character and the personal integrity to
know right from wrong, and the will and commitment
to act accordingly (to do the right thing). The second
is being a fearless experimenter. This is not to be confused with simply assessing and weighing risk and re-
41
EXHIBIT 2.5
Online Search for Desirable Attributes
of Entrepreneurship
Timmons/
Spinelli Theme
Commitment
Leadership
Opportunity immersion*
Risk tolerance
Adaptability
Achievement
Courage
Google
EBSCO
Proquest
534,000
1,200,000
9,010
14,000
57,600
50,400
370,000
81,000
151
377
1
0
4
21
192
10
7,042
7,230
0
0
53
688
4,169
647
*A non-Timmons/Spinelli theme.
Source: S. Kwiatkowski and N. M. Sharif, Knowledge Caf for Intellectual Entrepreneurship and Courage to Act (Warsaw, Poland:
Publishing house of Leon Kozminsky Academy of Entrepreneurship
and Management, 2005), p. 231.
ward, upside and downside, and ones comfort with a

certain level of risk and uncertainty. Fearless experimentation suggests a restlessness with convention
and a rejection of the status quo. It is the innovators
passion to create, invent, and improve. This relentless experimentation is enhanced by a third aspect of
courage: a lack of fear of failing at the experiment
and most undertakings for that matterand a lack of
fear of conflicts that may arise. In other words, there
is a mental toughness that is quite impervious to fears
but is not ignorant or oblivious to possible consequences. Consider the following examples of courage
to help elucidate this important concept.
In 1961 the Cuban Missile Crisis was one of the
most dangerous and frightening moments in American history, and especially in the Cold War between
the old USSR and the United States. Many historians
and military observers believe the two nations came
within hours, even minutes, of hostilities that would
have led to a nuclear holocaust. A few years earlier a
young U.S. Navy ensign was on a ship in these same
waters off Cuba, but he was not on watch at the time.
A senior officer, by error, had charted a course that
the young ensign, through his own sextant and map
calculations (this was long before GPS), had concluded was incorrect and would run the ship aground.
Such a calamity would end the careers of the navy
ships commander and officer in charge. The young
ensign, if wrong, would be demoted and court-marshalled. All of his senior officers were certain that the
ensigns much more experienced and senior officer
was correct, and the young man was urged not to pursue his belief in his own calculations. Nonetheless, he
showed enormous courage, fearlessness, and confidence that he was doing the right thing, and he insisted on making his case to the captain of the ship.
The captain listened. Fortunately for all, the young
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ensign had carefully and accurately done his readings

and calculationsand was correct. This avoided a
near disaster. This young ensign went on to be a highly
successful entrepreneur. His name was Ewing Marion
Kauffman.
The founder of Tai-Hwa Pottery, Mr. Lu, is a man
full of confidence in his work. Like many entrepreneurs, he believes that his company can make an impact on the global scene and that his products will be
well received in his home country, Taiwan, and elsewhere. Although the Taiwanese government sometimes offers incentives for his industry, Lu refuses to
change his business model or his products to qualify
for them. He has also been known to turn down offers
to market his firm. Lu is convinced that a good firm
will automatically attract customers, and if an entrepreneur focuses on his product and his customers,
people will see value in his company, and create a demand which will sustain the business.
The core of service in Tai-Hwa is about satisfying
the needs of buyers, local and international visitors,
strategic partners, artists, masters, and their educational program participants. These are the people who
create and experience Tai-Hwa and they are, in fact,
the force promoting Tai-Hwa through word-of-mouth
marketing. Lu is intent on establishing and maintaining in Tai-Hwa a relaxing space for visitors to appreciate, interact, and experience the artworks and
the culture they represent instead of listening to presentations in the meeting room.
Wretch.cc is a popular social networking site
among the young people in Taiwan. The wretch platform was one of the earliest showpieces of the Web2.0
application after it was launched in Taiwan. Wretch
was formed by a group of students who clearly understood the industry. The founding team turned down
capital investment offers from Sequoia and Kleiner
Perkins and chose Yahoo as their partner through a
merger and acquisitiona brave move that showed
that the Wretch team knew clearly what they wanted
and what their firm needed. In 2006, one in every four
people in Taiwan had a Wretch account. Most of these
early users were then college students and are now
young working professionals.
Leadership Successful entrepreneurs are experienced, possessing intimate knowledge of the technology and marketplace in which they will compete,
sound general management skills, and a proven track
record. They are self-starters and have an internal locus of control with high standards. They are patient
leaders, capable of installing tangible visions and managing for the longer haul. The entrepreneur is at once
10
a learner and a teacher, a doer and a visionary. The vision of building a substantial enterprise that will contribute something lasting and relevant to the world
while realizing a capital gain requires the patience to
stick to the task for 5 to 10 years or more.
Work by Dr. Alan Grant lends significant support
to the fundamental driving forces theory of entrepreneurship that will be explored in Chapter 5.
Grant surveyed 25 senior venture capitalists to
develop an entrepreneurial leadership paradigm.
Three clear areas evolved from his study: the lead
entrepreneur, the venture team, and the external
environment influences, which are outlined in further detail in Exhibit 2.6. Furthermore, Grant suggested that to truly understand this paradigm, it
should be metaphorically associated with a troika, a
Russian vehicle pulled by three horses of equal
strength. Each horse represents a cluster of the success factors. The troika was driven toward success by
the visions and dreams of the founding entrepreneurs.10 Grants work is supported by a later study
by Nigel Nicholson in his 1998 European Management journal article, reporting on the personality and
entrepreneurial leadership of the heads of the U.K.s
most successful independent companies.
Successful entrepreneurs possess a well-developed
capacity to exert influence without formal power.
These people are adept at conflict resolution. They
know when to use logic and when to persuade, when
to make a concession, and when to exact one. To run a
successful venture, an entrepreneur learns to get
along with many different constituenciesthe customer, the supplier, the financial backer, and the creditor, as well as the partners and others on the inside
often with conflicting aims. Success comes when the
entrepreneur is a mediatora negotiator rather than
a dictator.
Successful entrepreneurs are interpersonally supporting and nurturingnot interpersonally competitive. When a strong need to control, influence, and
gain power over others characterizes the lead entrepreneur, or where he or she has an insatiable appetite
for putting an associate down, the venture usually
gets into trouble. Entrepreneurs should treat others
as they want to be treated; they should share the
wealth with those who contributed. A dictatorial, adversarial, and domineering management style makes
it difficult to attract and keep people who thrive on a
thirst for achievement, responsibility, and results.
Compliant partners and managers often are chosen.
Destructive conflicts often erupt over who has the final say, who is right, and whose prerogatives are what.
Entrepreneurs who create and build substantial
enterprises are not lone wolves and superindepen-
A. Grant, The Development of an Entrepreneurial Leadership Paradigm for Enhancing New Venture Success, Frontiers of Entrepreneurship Research:
1992, ed. J. A. Hornaday et al. (Babson Park, MA: Babson College, 1992).
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EXHIBIT 2.6
The Entrepreneurial Leadership Paradigm
The Lead Entrepreneur
Self-concept
Intellectually honest
Has a realists attitude rather than one of invincibility.

Trustworthy: his/her word is his/her contract.
Admits what and when he/she does not know.
Displays a high energy level and a sense of urgency.
Capable of making hard decisions: setting and beating high goals.
Maintains an effective dialogue with the venture team, in the marketplace, and with other venture constituents.
Competent in people management and team-building skills.
Pacemaker
Courage
Communication skills
Team player
The Venture Team
Organizational style
The lead entrepreneur and the venture team blend their skills to operate in a participative environment.
Ethical behavior
Practices strong adherence to ethical business practices.
Faithfulness
Stretched commitments are consistently met or bettered.
Focus
Long-term venture strategies are kept in focus, but tactics are varied to achieve them.
Performance/reward
High standards of performance are created, and superior performance is rewarded fairly and equitably.
Adaptability
Responsive to rapid changes in product/technological cycles.
External Environmental Influences
Constituent needs
Organization needs are satisfied, in parallel with those of the other publics the enterprise serves.
Prior experience
Extensive prior experiences are effectively applied.
Mentoring
The competencies of others are sought and used.
Problem resolution
New problems are immediately solved or prioritized.
Value creation
High commitment is placed on long-term value creation for backers, customers, employees, and other
stakeholders.
Skill emphasis
Marketing skills are stressed over technical ones.
Source: Adapted from A. J. Grant, The Development of an Entrepreneurial Leadership Paradigm for Enhancing Venture Capital Success, Frontiers
of Entrepreneurship Research: 1992, ed. J. A. Hornaday et al. (Babson Park, MA: Babson College, 1992).
dent. They do not need to collect all the credit for the
effort. They not only recognize the reality that it is
rarely possible to build a substantial business working
alone, but also actively build a team. They have an
uncanny ability to make heroes out of the people they
attract to the venture by giving responsibility and
sharing credit for accomplishments.
In the corporate setting, this hero-making ability is identified as an essential attribute of successful
entrepreneurial managers.11 These hero makers, of
both the independent and corporate varieties, try to
make the pie bigger and better, rather than jealously
clutching and hoarding a tiny pie that is all theirs.
They have a capacity for objective interpersonal
relationships as well, which enables them to smooth
out individual differences of opinion by keeping
attention focused on the common goal to be
achieved.12
Opportunity Obsession Successful entrepreneurs are obsessed first with opportunitynot with
the money, the resources, the contacts and networking, and not with image or appearances. Although
11
12
some of these latter items have a place and time in

the entrepreneurial process, they are not the source
and driver for new ventures. Entrepreneurs, in their
best creative mode, are constantly thinking of new
ideas for businesses by watching trends, spotting patterns, and connecting the dots to shape and mold a
unique enterprise.
Take for example, CupC+ which has been around
in Taiwan for only four years, but the brand is already
famous for its excellent fruit teas. Before embarking
on the fruit franchising business, its founder, Kao,
searched long and hard for a niche in which she could
develop her career in. She researched the franchise
market and realized that franchises focusing on fruit
were uncommonthe stores were mostly located in
departmental storesand that the products were
usually expensive. Kao knew she had found her business opportunity since not every office worker could
afford to pay for these options, and Taiwanese people
do not often shop for fruit and fruit juices at departmental stores. She then decided that she wanted to
build a franchising network to promote drinking
juices and fruit teas made of fresh fruit.
D. L. Bradford and A. R. Cohen, Managing for Excellence: The Guide to Developing High Performance in Contemporary Organizations (New York: John
Wiley & Sons, 1984).
Churchill, Entrepreneurs and Their Enterprises: A Stage Model, pp. 122.
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The time was right and Kao was ready, but she
needed a partner who could help with providing
high-quality fruit, and preserving and transporting
them. Serendipitously, she was introduced to her
cousins husband, who had recently taken over his
family business, FuFruit. FuFruit was a large and
reputable fruit provider in northern Taiwan, and its
owner was looking into expanding the business.
Skilled at branding and marketing, Kao was the
best person to sell their new product to major
stores such as 7-Eleven and Family Mart, while her
cousins husband concentrated on promoting their
brand to high-tech firms such as Quanta Computer
Inc., and large retailers such as Costo, RT-Mart, and
Carrefour.
Why the name CupC+? The first C represents
the Vitamin C in the tea leaves used in the franchises
products, and the second C, the Vitamin C in the
fruit juices. In addition, Kao remembered that when
85C, Taiwans leading coffeehouse chain first
emerged in the market, people were curious about
the name and wanted to see what the shop offered.
She hoped the unusual name for her franchise would
do the same trick.
Zhang Chaming, founder and CEO of iPartment,
certainly believes in a winning strategy. His Web site
is one of the household names for social networking in
Taiwan and beyond, with more than 10 million people
registered on the site. Women comprise around 70
percent of its users, and it is arguably the most popular social networking service among females.
For a social networking site to be successful, it
needs to be different. When Zhang looked into the
operations of rival sites owned by Yahoo, PCHOME,
and Yam, he found that well over 70 percent of the
users were male. He and his colleagues asked themselves, Where were those females? Zhang says,
Quickly we found out that these sites lacked the elements which appealed to females. By filling the gap,
iPartment differentiates itself from its competitors.
The iPartment Web site aims to promote online
romance with a high level of security in a space free
of online pornography. The team observed that the
more popular TV shows in Taiwan were constructed
around people falling in love in an apartment-like environment, and convinced by feedback from potential users, designed the iPartment Web site with that
approach in mind. iPartment reproduces the concept
of a home, in a virtual environment where users can
rent their online apartments, find virtual roommates, and engage in activities such as home decoration, gardening, and keeping pets (or pay a fee for
home maintenance services). Zhang elaborates:
We also found out that friendship for females is the key
principle they lived by [and we used that] while design-
ing the site. The iPartment team then soon repositioned

the site and designed all the possible elements to meet
the needs in the site. We set strict rules on the site when
it was out; whoever delivered messages that may pose a
danger to the rest of the users or made sexual hints were
not allowed and their accounts would be immediately
deleted if [they were] reported or censured.
iPartment focuses on white-collar female users to

differentiate itself from other highly popular social
networking sites such as QQ, which covers almost all
social groups, and Sina, which focuses only on working professionals. Narrowing the target market is important for a start-up since resources are limited. Because of the Web sites business model, the iPartment
team knew it had to concentrate on the group of
users with the potential buying power for the services
offered.
Entrepreneurs realize good ideas are a dime a
dozen, but good opportunities are few and far between. Fortunately, a great deal is now known about
the criteria, the patterns, and the requirements that
differentiate the good idea from the good opportunity. Entrepreneurs rely heavily on their own previous experiences (or their frustrations as customers) to
come up with their breakthrough opportunities. Kurt
Bauer, for instance, had no prior business training or
experience before he headed for Eastern Europe in
1990 on a Fulbright Scholarship to work on privatization in Poland and Russia. In fact, he postponed his
acceptances to top medical schools in order to go
east. He was so impressed with the seemingly endless
stream of new business opportunities in the old eastern bloc countries that upon his return two years
later, he decided to go to business school and try to
figure out how to recognize and pursue the best of
these opportunities. We will study his venture here
from its roots and conception, to business plan development, to fund-raising and launch. Kurt and his
brother John, and their venture, are a classic example
of a pattern of opportunity obsession.
Throughout this text, we will examine in great detail
how entrepreneurs and investors are opportunity obsessed. We will see their ingenious, as well as straightforward, ways and patterns of creating, shaping, molding, and recognizing opportunities that are not just
good ideas, and then transforming these caterpillars
into butterflies. These practices, strategies, and
habits are part of the entrepreneurial mind-set and
are skills and know-how that are learnable and acquirable.
The entrepreneurs credo is to think opportunity
first and cash last. Time and againeven after harvesting a highly successful venturelead entrepreneurs will start up another company. They possess all
the money and material wealth anyone would ever
hope for, yet it is not enough. Like the artist, scientist,
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athlete, or musician who, at great personal sacrifice,

strives for yet another breakthrough discovery, new
record, or masterpiece, the greatest entrepreneurs
are similarly obsessed with what they believe is the
next breakthrough opportunity.
Having created and run a very popular bulletin
board system in Taiwans growing Internet community,
Wretch.cc founder Mr. Chien and his partners decided to launch a similar Web site with improved features based on the Wretch brand name and user base.
This move was inspired by Chiens observation that the
Taiwanese were sharing comments and images over
email and MSN, which were rather inconvenient
modes of transfer. He also noted the growing popularity of Flickr and TaipeiLink among the Taiwanese, and
the lack of improvement in the latters performance
even when the number of its users surged. In addition,
Chien and his team discovered that the Taiwanese
were not very fond of using foreign Web sites to share
information as these tended to require some technical
skill and software knowledge on the users part. Aware
of the IT advancements in the Web 2.0 era, Chien felt
that software engineers should make blogging easy
even for users with limited IT know-how. Chien and
his team designed a prototype of the Asian blog, in
which images were as much the focus as text was. This
was a radical shift away from blogs created by Westerners, which were mostly literature-heavy. In 2003,
the Wretch team created the new Web site, which was
visited mainly by Tawanese university students, and
which offered highly customized options, such as
background features and music.
Next, we cite an example from China, where Taiwanese business couple Yang Ging Fa and Ging Mei
Yiang have made a name for their restaurant franchise, Liangan Coffee, with its unique concept of
serving high-quality Western food in Chinese-style
crockery, and in a Chinese-style ambience. One of the
hottest items on the menu is the Liangan Buffett
Beef, featuring beef that is dried, then baked. The
idea for this dish originated from a BusinessWeek interview with Warren Buffett, in which he mentioned
that he liked beef cooked this way. Soon after the interview was televised, Liangans owners introduced
the item to its menu. They had foreseen how a powerful recommendation by a world celebrity would influence consumer behavior in China.
Entrepreneurs think big enough about opportunities. They know that a mom-and-pop business can often be more exhausting and stressful, and much less
rewarding, than a high-potential business. Their opportunity mind-set is how to create it, shape it, mold it,
13
14
45
or fix it so that the customer/end user will respond,

Wow! Their thinking habits focus on what can go
right herewhat and how can we change the product
or service to make it go right? What do we have to
offer to become the superior, dominant product or
service?
Tolerance of Risk, Ambiguity, and Uncertainty Because high rates of change and high levels of risk, ambiguity, and uncertainty are almost a
given, successful entrepreneurs tolerate risk, ambiguity, and uncertainty. They manage paradoxes and contradictions.
Entrepreneurs risk money, but they also risk reputation. Successful entrepreneurs are not gamblers; they
take calculated risks. Like the parachutist, they are willing to take a risk; however, in deciding to do so, they calculate the risk carefully and thoroughly and do everything possible to get the odds in their favor. Entrepreneurs get others to share inherent financial and
business risks with them. Partners put up money and
put their reputations on the line, and investors do likewise. Creditors also join the party, as do customers who
advance payments and suppliers who advance credit.
For example, one researcher studied three very successful entrepreneurs in California who initiated and
orchestrated actions that had risk consequences.13 It
was found that while they shunned risk, they sustained
their courage by the clarity and optimism with which
they saw the future. They limited the risks they initiated
by carefully defining and strategizing their ends and by
controlling and monitoring their meansand by tailoring them both to what they saw the future to be. Further, they managed risk by transferring it to others.
In 1990 John B. Miner proposed his concept of
motivationorganizational fit, within which he contrasted a hierarchic (managerial) role with a task (entrepreneurial) role.14 This study of motivational patterns showed that those who are task oriented (i.e.,
entrepreneurs) opt for the following roles because of
the corresponding motivations:
Role
Motivation
1. Individual achievement.
A desire to achieve through ones

own efforts and to attribute
success to personal causation.
A desire to avoid risk and leave
little to chance.
A desire for feedback.
A desire to introduce innovative
solutions.
A desire to think about the future
and anticipate future possibilities.
2. Risk avoidance.
3. Seeking results of behavior.
4. Personal innovation.
5. Planning and
setting goals.
D. Mitton, No Money, Know-How, Know-Who: Formula for Managing Venture Success and Personal Wealth, Frontiers of Entrepreneurship Research: 1984,
ed. J. A. Hornaday et al. (Babson Park, MA: Babson College, 1984), p. 427.
J. B. Miner, Entrepreneurs, High-Growth Entrepreneurs, and Managers: Contrasting and Overlapping Motivational Patterns, Journal of Business Venturing
5, p. 224.
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Entrepreneurs also tolerate ambiguity and uncertainty and are comfortable with conflict. Ask someone
working in a large company how sure they are about
receiving a paycheck this month, in two months, in six
months, and next year. Invariably they will say that it is
virtually certain and will muse at the question. Startup entrepreneurs face just the opposite situation:
There may be no revenue at the beginning, and if
there is, a 90-day backlog in orders would be quite an
exception. To make matters worse, lack of organization, structure, and order is a way of life. Constant
changes introduce ambiguity and stress into every
part of the enterprise. Jobs are undefined and changing continually, customers are new, coworkers are
new, and setbacks and surprises are inevitable. And
there never seems to be enough time.
Successful entrepreneurs maximize the good
higher-performance results of stress and minimize
the negative reactions of exhaustion and frustration.
Two surveys have suggested that very high levels of
both satisfaction and stress characterize founders, to
a greater degree than managers, regardless of the
success of their ventures.15
Creativity, Self-Reliance, and Adaptability
The high levels of uncertainty and very rapid rates of
change that characterize new ventures require fluid
and highly adaptive forms of organization that can respond quickly and effectively.
Successful entrepreneurs believe in themselves.
They believe that their accomplishments (and setbacks) lie within their own control and influence and
that they can affect the outcome. Successful entrepreneurs have the ability to see and sweat the details
and also to conceptualize (i.e., they have helicopter
minds). They are dissatisfied with the status quo and
are restless initiators.
The entrepreneur has historically been viewed as
an independent, highly self-reliant innovator and the
champion (and occasional villain) of the free enterprise economy. More modern research and investigation have refined the agreement among researchers
and practitioners alike that effective entrepreneurs
actively seek and take initiative. They willingly put
themselves in situations where they are personally responsible for the success or failure of the operation.
They like to take the initiative to solve a problem or
fill a vacuum where no leadership exists. They also
like situations where personal impact on problems
can be measured. Again, this is the action-oriented
nature of the entrepreneur expressing itself.
Successful entrepreneurs are adaptive and resilient. They have an insatiable desire to know how
well they are performing. They realize that to know
15
16
how well they are doing and how to improve their

performance, they need to actively seek and use
feedback. Seeking and using feedback is also central
to the habit of learning from mistakes and setbacks,
and of responding to the unexpected. For the same
reasons, these entrepreneurs often are described as
excellent listeners and quick learners.
Entrepreneurs are not afraid of failing; rather, they
are more intent on succeeding, counting on the fact
that success covers a multitude of blunders,16 as
George Bernard Shaw eloquently stated. People who
fear failure will neutralize whatever achievement motivation they may possess. They will tend to engage in
a very easy task, where there is little chance of failure,
or in a very difficult situation, where they cannot be
held personally responsible if they do not succeed.
Further, successful entrepreneurs learn from failure experiences. They better understand not only
their roles but also the roles of others in causing the
failure, and thus they are able to avoid similar problems in the future. There is an old saying to the effect
that the cowboy who has never been thrown from a
horse undoubtedly has not ridden too many! The iterative, trial-and-error nature of becoming a successful
entrepreneur makes serious setbacks and disappointments an integral part of the learning process.
Motivation to Excel Successful entrepreneurs
are motivated to excel. Entrepreneurs are selfstarters who appear driven internally by a strong
desire to compete against their own self-imposed
standards and to pursue and attain challenging goals.
This need to achieve has been well established in the
literature on entrepreneurs since the pioneering
work of McClelland and Atkinson on motivation in
the 1950s and 1960s. Seeking out the challenge
inherent in a start-up and responding in a positive
way, noted by the distinguished entrepreneurs mentioned earlier, is achievement motivation in action.
Conversely, these entrepreneurs have a low need
for status and power, and they derive personal motivation from the challenge and excitement of creating
and building enterprises. They are driven by a thirst
for achievement, rather than by status and power.
Ironically, their accomplishments, especially if they
are very successful, give them power. But it is important to recognize that power and status are a result of
their activities. Setting high but attainable goals
enables entrepreneurs to focus their energies, be selective in sorting out opportunities, and know what to
say no to. Having goals and direction also helps define
priorities and provides measures of how well they are
performing. Possessing an objective way of keeping
score, such as changes in profits, sales, or stock price,
E. A. Fagonson, Personal Value Systems of Men and Women Entrepreneurs versus Managers, Journal of Business Venturing, 1993.
Cited in R. Little, How to Lose $100,000,000 and Other Valuable Advice (Boston: Little, Brown, 1979), p. 72.
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failure of their ventures. They believe they personally

can affect the outcome. This attribute is also consistent with achievement motivation, which is the desire
to take personal responsibility, and self-confidence.
This veridical awareness often is accompanied by
other valuable entrepreneurial traitsperspective
and a sense of humor. The ability to retain a sense of
perspective, and to know thyself in both strengths
and weaknesses, makes it possible for an entrepreneur to laugh, to ease tensions, and to get an unfavorable situation set in a more profitable direction.
is also important. Thus money is seen as a tool and a

way of keeping score, rather than the object of the
game by itself.
Successful entrepreneurs insist on the highest personal standards of integrity and reliability. They do
what they say they are going to do, and they pull for
the long haul. These high personal standards are the
glue and fiber that bind successful personal and business relationships and make them endure.
A study involving 130 members of the Small
Company Management Program at Harvard Business School confirmed how important this issue is.
Most simply said it was the single most important
factor in their long-term success.17
The best entrepreneurs have a keen awareness of
their own strengths and weaknesses and those of their
partners and of the competitive and other environments surrounding and influencing them. They are
coldly realistic about what they can and cannot do and
do not delude themselves; that is, they have veridical
awareness or optimistic realism. It also is worth
noting that successful entrepreneurs believe in themselves. They do not believe that fate, luck, or other
powerful, external forces will govern the success or
Entrepreneurial Reasoning: The

Entrepreneurial Mind in Action
How do successful entrepreneurs think, what actions
do they initiate, and how do they start and build businesses? By understanding the attitudes, behaviors,
management competencies, experience, and knowhow that contribute to entrepreneurial success, one
has some useful benchmarks for gauging what to do.
Exhibit 2.7 examines the role of opportunity in entrepreneurship.
EXHIBIT 2.7
Opportunity KnocksOr Does It Hide? An Examination
of the Role of Opportunity Recognition in Entrepreneurship
Number (and Proportion) of Opportunities of Various Sources and Types
Sources of Opportunities
Prior work
Prior employment
Prior consulting work
Prior business
Network
Social contact
Business contact
Thinking by analogy
Partner
Types of Opportunities
Niche expansion/
underserved niche
Customer need
Own firms need
Better technology
Entrepreneurs
67
36
11
20
25
7
18
13
10
(58.3%)
(21.7%)
(11.3%)
(8.7%)
Entrepreneurs
Nonentrepreneurs
13 (48.2%)
6
4
2
8 (29.6%)
6
2
6 (22.2%)
Nonentrepreneurs
29 (25.2%)
7 (29.2%)
34 (29.6%)
6 (5.2%)
46 (40.0%)
6 (25.0%)
1 (4.2%)
10 (41.7%)
Source: Charlene, Zeitsma, Opportunity KnocksOr Does it Hide? An Examination of the Role of
Opportunity Recognition in Entrepreneurship. In P. D. Reynolds, et al., eds., Frontiers of Entrepreneurship Research: 1999, Babson Park, MA: Babson College. Used by permission of the author.
Note: Numbers equal total people in the sample allocated to each category. Numbers in
parentheses equal percentage of total surveyed.
17
47
W. H. Stewart, Jr., W. E. Watson, J. C. Carland, and J. W. Carland, A Comparison of Entrepreneurs, Small Business Owners, and Corporate Managers,
Journal of Business Venturing 14, no. 2 (1999).
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EXHIBIT 2.8
Who Is the Entrepreneur?
High
Inventor
Entrepreneur
Promoter
Manager,
administrator
Creativity
and
innovation
High
Low
General management skills, business know-how, and networks
Successful entrepreneurs have a wide range of personality types. Most research about entrepreneurs has
focused on the influences of genes, family, education,
career experience, and so forth, but no psychological
model has been supported. Studies have shown that
an entrepreneur does not need specific inherent
traits, but rather a set of acquired skills.18 Perhaps one
Price-Babson College fellow phrased it best when he
said, One does not want to overdo the personality
stuff, but there is a certain ring to it.19
There is no evidence of an ideal entrepreneurial
personality. Great entrepreneurs can be either gregarious or low-key, analytical or intuitive, charismatic or
boring, good with details or terrible, delegators or
control freaks. What you need is a capacity to execute
in certain key ways.20 Successful entrepreneurs share
common attitudes and behaviors. They work hard and
are driven by an intense commitment and determined
perseverance; they see the cup half full, rather than
half empty; they strive for integrity; they thrive on the
competitive desire to excel and win; they are dissatisfied with the status quo and seek opportunities to improve almost any situation they encounter; they use
failure as a tool for learning and eschew perfection in
favor of effectiveness; and they believe they can personally make an enormous difference in the final outcome of their ventures and their lives.
Those who have succeeded speak of these attitudes and behaviors time and again.21 For example,
two famous entrepreneurs have captured the intense
commitment and perseverance of entrepreneurs.
Wally Amos, famous for his chocolate chip cookies,
said, You can do anything you want to do.22 John
Johnson of Johnson Publishing Company (publisher
18
of Ebony) expressed it this way: You need to think

yourself out of a corner, meet needs, and never, never
accept no for an answer.23
Successful entrepreneurs possess not only a creative and innovative flair, but also solid management
skills, business know-how, and sufficient contacts.
Exhibit 2.8 demonstrates this relationship.
Inventors, noted for their creativity, often lack the
necessary management skills and business know-how.
Promoters usually lack serious general management
and business skills and true creativity. Managers govern, police, and ensure the smooth operation of the
status quo; their management skills, while high, are
tuned to efficiency as well, and creativity is usually
not required. Although the management skills of the
manager and the entrepreneur overlap, the manager
is more driven by conservation of resources and the
entrepreneur is more opportunity-driven.24
The Concept of Apprenticeship

Shaping and Managing an
Apprenticeship
When one looks at successful entrepreneurs, one
sees profiles of careers rich in experience. Time and
again there is a pattern among successful entrepreneurs. They have all acquired 10 or more years
of substantial experience, built contacts, garnered
the know-how, and established a track record in
the industry, market, and technology niche within
which they eventually launch, acquire, or build a
business. Frequently they have acquired intimate
knowledge of the customer, distribution channels,
W. Lee, What Successful Entrepreneurs Really Do, Lee Communications, 2001.

Comment made during a presentation at the June 1987 Price-Babson College Fellows Program by Jerry W. Gustafson, Coleman-Fannie May Candies Professor of Entrepreneurship, Beloit College, at Babson College.
20
Lee, What Successful Entrepreneurs Really Do, Lee Communications, 2001.
21
See the excellent summary of a study of the first 21 inductees into Babson Colleges Academy of Distinguished Entrepreneurs by J. A. Hornaday and
N. Tieken, Capturing Twenty-One Heffalumps, in Frontiers of Entrepreneurship Research: 1983, pp. 23, 50.
22
Made during a speech at his induction in 1982 into the Academy of Distinguished Entrepreneurs, Babson College.
23
Made during a speech at his induction in 1979 into the Academy of Distinguished Entrepreneurs, Babson College.
24
Timmons, Muzyka, Stevenson, and Bygrave, Opportunity Recognition: The Core of Entrepreneurship, pp. 4249.
19
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and market through direct sales and marketing experience. The more successful ones have made
money for their employer before doing it for themselves. Consider the following examples:
Ren Zhengfei joined the Peoples Liberation
Army of China to work as a military technologist upon graduation. Ren was an eager learner,
and he became a specialist in the field of
telecommunications. In 1978, after leading several successful telecommunications projects, he
was elected as the military delegate to attend
the National Science Conference. Ren left the
army after a 14-year career. In 1988, Ren
founded Hwawei Technologies. In 1992, he invented the first domestic PBX exchanger.
Hwawei Technologies is known for its strong
R&D department, and that, together with Rens
military-style management, helped the company grow to become the global power in
telecommunications infrastructure it is today.
Robin Li, founder of Baidu, graduated from the
State University of New York at Buffalo in 1994
with a master degree in computer science. He
then joined Dow Jones and Company, and developed a real-time financial information system for the online edition of The Wall Street
Journal. During this time, he also designed a
page-ranking algorithm which was awarded a
U.S. patent. In 1997, Li joined the pioneer
search engine company Infoseek, and developed
a picture algorithm for Go.com. Armed with
the experience and knowledge gained from his
previous jobs, Li went back to China and
founded Baidu with his venture capitalist friend
Eric Xu in 1999. The company has been listed
on the NASDAQ since 2005, and is now the
most widely used search engine in China.
Tens of thousands of similar examples exist. There
are always exceptions to any such pattern, but if you
want the odds in your favor, get the experience first.
Successful entrepreneurs are likely to be older and to
have at least 8 to 10 years of experience. They are
likely to have accumulated enough net worth to contribute to funding the venture or to have a track
record impressive enough to give investors and creditors the necessary confidence. Finally, they usually
have found and nurtured relevant business and other
contacts and networks that ultimately contribute to
the success of their ventures.
The first 10 or so years after leaving school can
make or break an entrepreneurs career in terms of
how well he or she is prepared for serious entrepre25
49
neuring. Evidence suggests that the most durable entrepreneurial careers, those found to last 25 years or
more, were begun across a broad age spectrum, but
after the person selected prior work or a career to
prepare specifically for an entrepreneurial career.
Having relevant experience, know-how, attitudes,
behaviors, and skills appropriate for a particular venture opportunity can dramatically improve the odds
for success. The other side of the coin is that if an entrepreneur does not have these, then he or she will
have to learn them while launching and growing the
business. The tuition for such an approach is often
greater than most entrepreneurs can afford.
Since entrepreneurs frequently evolve from an entrepreneurial heritage or are shaped and nurtured by
their closeness to entrepreneurs and others, the concept of an apprenticeship can be a useful one. Much
of what an entrepreneur needs to know about entrepreneuring comes from learning by doing. Knowing
what to prepare for, where the windows for acquiring
the relevant exposure lie, how to anticipate these,
where to position oneself, and when to move on can
be quite useful.
As Howard Stevenson of the Harvard Business
School has often reminded us when teaching in the
Price-Babson College Fellows Program, and elsewhere:
You have to approach the world as an equal. There is no
such thing as being supplicant. You are trying to work
and create a better solution by creating action among a
series of people who are relatively equal. We destroy
potential entrepreneurs by putting them in a velvetlined rut, by giving them jobs that pay too much, and by
telling them they are too good, before they get adequate
intelligence, experience, and responsibility.
Windows of Apprenticeship
Exhibit 2.9 summarizes the key elements of an apprenticeship and experience curve and relates these
to age windows.25 Age windows are especially important because of the inevitable time it takes to create
and build a successful activity, whether it is a new
venture or within another organization.
There is a saying in the venture capital business
that the lemons, or losers, in a portfolio ripen in
about two and one-half years and that the pearls, or
winners, usually take seven or eight years to come to
fruition. Therefore, seven years is a realistic time
frame to expect to grow a higher-potential business to
a point where a capital gain can be realized. Interestingly, presidents of large corporations, presidents of
colleges, and self-employed professionals often de-
The authors wish to acknowledge the contributions to this thinking by Harvey Chet Krentzman, entrepreneur, lecturer, author, and nurturer of at least three
dozen growth-minded ventures over the past 20 years.
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EXHIBIT 2.9
Windows of Entrepreneurial Apprenticeship
Age
Elements of the Apprenticeship
and Experience Curve
1. Relevant business experience
2. Management skills and
know-how
3. Entrepreneurial goals
and commitment
4. Drive and energy
5. Wisdom and judgment
6. Focus of apprenticeship
7. Dominant life-stage issues*
20s
30s
40s
50s
Low
Low to moderate
Moderate to high
Moderate to high
Higher
High
Highest
High
Varies widely
Focused high
High
High
Highest
Lowest
Discussing what you
enjoy; key is learning
business, sales,
marketing; profit and
loss responsibility
Realizing your dream
of adolescence and
young adulthood
High
Higher
General management
Division management
Founder
Moderate
Higher
Growing and
harvesting
Lowest
Highest
Reinvesting
Personal growth and

new directions and
ventures
Renewal,
regeneration,
reinvesting
in the system
*From The Seasons of a Mans Life by Daniel Levinson, copyright 1978 by Daniel J. Levinson. Used by permission of Alfred A. Knopf, a division
of Random House, Inc.
scribe years as the time it takes to do something significant.

The implications of this are quite provocative.
First, time is precious. Assume an entrepreneur
spends the first five years after college or graduate
school gaining relevant experience. He or she will be
25 to 30 years of age (or maybe as old as 35) when
launching a new venture. By the age of 50, there will
have been time for starting, at most, three successful
new ventures. Whats more, entrepreneurs commonly
go through false starts or even a failure at first in the
trial-and-error process of learning the entrepreneurial
ropes. As a result, the first venture may not be
launched until later (i.e., in the entrepreneurs mid- to
late 30s). This would leave time to grow the current
venture and maybe one more. (There is always the
possibility of staying with a venture and growing it to a
larger company of $50 million or more in sales.)
Reflecting on Exhibit 2.9 will reveal some other
paradoxes and dilemmas. For one thing, just when an
entrepreneurs drive, energy, and ambition are at a
peak, the necessary relevant business experience and
management skills are least developed, and those
critical elements, wisdom and judgment, are in their
infancy. Later, when an entrepreneur has gained the
necessary experience in the deep, dark canyons of
uncertainty and has thereby gained wisdom and
26
judgment, age begins to take its toll. Also, patience

and perseverance to relentlessly pursue a long-term
vision need to be balanced with the urgency and realism to make it happen. Flexibility to stick with the
moving opportunity targets and to abandon some and
shift to others is also required. However, flexibility
and the ability to act with urgency disappear as the
other commitments of life are assumed.
The Concept of Apprenticeship:

Acquiring the 50,000 Chunks
During the past several years, studies about entrepreneurs have tended to confirm what practitioners
have known all along: that some attitudes, behaviors,
and know-how can be acquired and that some of
these attributes are more desirable than others. It is
also clear that apprenticeship is a vital aspect of entrepreneurial education.
Increasingly, research studies on the career paths
of entrepreneurs and the self-employed suggest that
the role of experience and know-how is central in successful venture creation. Many successful entrepreneurs do not have prior industry experience. More
critical to the entrepreneur is the ability to gain information and act on it.26 Evidence also suggests that
success is linked to preparation and planning.27 This is
K. H. Vesper, New Venture Ideas: Dont Overlook the Experience Factor, Harvard Business Review, reprinted in Growing Concerns: Building and Managing the Smaller Business, ed. D. E. Gumpert (New York: John Wiley & Sons, 1984), pp. 2855.
27
See R. Ronstadts and H. Stevensons studies reported in Frontiers of Entrepreneurship Research: 1983.
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what getting 50,000 chunks of experience is all

about.
Although formal market research may provide
useful information, it is also important to recognize
the entrepreneurs collective, qualitative judgment
must be weighted most heavily in evaluating opportunities. One study found that entrepreneurs view
believing in the idea, and experimenting with new
venture ideas that result in both failures and successes, as the most important components of opportunity recognition.28
Most successful entrepreneurs follow a pattern of
apprenticeship, where they prepare for becoming entrepreneurs by gaining the relevant business experiences from parents who are self-employed or through
job experiences. They do not leave acquisition of
experience to accident or osmosis. As entrepreneur
Harvey Chet Krentzman has said, Know what you
know and what you dont know.
Role Models
Numerous studies show a strong connection between
the presence of role models and the emergence of
entrepreneurs. For instance, an early study showed
that more than half of those starting new businesses
had parents who owned businesses.29 Likewise, 70
percent of MIT graduates who started technology
businesses had entrepreneurial parents.30 In Asia, we
also see the importance of role models. We highlight
two examples here.
Dr. Wilber Huang, MD, founder and general
manager of Abnova, one of Taiwans most prominent
biotech companies, was heavily influenced by his ITsavvy family in his career choiceseven though he
was specializing in the vastly different field of medicine. During his clinical training, Huang was struck
by the length of time it took to manufacture a new
drug, especially when he compared this with how fast
new computer applications and models were hitting
the market. His family would share with him ideas
and concepts of running successful IT firms, and this
got him thinking about creating a platform for efficient, large-scale proteins-related applications manufacturing.
The roots of entrepreneurship in Taiwan reach
back well over a century. As a third generation entrepreneur, I am the beneficiary of this special heritage, said George Yen, one of Taiwans most famous
management gurus. Yen is the chairman of San Yang
28
51
Metal Industrial Co. Ltd., Applied Nano Technology

Science, Inc., Great Sequoia Corp., Taiwanabrator
Co. Ltd., and Taiwan Sintong Machinery Co. Ltd.
When I started my trading business in New York
City at the age of 34, I had two things going for me.
One, I was brought up in a business environment
which instilled in me a longstanding interest in business management. Two, I have an innate comfort in
risk taking,
Yens father once told him that a businessman had
to adapt to the changing times, and Yen manages his
family business with that advice in mind. Like Yen,
his granduncle is known for his successful high-risk
ventures in the business world. On one occasion, after he offered to buy out the unprofitable Far Eastern Department of a large American trading company, Yen realized that he was essentially following in
the footsteps of his granduncle. The authors summarized it this way:
Family firms spawn entrepreneurs. Older generations
provide leadership and role modeling. This phenomenon cuts across industries, firm size, and gender.
The Babson College Historically Black Colleges and

Universities Case Writing Consortium write teaching
cases featuring African American entrepreneurs. The
experiences of these black entrepreneurs are exactly
the role modeling that inspires students.
Myths and Realities

Folklore and stereotypes about entrepreneurs and
entrepreneurial success are remarkably durable,
even in these informed and sophisticated times.
More is known about the founders and the process of
entrepreneurship than ever before.
However, certain myths enjoy recurring attention
and popularity, in part because while generalities may
apply to certain types of entrepreneurs and particular
situations, the great variety of founders tends to defy
generalization. Exhibit 2.10 lists myths about entrepreneurs that have persisted and realities that are
supported by research.
Studies have indicated that 90 percent or more of
founders start their companies in the same marketplace, technology, or industry they have been working
in.31 Others have found that entrepreneurs are likely
to have role models, have 8 to 10 years of experience,
and be well educated. It also appears that successful
Successful Entrepreneurs Insights into Opportunity Recognition, G. Hills and R. Shrader, University of Illinois, Chicago, 2000.
A. Cooper and W. Dunkelberg, A New Look at Business Entry (San Mateo, CA: National Federation of Independent Businesses, March 1984).
30
Fortune, June 7, 1999.
31
A good summary of some of these studies is provided by R. H. Brockhaus, The Psychology of the Entrepreneur, in Encyclopedia of Entrepreneurship, ed.
C. Kent, D. Sexton, and K. Vesper (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, 1982), pp. 50, 55.
29
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EXHIBIT 2.10
Myths and Realities about Entrepreneurs
Myth 1Entrepreneurs are born, not made.
RealityWhile entrepreneurs are born with certain native intelligence, a flair for creating, and energy, these talents by themselves are
like unmolded clay or an unpainted canvas. The making of an entrepreneur occurs by accumulating the relevant skills, knowhow, experiences, and contacts over a period of years and includes large doses of self-development. The creative capacity to
envision and then pursue an opportunity is a direct descendant of at least 10 or more years of experience that lead to pattern
recognition.
Myth 2Anyone can start a business.
RealityEntrepreneurs who recognize the difference between an idea and an opportunity, and who think big enough, start businesses
that have a better chance of succeeding. Luck, to the extent it is involved, requires good preparation. And the easiest part is
starting. What is hardest is surviving, sustaining, and building a venture so its founders can realize a harvest. Perhaps only one
in 10 to 20 new businesses that survive five years or more results in a capital gain for the founders.
Myth 3Entrepreneurs are gamblers.
RealitySuccessful entrepreneurs take very careful, calculated risks. They try to influence the odds, often by getting others to share risk
with them and by avoiding or minimizing risks if they have the choice. Often they slice up the risk into smaller, quite digestible
pieces; only then do they commit the time or resources to determine if that piece will work. They do not deliberately seek to take
more risk or to take unnecessary risk, nor do they shy away from unavoidable risk.
Myth 4Entrepreneurs want the whole show to themselves.
RealityOwning and running the whole show effectively puts a ceiling on growth. Solo entrepreneurs usually make a living. It is
extremely difficult to grow a higher-potential venture by working single-handedly. Higher potential entrepreneurs build a team,
an organization, and a company. Besides, 100 percent of nothing is nothing, so rather than taking a large piece of the pie,
they work to make the pie bigger.
Myth 5Entrepreneurs are their own bosses and completely independent.
RealityEntrepreneurs are far from independent and have to serve many masters and constituencies, including partners, investors,
customers, suppliers, creditors, employees, families, and those involved in social and community obligations. Entrepreneurs,
however, can make free choices of whether, when, and what they care to respond to. Moreover, it is extremely difficult, and
rare, to build a business beyond $1 million to $2 million in sales single-handedly.
Myth 6Entrepreneurs work longer and harder than managers in big companies.
RealityThere is no evidence that all entrepreneurs work more than their corporate counterparts. Some do, some do not. Some actually
report that they work less.
Myth 7Entrepreneurs experience a great deal of stress and pay a high price.
RealityBeing an entrepreneur is stressful and demanding. But there is no evidence that it is any more stressful than numerous other
highly demanding professional roles, and entrepreneurs find their jobs very satisfying. They have a high sense of
accomplishment, are healthier, and are much less likely to retire than those who work for others. Three times as many
entrepreneurs as corporate managers say they plan to never retire.
Myth 8Start a business and fail and youll never raise money again.
RealityTalented and experienced entrepreneursbecause they pursue attractive opportunities and are able to attract the right people
and necessary financial and other resources to make the venture workoften head successful ventures. Further, businesses fail,
but entrepreneurs do not. Failure is often the fire that tempers the steel of an entrepreneurs learning experience and street
savvy.
Myth 9Money is the most important start-up ingredient.
RealityIf the other pieces and talents are there, the money will follow, but it does not follow that an entrepreneur will succeed if he or
she has enough money. Money is one of the least important ingredients in new venture success. Money is to the entrepreneur
what the paint and brush are to the artistan inert tool that in the right hands can create marvels.
Myth 10Entrepreneurs should be young and energetic.
RealityWhile these qualities may help, age is no barrier. The average age of entrepreneurs starting high-potential businesses is in the
mid-30s, and there are numerous examples of entrepreneurs starting businesses in their 60s. What is critical is possessing the
relevant know-how, experience, and contacts that greatly facilitate recognizing and pursuing an opportunity.
Myth 11Entrepreneurs are motivated solely by the quest for the almighty dollar.
RealityEntrepreneurs seeking high-potential ventures are more driven by building enterprises and realizing long-term capital gains than
by instant gratification through high salaries and perks. A sense of personal achievement and accomplishment, feeling in
control of their own destinies, and realizing their vision and dreams are also powerful motivators. Money is viewed as a tool
and a way of keeping score, rather than an end in itself. Entrepreneurs thrive on the thrill of the chase; and, time and again,
even after an entrepreneur has made a few million dollars or more, he or she will work on a new vision to build another
company.
(continued)
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53
(concluded)
Myths and Realities about Entrepreneurs

Myth 12Entrepreneurs seek power and control over others.
RealitySuccessful entrepreneurs are driven by the quest for responsibility, achievement, and results, rather than for power for its own
sake. They thrive on a sense of accomplishment and of outperforming the competition, rather than a personal need for power
expressed by dominating and controlling others. By virtue of their accomplishments, they may be powerful and influential, but
these are more the by-products of the entrepreneurial process than a driving force behind it.
Myth 13If an entrepreneur is talented, success will happen in a year or two.
RealityAn old maxim among venture capitalists says it all: The lemons ripen in two and a half years, but the pearls take seven or eight.
Rarely is a new business established solidly in less than three or four years.
Myth 14Any entrepreneur with a good idea can raise venture capital.
RealityOf the ventures of entrepreneurs with good ideas who seek out venture capital, only 1 to 3 out of 100 are funded.
Myth 15If an entrepreneur has enough start-up capital, he or she cant miss.
RealityThe opposite is often true; that is, too much money at the outset often creates euphoria and a spoiled-child syndrome. The
accompanying lack of discipline and impulsive spending usually lead to serious problems and failure.
Myth 16Entrepreneurs are lone wolves and cannot work with others.
RealityThe most successful entrepreneurs are leaders who build great teams and effective relationships working with peers, directors,
investors, key customers, key suppliers, and the like.
Myth 17Unless you attained 600 on your SATs or GMATs, youll never be a successful entrepreneur.
RealityEntrepreneurial IQ is a unique combination of creativity, motivation, integrity, leadership, team building, analytical ability, and
ability to deal with ambiguity and adversity.
entrepreneurs have a wide range of experiences in

products/markets and across functional areas.32 Studies also have shown that most successful entrepreneurs
start companies in their 30s. Statistics of companies
listed on the ChiNext (the Growth Enterprise
Market Board in China) show that the average age
of 92 shareholders whose equity value exceeds
RMB 1 billion is 46.
It has been found that entrepreneurs work both
more and less than their counterparts in large organizations, that they have high degrees of satisfaction
with their jobs, and that they are healthier.33 Another
study showed that nearly 21 percent of the founders
were over 40 when they embarked on their entrepreneurial career, the majority were in their 30s, and just
over one-fourth did so by the time they were 25.
What Can Be Learned?

For over 30 years, the authors have been engaged as
educators, cofounders, investors, advisors, and directors of new, higher-potential ventures. Throughout
the text are multipart cases about real, young entrepreneurs, including some of our former college and
graduate students. You will face the same situations
these aspiring entrepreneurs faced as they sought to
turn dreams into reality. The cases and text, com32
33
bined with other online resources, will enable you to

grapple with all of the conceptual, practical, financial,
and personal issues entrepreneurs encounter. This
book will help you get the odds of success in your
favor. It will focus your attention on developing
answers for the most important of these questions,
including these:
What does an entrepreneurial career take?
What is the difference between a good opportunity and just another idea?
Is the opportunity I am considering the right
opportunity for me now?
Why do some firms grow quickly to several million dollars in sales but then stumble, never
growing beyond a single-product firm?
What are the critical tasks and hurdles in seizing an opportunity and building the business?
How much money do I need and when, where,
and how can I get iton acceptable terms?
What financing sources, strategies, and mechanisms can I use from prestart, through meaningful careers in new and growing firms, and
in the early growth stage to the harvest of my
venture?
What are the minimum resources I need to
gain control over the opportunity, and how can
I do this?
Over 80 studies in this area have been reported in Frontiers of Entrepreneurship Research (Babson Park, MA: Babson College) for the years 1981 through 1997.
Stevenson, Who Are the Harvard Self-Employed? p. 233.
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Is a business plan needed? If so, what kind is

needed and how and when should I develop
one?
Who are the constituents for whom I must create or add value to achieve a positive cash flow
and to develop harvest options?
What is my venture worth and how do I negotiate what to give up?
What are the critical transitions in entrepreneurial management as a firm grows from $1
million to $5 million to $25 million in sales?
What is it that entrepreneurial leaders do differently that enables them to achieve such competitive breakthroughs and advantages,
particularly over conventional practices, but
also so-called best practices?
What are the opportunities and implications for
21st century entrepreneurs and the Internet,
clean tech, and nanosciences? How can these
be seized and financed?
What do I need to know and practice in entrepreneurial reasoning and thinking to have a
competitive edge?
What are some of the pitfalls, minefields, and
hazards I need to anticipate, prepare for, and
respond to?
What are the contacts and networks I need to
access and to develop?
Do I know what I do and do not know, and do I
know what to do about it?
How can I develop a personal entrepreneurial
game plan to acquire the experience I need to
succeed?
How critical and sensitive is the timing in each
of these areas?
Why do entrepreneurs who succeed in the long
term seek to maintain reputations for integrity
and ethical business practices?
We believe that we can significantly improve the
quality of decisions students make about entrepreneurship and thereby also improve the fit between
what they aspire to do and the requirements of the
particular opportunity. In many cases, those choices
lead to self-employment or meaningful careers in
new and growing firms and, increasingly, in large
firms that get it. In other cases, students join larger
firms whose customer base and/or suppliers are
principally the entrepreneurial sector. Still others
seek careers in the financial institutions and professional services firms that are at the vortex of the entrepreneurial economy: venture capital, private equity,
34
investment banks, commercial banks, consulting, accounting, and the like.

Our view of entrepreneurship is that it need not be
an end in itself. Rather, it is a pathway that leads to innumerable ideas and opportunities, and opens visions
of what young people can become. You will learn
skills, and how to use those skills appropriately. You
will learn how to tap your own and others creativity,
and to apply your new energy. You will learn the difference between another good idea and a serious opportunity. You will learn the power and potential of
the entrepreneurial team. You will learn how entrepreneurs finance and grow their companies, often
with ingenious bootstrapping strategies that get big
results with minimal resources. You will learn the joy
of self-sufficiency and independence. You will learn
how entrepreneurial leaders make this happen, and
give back to society. You will discover anew what it is
about entrepreneurship that gives you sustaining entrepreneurial reasoning and thinking in order to fuel
your dreams. One of the best perspectives on this
comes from Jerry Gustafson, Coleman-Fannie May
Candies Professor of Entrepreneurship and Chair,
Beloit College, Beloit, Wisconsin, who was probably
the first professor at a liberal arts college to create an
entrepreneurship course:
Entrepreneurship is important for its own sake. The
subject frames an ideal context for students to address
perennial questions concerning their identity, objectives, hopes, relation to society, and the tension between thought and action. Entrepreneurship concerns
thinking of what we are as persons. . . . Furthermore, of
its nature, entrepreneurship is about process. One cannot discuss entrepreneurship without encountering
the importance of goal setting, information gathering,
persistence, resourcefulness, and resiliency. It is not
lost on students that the behaviors and styles of entrepreneurs tend to be socially rewarded, and these are
precisely the behaviors we wish to see the students exhibit in the classroom.34
A Word of Caution: What SATs, IQ Tests,

GMATs, and Others Dont Measure
Nothing in the world can take the place of persistence.
Talent will not; nothing is more common than unsuccessful
men with talent. Genius will not; unrewarded genius is
almost a proverb. Education will not; the world is full of
educated derelicts. Persistence and determination alone
are omnipotent. The slogan Press on has solved and
solved and always will solve the problems of the human
race.
J. Gustafson, SEEing Is Not Only about Business, PULSE, 1988 (Babson Park, MA: Price-Babson College Fellows Program).
President Calvin Coolidge
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The following data about alumni whose careers were

followed for nearly 25 years has always shocked secondyear Harvard MBA students. Regardless of the measure one applies, among the very top of the class were
graduates who were both highly successful and not
very successful. At the bottom of the class were
alumni who became outrageously successful, and
others who accomplished little with their lives and exceptional education. The middle of the class achieved
all points on the continuum of success. How could
this be?
Americas brightest fared poorly in the Third International Mathematics and Science Study comparing high school seniors from 20 nations, according to
The New York Times. In a competition between the
worlds most precocious seniors, those taking physics
and advanced math, the Americans performed at the
bottom. The article noted,
After decades of agonizing over the fairness of SAT
scores, the differences between male and female mathematical skills, and gaps in IQ between various racial
and ethnic groups, the notion of intelligence and how to
measure it remains more political than scientific, and as
maddenly elusive as ever.35
In ancient China, the top scholar in the Imperial

Examination is called a zhuangyuan (
), and
zhuangyuan are highly admired throughout Chinese history. Today, people refer to students who
scored the highest points in their provincial college
entrance examinations as zhuangyuan. Being called
a zhuangyuan is still the ultimate badge of honor
for many students in China. However, results from
a study of 1,120 zhuangyuan who graduated between 1977 and 2008 were shocking; most of
these top scholars perform far below expectation in
their careers. Conversely, a study on a high-ranking
Chinese universitys outstanding alumni showed
that none of these former students were zhangyuan.
In short, there are many different kinds of intelligencea much greater bandwidth than most researchers and test architects ever imagined. The
dynamic and subtle complexities of the entrepreneurial task require its own special intelligences.
How else would one explain the enormous contradiction inherent in business and financially failed
geniuses?
One only need consider the critical skills and capacities that are at the heart of entrepreneurial leadership and achievement, yet are not measured by the
35
36
55
IQ tests, SATs, GMATs, and the like that grade and

sort young applicants with such imprecision. Consider the skills and capacities not measured by these
tests:
Leadership skills.
Interpersonal skills.
Team building and team playing.
Creativity and ingenuity.
Motivation.
Learning skills (versus knowledge).
Persistence and determination.
Values, ethics, honesty, and integrity.
Goal-setting orientation.
Self-discipline.
Frugality.
Resourcefulness.
Resiliency and capacity to handle adversity.
Ability to seek, listen, and use feedback.
Reliability.
Dependability.
Sense of humor.
It is no wonder that a number of excellent colleges and universities eliminated these measures or
placed them in a proper perspective. Obviously this
should not be construed to mean entrepreneurship
is for dummies. Quite the opposite is true. Indeed,
intelligence is a very valuable and important asset
for entrepreneurs, but by itself is woefully inadequate.
Clearly just being very smart wont help much if
one doesnt possess numerous other qualities (see
Chapter 9, The Entrepreneurial Manager and the
Team and Chapter 10, Ethical Decision Making, for
an elaboration on these other qualities). A fascinating article by Chris Argyris, Teaching Smart People
How to Learn, is well worth reading to get some
powerful insights into why it is often not the class
genius who becomes most successful.36
A Personal Strategy
An apprenticeship can be an integral part of the
process of shaping an entrepreneurial career. One
principal task is to determine what kind of entrepre-
Tests Show Nobodys Smart about Intelligence, The New York Times, March 1, 1998, p. 41.
C. Argyris, Teaching Smart People How to Learn, Harvard Business Review, MayJune 1991.
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neur a person is likely to become, based on background, experience, and drive. Through an apprenticeship, an entrepreneur can shape a strategy and
action plan to make it happen. The Crafting a Personal Entrepreneurship Strategy exercise at the end
of this chapter addresses this issue more fully. For a
quick inventory of your entrepreneurial attributes,
do the second exercise, Personal Entrepreneurial
Strategy.
Despite all the work involved in becoming an entrepreneur, the bottom line is revealing. Evidence
about careers and job satisfaction of entrepreneurs
all points to the same conclusion: If they had to do it
over again, not only would more of them become entrepreneurs again, but also they would do it sooner.37
They report higher personal satisfaction with their
lives and their careers than their managerial counterparts. Nearly three times as many say they plan
never to retire, according to Stevenson. Numerous
other studies show that the satisfaction from independence and living and working where and how
they want to is a source of great satisfaction.38 Financially, successful entrepreneurs enjoy higher incomes and a higher net worth than career managers
in large companies. In addition, the successful harvest of a company usually means a capital gain of several million dollars or more and, with it, a new array
of very attractive options and opportunities to do
whatever they choose to do with the rest of their
lives.
Entrepreneurs Creed
So much time and space would not be spent on the
entrepreneurial mind if it were just of academic interest. But they are, entrepreneurs themselves believe, in large part responsible for success. When
asked an open-ended question about what entrepreneurs believed are the most critical concepts, skills,
and know-how for running a businesstoday and
five years hencetheir answers were very revealing.
Most mentioned mental attitudes and philosophies
based on entrepreneurial attributes, rather than specific skills or organizational concepts. These answers
are gathered together in what might be called an entrepreneurs creed:
37
38
Do what gives you energyhave fun.

Figure out what can go right and make it.
Say can do rather than cannot or maybe.
Illegitimi non carborundum: tenacity and creativity will triumph.
Anything is possible if you believe you can do it.
If you dont know it cant be done, then youll
go ahead and do it.
The cup is half-full, not half-empty.
Be dissatisfied with the way things areand
look for improvement.
Do things differently.
Dont take a risk if you dont have tobut take a
calculated risk if its the right opportunity for you.
Businesses fail; successful entrepreneurs
learnbut keep the tuition low.
It is easier to beg for forgiveness than to ask for
permission in the first place.
Make opportunity and results your obsession
not money.
Money is a tool and a scorecard available to the
right people with the right opportunity at the
right time.
Making money is even more fun than spending
it.
Make heroes out of othersa team builds a
business; an individual makes a living.
Take pride in your accomplishmentsits contagious!
Sweat the details that are critical to success.
Integrity and reliability equal long-run oil and
glue.
Accept the responsibility, less than half the
credit, and more than half the blame.
Make the pie biggerdont waste time trying
to cut smaller slices.
Play for the long haulit is rarely possible to
get rich quickly.
Dont pay too muchbut dont lose it!
Only the lead dog gets a change of view.
Success is getting what you want: Happiness is
wanting what you get.
Give back.
Embrace sustainability.
Never give up.
Stevenson, Who Are the Harvard Self-Employed? pp. 23354.

R. C. Ronstadt, The Decision Not to Become an Entrepreneur, in Frontiers of Entrepreneurship Research: 1983, ed. J. A. Hornaday et al. (Babson Park,
MA: Babson College, 1983), pp. 192212; and R. C. Ronstadt, Ex-Entrepreneurs and the Decision to Start an Entrepreneurial Career, in Frontiers of
Entrepreneurship Research: 1983, pp. 43760.
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Chapter Summary
Entrepreneurs are men and women of all sizes, ages,
shapes, religions, colors, and backgrounds. There is
no single profile or psychological template.
Successful entrepreneurs share seven common
themes that describe their attitudes and ways of
thinking and acting.
Rather than being inborn, the behaviors inherent in
these seven attributes can be nurtured, learned, and
encouraged, which successful entrepreneurs model
for themselves and those with whom they work.
Entrepreneurs love competition and actually avoid risks
when they can, preferring carefully calculated risks.
Entrepreneurship can be learned; it requires an apprenticeship.
Most entrepreneurs gain the apprenticeship over 10
years or more after the age of 21 and acquire networks, skills, and the ability to recognize business
patterns.
The entrepreneurial mind-set can benefit large, established companies today just as much as smaller
firms.
Many myths and realities about entrepreneurship
provide insights for aspiring entrepreneurs.
A word of caution: IQ tests, SATs, GMATs, LSATs,
and others do not measure some of the most important entrepreneurial abilities and aptitudes.
Most successful entrepreneurs have had a personal
strategy to help them achieve their dreams and goals,
both implicitly and explicitly.
The principal task for the entrepreneur is to determine what kind of entrepreneur he or she wants to
become based on his or her attitudes, behaviors,
management competencies, experience, and so forth.
Self-assessment is the hardest thing for entrepreneurs to do; but if you dont do it, you will really get
into trouble. If you dont do it, who will?
Study Questions
1. What is the difference between a manager and a
leader?
2. Define the seven major themes that characterize
the mind-sets, attitudes, and actions of a successful
entrepreneur. Which are most important, and
why? How can they be encouraged and
developed?
3. Entrepreneurs are made, not born. Why is this so?
Do you agree, and why or why not?
4. Explain what is meant by the apprenticeship concept.

Why is it so important to young entrepreneurs?
5. What is your personal entrepreneurial strategy? How
should it change?
6. What is one persons ham is another persons poison. What does this mean?
7. Can you evaluate thoroughly your attraction to entrepreneurship?
8. Who should be an entrepreneur and who should not?
Internet Resources for Chapter 2

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Robin_Li&oldid
=421692294 Wikipedia article on Robin Li, written on
March 31, 2011 (retrieved on April 8, 2011).
http://home.baidu.com/about/management.html
(retrieved on April 8, 2011).
www.chinanews.com/cj/2010/11-16/2657828.shtml
, written on November 16, 2010 (retrieved on
April 8, 2011).
http://edu.sina.com.cn/gaokao/2009-05-14/1644199853.
shtml
, written on May 14, 2009 (retrieved on
April 8, 2011).
http://edu.people.com.cn/GB/8216/159327/159477/
9558186.html
, written on June 29, 2009 (retrieved on

April 8, 2011).
http://edu.qq.com/a/20090514/000341.htm
,
written on May 14, 2009 (retrieved on April 8, 2008).
www.benlore.com The Entrepreneurs Mind is a Web
resource that presents an array of real-life stories and
advice from successful entrepreneurs and industry experts
on the many different facets of entrepreneurship and
emerging business.
www.entrepreneurs.about.com Comprehensive
media-sponsored Web sites on small business and
entrepreneurs.
www.blackenterprise.com Black Enterprise is a business
news and investment resource aimed at African American
entrepreneurs and business owners.
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MIND STRETCHERS
Have You Considered?
1. Who can be an entrepreneur, and who cannot?
Why?
2. What do you think are the factors which have resulted
in entrepreneurship flourishing in Asia?
3. How do you personally stack up against the seven entrepreneurial mind-sets? What do you need to develop and improve?
4. If you work for a larger company, what is it doing
to attract and keep the best entrepreneurial
talent?
5. How would you describe and evaluate your own apprenticeship? What else has to happen?
6. Is Bill Gates an entrepreneur, a leader, a manager?

How can we know?
7. How will you personally define success in 5, 10, and
25 years? Why?
8. Assume that at age 40 to 50 years, you have achieved
a net worth of $25 million to $50 million in todays
dollars. So what? Then what?
9. Shi Yuzu is a serial entrepreneur. Highlight what you
feel are the attributes which have contributed to his
success.
10. Great athletic talent is not equal to a great athlete.
Why? How does this apply to entrepreneurship?
Exercise 1
Crafting a Personal
Entrepreneurial Strategy
If you dont know where youre going, any path will take you there.
From The Wizard of Oz
Crafting a personal entrepreneurial strategy can be viewed

as the personal equivalent of developing a business plan.
As with planning in other situations, the process itself is
more important than the plan.
The key is the process and discipline that put an individual in charge of evaluating and shaping choices and initiating action that makes sense, rather than letting things
just happen. Having a longer-term sense of direction can
be highly motivating. It also can be extremely helpful in determining when to say no (which is much harder than saying yes) and can temper impulsive hunches with a more
thoughtful strategic purpose. This is important because todays choices, whether or not they are thought out, become
tomorrows track record. They may end up shaping an entrepreneur in ways that he or she may not find so attractive
10 years hence and, worse, may also result in failure to obtain just those experiences needed in order to have highquality opportunities later on.
Therefore, a personal strategy can be invaluable, but it
need not be a prison sentence. It is a point of departure,
rather than a contract of indenture, and it can and will
change over time. This process of developing a personal
strategy for an entrepreneurial career is a very individual
one and, in a sense, one of self-selection.
Reasons for planning are similar to those for developing
a business plan (see Chapter 7). Planning helps an entrepreneur to manage the risks and uncertainties of the future;
helps him or her to work smarter, rather than simply harder;
keeps him or her in a future-oriented frame of mind; helps

him or her to develop and update a keener strategy by testing the sensibility of his or her ideas and approaches with
others; helps motivate; gives him or her a results orientation; helps make him or her effective in managing and
coping with what is by nature a stressful role; and so forth.
Rationalizations and reasons given for not planning,
like those that will be covered in Chapter 7, are that plans
are out of date as soon as they are finished and that no
one knows what tomorrow will bring and, therefore, it is
dangerous to commit to uncertainty. Further, the cautious,
anxious person may find that setting personal goals creates a further source of tension and pressure and a heightened fear of failure. There is also the possibility that future
or yet unknown options, which actually might be more attractive than the one chosen, may become lost or be excluded.
Commitment to a career-oriented goal, particularly for
an entrepreneur who is younger and lacks much realworld experience, can be premature. For the person who
is inclined to be a compulsive and obsessive competitor
and achiever, goal setting may add gasoline to the fire.
And, invariably, some events and environmental factors
beyond ones control may boost or sink the best-laid
plans.
Personal plans fail for the same reasons as business
plans, including frustration when the plan appears not to
work immediately and problems of changing behavior from
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an activity-oriented routine to one that is goal-oriented.

Other problems are developing plans that are based on admirable missions, such as improving performance, rather
than goals, and developing plans that fail to anticipate obstacles, and those that lack progress milestones, reviews,
and so forth.
A Conceptual Scheme for Self-Assessment

Exhibit 2.11 shows one conceptual scheme for thinking
about the self-assessment process called the Johari Window.
According to this scheme, there are two sources of information about the self: the individual and others. According to the
Johari Window, there are three areas in which individuals
can learn about themselves.
There are two potential obstacles to self-assessment efforts. First, it is hard to obtain feedback; second, it is hard
to receive and benefit from it. Everyone possesses a personal frame of reference, values, and so forth, which influence first impressions. It is, therefore, almost impossible for
an individual to obtain an unbiased view of himself or herself from someone else. Further, in most social situations,
people usually present self-images that they want to preserve, protect, and defend; and behavioral norms usually
exist that prohibit people from telling a person that he or
she is presenting a face or impression that differs from what
the person thinks is being presented. For example, most
people will not point out to a stranger during a conversation that a piece of spinach is prominently dangling from
between his or her front teeth.
The first step for an individual in self-assessment is to
generate data through observation of his or her thoughts
and actions and by getting feedback from others for the
purposes of (1) becoming aware of blind spots and (2) reinforcing or changing existing perceptions of both strengths
and weaknesses.
Once an individual has generated the necessary data,
the next steps in the self-assessment process are to study the
data generated, develop insights, and then establish apprenticeship goals to gain any learning, experience, and
so forth.
Finally, choices can be made in terms of goals and opportunities to be created or seized.
59
Crafting an Entrepreneurial Strategy

Profiling the Past
One useful way to begin the process of self-assessment and
planning is for an individual to think about his or her entrepreneurial roots (what he or she has done, his or her preferences in terms of lifestyle and work style, etc.) and couple
this with a look into the future and what he or she would
like most to be doing and how he or she would like to live.
In this regard, everyone has a personal history that has
played and will continue to play a significant role in influencing his or her values, motivations, attitudes, and behaviors. Some of this history may provide useful insight into
prior entrepreneurial inclinations, as well as into his or her
future potential fit with an entrepreneurial role. Unless an
entrepreneur is enjoying what he or she is doing for work
most of the time, when in his or her 30s, 40s, or 50s, having a great deal of money without enjoying the journey will
be a very hollow success.
Profiling the Present

It is useful to profile the present. Possession of certain personal entrepreneurial attitudes and behaviors (i.e., an entrepreneurial mind) has been linked to successful careers
in entrepreneurship. These attitudes and behaviors deal
with such factors as commitment, determination, and perseverance; the drive to achieve and grow; an orientation
toward goals; the taking of initiative and personal responsibility; and so forth.
In addition, various role demands result from the pursuit
of opportunities. These role demands are external in the
sense that they are imposed upon every entrepreneur by
the nature of entrepreneurship. As will be discussed in
Chapter 7, the external business environment is given, the
demands of a higher-potential business in terms of stress
and commitment are given, and the ethical values and integrity of key actors are given. Required as a result of the
demands, pressures, and realities of starting, owning, and
operating a substantial business are such factors as accommodation to the venture, toleration of stress, and so
forth. A realistic appraisal of entrepreneurial attitudes and
EXHIBIT 2.11
Peeling the Onion
Known to Entrepreneur and Team
Not Known to Entrepreneur and Team
Known to Prospective
Investors and Stakeholders
Area 1 Known area:

(what you see is what you get)
Area 2 Blind area: (we do not know what

we do not know, but you do)
Not Known to Prospective

Investors and Stakeholders
Area 3 Hidden area: (unsharedyou do

not know what we do, but the deal does
not get done until we find out)
Area 4 Unknown area: (no venture is

certain or risk free)
Source: J. McIntyre, I. M. Rubin, and D. A. Kolb, Organizational Psychology: Experiential Approach, 2nd ed., 1974. Adapted by permission of
Pearson Education, Inc., Upper Saddle River, NJ.
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behaviors in light of the requirements of the entrepreneurial

role is useful as part of the self-assessment process.
Also, part of any self-assessment is an assessment of
management competencies and what chunks of experience, know-how, and contacts need to be developed.
Getting Constructive Feedback

A Scottish proverb says, The greatest gift that God hath
given us is to see ourselves as others see us. One common
denominator among successful entrepreneurs is a desire to
know how they are doing and where they stand. They have
an uncanny knack for asking the right questions about their
performance at the right time. This thirst to know is driven
by a keen awareness that such feedback is vital to improving their performance and their odds for success.
Receiving feedback from others can be a most demanding experience. The following list of guidelines in receiving
feedback can help:
Feedback needs to be solicited, ideally, from those who
know the individual well (e.g., someone he or she has
worked with or for) and who can be trusted. The context in which the person is known needs to be considered. For example, a business colleague may be better
able to comment upon an individuals managerial skills
than a friend. Or a personal friend may be able to
comment on motivation or on the possible effects on the
family situation. It is helpful to chat with the person before asking him or her to provide any specific written
impressions and to indicate the specific areas he or she
can best comment upon. One way to do this is to formulate questions first. For example, the person could be
told, Ive been asking myself the following question . . .
and I would really like your impressions in that regard.
Specific comments in areas that are particularly important either personally or to the success of the venture
need to be solicited and more detail probed if the person giving feedback is not clear. A good way to check
if a statement is being understood correctly is to paraphrase the statement. The person needs to be encouraged to describe and give examples of specific
situations or behaviors that have influenced the impressions he or she has developed.
Feedback is most helpful if it is neither all positive nor
all negative, but it should be actionable.
Feedback needs to be obtained in writing so that the person can take some time to think about the issues, and so
feedback from various sources can be pulled together.
The person asking for feedback needs to be honest and
straightforward with himself or herself and with others.
Time is too precious and the road to new venture success too treacherous to clutter this activity with game
playing or hidden agendas. The person receiving feed-
back needs to avoid becoming defensive and taking

negative comments personally.
It is important to listen carefully to what is being said
and think about it. Answering, debating, or rationalizing should be avoided.
An assessment of whether the person soliciting feedback has considered all important information and has
been realistic in his or her inferences and conclusions
needs to be made.
Help needs to be requested in identifying common
threads or patterns, possible implications of self-assessment data and certain weaknesses (including alternative inferences or conclusions), and other relevant
information that is missing.
Additional feedback from others needs to be sought to
verify feedback and to supplement the data.
Reaching final conclusions or decisions needs to be left
until a later time.
Putting It All Together

Exhibit 2.12 shows the relative fit of an entrepreneur with a
venture opportunity, given his or her relevant attitudes and
behaviors and relevant general management skills, experience, know-how, and contacts, and given the role demands of the venture opportunity. A clean appraisal is almost impossible. Self-assessment just is not that simple. The
process is cumulative, and what an entrepreneur does
about weaknesses, for example, is far more important than
what the particular weaknesses might be. After all, everyone has weaknesses.
Thinking Ahead
As it is in developing business plans, goal setting is important in personal planning. Few people are effective goal
setters. Perhaps fewer than 5 percent have ever committed
their goals to writing, and perhaps fewer than 25 percent
of adults even set goals mentally.
Again, goal setting is a process, a way of dealing
with the world. Effective goal setting demands time, selfdiscipline, commitment and dedication, and practice.
Goals, once set, do not become static targets.
A number of distinct steps are involved in goal setting,
steps that are repeated over and over as conditions change:
Establishment of goals that are specific and concrete
(rather than abstract and out of focus), measurable, related to time (i.e., specific about what will be accomplished over a certain time period), realistic, and
attainable.
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EXHIBIT 2.12
Fit of the Entrepreneur and the Venture Opportunity
Attractiveness of venture opportunity
High
Potential for
singles or doubles,
but may strike out
Potential for triples

and home runs
No hat and no cattle
Big hat, no cattle
High
Low
Entrepreneur's requisites
(mind-set, know-how, and experience)
Establishment of priorities, including the identification

of conflicts and trade-offs and how these can be resolved.
Identification of potential problems and obstacles that
could prevent goals from being attained.
Specification of action steps that are to be performed
to accomplish the goal.
Indication of how results will be measured.

Establishment of milestones for reviewing progress and
tying these to specific dates on a calendar.
Identification of risks involved in meeting the goals.
Identification of help and other resources that may be
needed to obtain goals.
Periodic review of progress and revision of goals.
Exercise 2
Personal Entrepreneurial
Strategy
The exercise that follows will help you gather data, both
from yourself and from others; evaluate the data you have
collected; and craft a personal entrepreneurial strategy.
The exercise requires active participation on your part.
The estimated time to complete the exercise is 1.5 to 3
hours. Those who have completed the exercisestudents,
practicing entrepreneurs, and othersreport that the selfassessment process was worthwhile and it was also demanding. Issues addressed will require a great deal of
thought, and there are, of course, no wrong answers.
Although this is a self-assessment exercise, it is useful to
receive feedback. Whether you choose to solicit feedback
and how much, if any, of the data you have collected you
choose to share with others is your decision. The exercise

will be of value only to the extent that you are honest and
realistic in your approach.
A complex set of factors clearly goes into making someone a successful entrepreneur. No individual has all the personal qualities, managerial skills, and the like, indicated in
the exercise. And, even if an individual did possess most of
these, his or her values, preferences, and such may make
him or her a very poor risk to succeed as an entrepreneur.
The presence or absence of any single factor does not guarantee success or failure as an entrepreneur. Before proceeding, remember, it is no embarrassment to reach for the stars
and fail to reach them. It is a failure not to reach for the stars.
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Part I: Profile of the Past: Tear Out

and Complete
Name:
Date:
STEP 1
Examine Your Personal Preferences.
What gives you energy, and why? These are things from either work or leisure, or both, that give you the greatest amount of
personal satisfaction, sense of enjoyment, and energy.
Activities/Situations That Give You Energy
Reasons for Your Joy and Satisfaction
What takes away your energy, and why? These create for you the greatest amount of personal dissatisfaction, anxiety, or
discontent and take away your energy and motivation.
Activities/Situations That Sap Your Energy
Reasons for This
Rank (from the most to the least) the items you have just listed:
Gives Energy
Takes Energy
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63
In 20 to 30 years, how would you like to spend an ideal month? Include in your description your desired lifestyle, work style,
income, friends, and so forth, and a comment about what attracts you to, and what repels you about, this ideal existence.
Complete the idea generation guide in Chapter 5 and list the common attributes of the 10 businesses you wanted to enter
and the 10 businesses you did not:
AttributesWould Energize
AttributesWould Turn Off
Which of these attributes would give you energy and which would take it away, and why?
Attribute
Give or Take Energy
Reason
Complete this sentence: I would/would not like to start/acquire my own business someday because . . .
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Discuss any patterns, issues, insights, and conclusions that have emerged:
Rank the following in terms of importance to you:

Important
Location
Geography (particular area)
Community size and nature
Community involvement
Commuting distance (one way):
20 minutes or less
30 minutes or less
60 minutes or less
More than 60 minutes
Irrelevant
5
5
5
5
4
4
4
4
3
3
3
3
2
2
2
2
1
1
1
1
5
5
5
5
4
4
4
4
3
3
3
3
2
2
2
2
1
1
1
1
5
5
5
4
4
4
3
3
3
2
2
2
1
1
1
5
5
5
4
4
4
3
3
3
2
2
2
1
1
1
5
5
5
5
5
4
4
4
4
4
3
3
3
3
3
2
2
2
2
2
1
1
1
1
1
5
5
5
5
4
4
4
4
3
3
3
3
2
2
2
2
1
1
1
1
Standard of Living
Tight belt/later capital gains
Average/limited capital gains
High/no capital gains
Become very rich
5
5
5
5
4
4
4
4
3
3
3
3
2
2
2
2
1
1
1
1
Personal Development
Utilization of skill and education
Opportunity for personal growth
Contribution to society
Positioning for opportunities
Generation of significant contacts, experience, and know-how
5
5
5
5
5
4
4
4
4
4
3
3
3
3
3
2
2
2
2
2
1
1
1
1
1
Lifestyle and Work Style

Size of business:
Less than $2 million sales or under 510 employees
More than $2 million sales or 510 employees
More than $10 million sales and 4050 employees
Rate of real growth:
Fast (over 25%/year)
Moderate (10% to 15%/year)
Slow (less than 5%/year)
Workload (weekly):
Over 70 hours
55 to 60 hours
40 hours or less
Marriage
Family
Travel away from home:
More than 60%
30% to 60%
Less than 30%
None
Status and Prestige

Impact on Ecology and Environment: Sustainability
Capital Required
From you
From others
5
5
4
4
3
3
2
2
1
1
5
5
4
4
3
3
2
2
1
1
Other Considerations
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Imagine you had $1,000 with which to buy the items you ranked on the previous page. Indicate below how you would allocate the money. For example, the item that is most important should receive the greatest amount. You may spend nothing
on some items, you may spend equal amounts on some, and so forth. Once you have allocated the $1,000, rank the items
in order of importance, the most important being number 1.
Item
Share of $1,000
Rank
Location
Lifestyle and work style
Standard of living
Personal development
Status and prestige
Ecology and environment
Capital required
What are the implications of these rankings?
STEP 2
Examine Your Personal History.
List activities (1) that have provided you financial support in the past (e.g., a part-time or full-time job or your own business),
(2) that have contributed to your well-being (e.g., financing your education or a hobby), and (3) that you have done on your
own (e.g., building something).
Discuss why you became involved in each of the activities just listed and what specifically influenced each of your decisions.
Which were driven by financial necessity and which by opportunity?
Discuss what you learned about yourself, about self-employment, about managing people, and about working for money and
someone else, versus creating or seizing an opportunity, and building something from scratch.
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List and discuss your full-time work experience, including descriptions of specific tasks in which you innovated and led something, the number of people you led, whether you were successful, and so forth.
Discuss why you became involved in each of the employment situations just listed and what specifically influenced each of
your decisions.
Discuss what you learned about yourself; about creating, innovating, or originating a project, club, or business; and about
making money.
List and discuss other activities, such as sports, in which you have participated; indicate whether each activity was individual (e.g., chess or tennis) or team (e.g., football). Did you have a leadership role?
What lessons and insights emerged, and how will these apply to life as an entrepreneur?
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If you have ever been fired from or quit either a full-time or part-time job, indicate the job, why you were fired or quit, the circumstances, and what you have learned and what difference this has made regarding working for yourself or someone else.
If you changed jobs or relocated, indicate the job, why the change occurred, the circumstances, and what you have learned
from those experiences.
Among those individuals who have mentored and influenced you most, do any own and operate their own businesses or engage independently in a profession (e.g., certified public accountant)? How have these people influenced you? How do you
view them and their roles? What have you learned from them about self-employment? Include a discussion of the things that
attract or repel you, the trade-offs they have had to consider, the risks they have faced and rewards they have enjoyed, and
entry strategies that have worked for them.
If you have ever started a business of any kind or worked in a small company, list the things you liked most and those you
liked least, and why:
Like Most
Reason
Like Least
Reason
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If you have ever worked for a larger company (over 500 employees or over $50 million in sales), list the things you liked
most and those you liked least about your work, and why.
Like Most
Reason
Like Least
Reason
Part II: Profile of the Present:

Where You Are
STEP 1
Examine Your Entrepreneurial Mind.
Examine your attitudes, behaviors, and know-how. Rank yourself (on a scale of 5 to 1).
5
5
5
5
5
5
4
4
4
4
4
4
3
3
3
3
3
3
2
2
2
2
2
2
1
1
1
1
1
1
5
5
5
5
4
4
4
4
3
3
3
3
2
2
2
2
1
1
1
1
5
5
5
4
4
4
3
3
3
2
2
2
1
1
1
5
5
4
4
3
3
2
2
1
1
5
5
5
4
4
4
3
3
3
2
2
2
1
1
1
5
5
5
5
5
4
4
4
4
4
3
3
3
3
3
2
2
2
2
2
1
1
1
1
1
Strongest
Commitment and Determination
Decisiveness
Tenacity
Discipline
Persistence in solving problems
Willingness to sacrifice
Total immersion in the mission
Courage
Moral strength
Opportunity Obsession
Having knowledge of customers needs
Being market driven
Obsession with value creation and enhancement
Tolerance of Risk, Ambiguity, and Uncertainty
Risk minimizer
Risk sharer
Tolerance of uncertainty and lack of structure
Tolerance of stress and conflict
Ability to resolve problems and integrate solutions
Creativity, Self-Reliance, and Ability to Adapt
Restlessness with status quo
Ability to adapt
Lack of fear of failure
Ability to conceptualize and to sweat details
Weakest
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5
5
5
5
5
4
4
4
4
4
4
3
3
3
3
3
3
2
2
2
2
2
2
1
1
1
1
1
1
5
5
5
5
5
4
4
4
4
4
3
3
3
3
3
2
2
2
2
2
1
1
1
1
1
5
5
4
4
3
3
2
2
1
1
Strongest
Motivation to Excel
Goal and results orientation
Drive to achieve and grow (self-imposed)
Ability to be interpersonally supporting (versus competitive)
Awareness of weaknesses (and strengths)
Having perspective and sense of humor
Leadership
Being self-starter
Having internal locus of control
Having integrity and reliability
Having patience
Being team builder and hero maker
69
Weakest
Summarize your entrepreneurial strengths.
Summarize your entrepreneurial weaknesses.
STEP 2
Examine Entrepreneurial Role Requirements.
Rank where you fit in the following roles:
Strongest
Accommodation to Venture
Extent to which career and venture are no. 1 priority
Stress
The cost of accommodation
Values
Extent to which conventional values are held
Ethics and Integrity
Weakest
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Summarize your strengths and weaknesses.
STEP 3
Examine Your Management Competencies.
Rank your skills and competencies below:
Strongest
Weakest
Marketing
Market research and evaluation
Marketing planning
Product pricing
Sales management
Direct mail/catalog selling
Telemarketing
Search engine optimization
Customer service
Distribution management
Product management
New product planning
5
5
5
5
5
5
5
5
5
5
5
4
4
4
4
4
4
4
4
4
4
4
3
3
3
3
3
3
3
3
3
3
3
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
Operations/Production
Manufacturing management
Inventory control
Cost analysis and control
Quality control
Production scheduling and flow
Purchasing
Job evaluation
5
5
5
5
5
5
5
4
4
4
4
4
4
4
3
3
3
3
3
3
3
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
Finance
Accounting
Capital budgeting
Cash flow management
Credit and collection management
Managing relations with financial sources
Short-term financing
Public and private offerings
5
5
5
5
5
5
5
4
4
4
4
4
4
4
3
3
3
3
3
3
3
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
Administration
Problem solving
Communications
Planning
Decision making
Project management
Negotiating
Personnel administration
Management information systems
Computer/IT/Internet
5
5
5
5
5
5
5
5
5
4
4
4
4
4
4
4
4
4
3
3
3
3
3
3
3
3
3
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
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Strongest
71
Weakest
Interpersonal/Team
Leadership/vision/influence
Helping and coaching
Feedback
Conflict management
Teamwork and people management
5
5
5
5
5
4
4
4
4
4
3
3
3
3
3
2
2
2
2
2
1
1
1
1
1
Law
Corporations and LLCs
Contracts
Taxes
Securities and private placements
Intellectual property rights and patents
Real estate law
Bankruptcy
5
5
5
5
5
5
5
4
4
4
4
4
4
4
3
3
3
3
3
3
3
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
Unique Skills
STEP 4
Based on an Analysis of the Information Given in Steps 13, Indicate the Items You Would Add to a
Do List, Including (1) Need for External Brain Trust Advisors; (2) Board Composition; (3) Additional
Team Members; and (4) Additional Knowledge/Skills/Experience.
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Part III: Getting Constructive Feedback

Part III is an organized way for you to gather constructive feedback.
STEP 1
(Optional) Give a Copy of Your Answers to Parts I and II to the Person Designated to Evaluate Your Responses. Ask Him or Her to Answer the Following:
Have you been honest, objective, hard-nosed, and complete in evaluating your skills?
Are there any strengths and weaknesses you have inventoried incorrectly?
Are there other events or past actions that might affect this analysis and that have not been addressed?
STEP 2
Solicit Feedback.
Give one copy of the feedback form (begins on the next page) to each person who has been asked to evaluate your
responses.
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Feedback Form
Feedback for:
Prepared by:
STEP 1
Please Check the Appropriate Column Next to the Statements about the Entrepreneurial Attributes, and
Add Any Additional Comments You May Have.
Strong
Adequate
Weak
No Comment
Commitment and Determination

Decisiveness
Tenacity
Discipline
Persistence in solving problems
Willingness to sacrifice
Total immersion in the mission
S
S
S
S
S
S
A
A
A
A
A
A
W
W
W
W
W
W
NC
NC
NC
NC
NC
NC
Courage
Moral strength
S
S
A
A
W
W
NC
NC
S
S
A
A
W
W
NC
NC
Opportunity Obsession
Having knowledge of customers needs
Being market driven
Obsession with value creation and enhancement
S
S
S
A
A
A
W
W
W
NC
NC
NC
Tolerance of Risk, Ambiguity, and Uncertainty

Risk minimizer
Risk sharer
Tolerance of uncertainty and lack of structure
Tolerance of stress and conflict
Ability to resolve problems and integrate solutions
S
S
S
S
S
S
A
A
A
A
A
A
W
W
W
W
W
W
NC
NC
NC
NC
NC
NC
Creativity, Self-Reliance, and Ability to Adapt

Restlessness with status quo
Ability to adapt
Lack of fear of failure
Ability to conceptualize and to sweat details
S
S
S
S
S
A
A
A
A
A
W
W
W
W
W
NC
NC
NC
NC
NC
Motivation to Excel
Goal and results orientation
Drive to achieve and grow (self-imposed standards)
Ability to be interpersonally supportive (versus competitive)
Awareness of weaknesses (and strengths)
Having perspective and sense of humor
S
S
S
S
S
S
A
A
A
A
A
A
W
W
W
W
W
W
NC
NC
NC
NC
NC
NC
Leadership
Being self-starter
Having internal locus of control
Having integrity and reliability
Having patience
Being team builder and hero maker
S
S
S
S
S
A
A
A
A
A
W
W
W
W
W
NC
NC
NC
NC
NC

Please make any comments that you can on such additional matters as my energy, health, and emotional stability; my creativity
and innovativeness; my intelligence; my capacity to inspire; my values; and so forth.
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STEP 2
Please Check the Appropriate Column Next to the Statements about Entrepreneurial Role Requirements
to Indicate My Fit and Add Any Additional Comments You May Have.
Accommodation to venture
Stress (cost of accommodation)
Values (conventional economic and professional values of free
enterprise system)
Ethics and integrity
Strong
Adequate
Weak
No Comment
S
S
S
A
A
A
W
W
W
NC
NC
NC
NC
Additional Comments:
STEP 3
Please Check the Appropriate Column Next to the Statements about Management Competencies, and
Add Any Additional Comments You May Have.
Strong
Adequate
Weak
No Comment
S
S
S
S
S
S
A
A
A
A
A
A
W
W
W
W
W
W
NC
NC
NC
NC
NC
NC
S
S
S
S
A
A
A
A
W
W
W
W
NC
NC
NC
NC
Operations/Production
Manufacturing management
Inventory control
Cost analysis and control
Quality control
Production scheduling and flow
Purchasing
Job evaluation
S
S
S
S
S
S
S
A
A
A
A
A
A
A
W
W
W
W
W
W
W
NC
NC
NC
NC
NC
NC
NC
Finance
Accounting
Capital budgeting
Cash flow management
Credit and collection management
Managing relations with financial sources
Short-term financing
Public and private offerings
S
S
S
S
S
S
S
A
A
A
A
A
A
A
W
W
W
W
W
W
W
NC
NC
NC
NC
NC
NC
NC
Administration
Problem solving
Communications
Planning
Decision making
Project management
Negotiating
Personnel administration
Management information systems
Computer/IT/Internet
S
S
S
S
S
S
S
S
S
A
A
A
A
A
A
A
A
A
W
W
W
W
W
W
W
W
W
NC
NC
NC
NC
NC
NC
NC
NC
NC
Marketing
Market research and evaluation
Marketing planning
Product pricing
Sales management
Direct mail/catalog selling
Telemarketing
Search engine optimization
Customer service
Distribution management
Product management
New product planning
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Strong
Adequate
Weak
No Comment
Interpersonal/Team
Leadership/vision/influence
Helping and coaching
Feedback
Conflict management
Teamwork and people management
S
S
S
S
S
A
A
A
A
A
W
W
W
W
W
NC
NC
NC
NC
NC
Law
Corporations and LLCs
Contracts
Taxes
Securities and private placements
Intellectual property rights and patents
Real estate law
Bankruptcy
S
S
S
S
S
S
S
A
A
A
A
A
A
A
W
W
W
W
W
W
W
NC
NC
NC
NC
NC
NC
NC
Unique Skills
NC
Additional Comments:
STEP 4
Please Evaluate My Strengths and Weaknesses.
In what area or areas do you see my greatest potential or existing strengths in terms of the venture opportunity we have discussed, and why?
Area of Strength
Reason
In what area or areas do you see my greatest potential or existing weaknesses in terms of the venture opportunity we have
discussed, and why?
Area of Weakness
Reason
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If you know my partners and the venture opportunity, what is your evaluation of their fit with me and the fit among them?
Given the venture opportunity, what you know of my partners, and your evaluation of my weaknesses, should I consider any
additional members for my management team, my board, and my brain trust of advisors? If so, what should be their strengths
and relevant experience? Can you suggest someone?
Please make any other suggestions that would be helpful for me to consider (e.g., comments about what you see that I like
to do, my lifestyle, work style, patterns evident in my skills inventory, the implications of my particular constellation of management strengths and weaknesses and background, the time implications of an apprenticeship, or key people you think I
should meet).
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Part IV: Putting It All Together

STEP 1
Reflect on Your Previous Responses and the Feedback You Have Solicited or Have Received Informally
(from Class Discussion or from Discussions with Friends, Parents, Etc.).
STEP 2
Assess Your Entrepreneurial Strategy.
What have you concluded at this point about entrepreneurship and you?
How do the requirements of entrepreneurshipespecially the sacrifices, total immersion, heavy workload, and long-term
commitmentfit with your own aims, values, and motivations?
What specific conflicts do you anticipate between your aims and values, and the demands of entrepreneurship?
How would you compare your entrepreneurial mind, your fit with entrepreneurial role demands, your management competencies, and so forth, with those of other people you know who have pursued or are pursuing an entrepreneurial career?
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Think ahead 5 to 10 years or more, and assume that you would want to launch or acquire a higher-potential venture. What
chunks of experience and know-how do you need to accumulate?
What are the implications of this assessment of your entrepreneurial strategy in terms of whether you should proceed with
your current venture opportunity?
What is it about the specific opportunity you want to pursue that will provide you with sustained energy and motivation? How
do you know this?
At this time, given your major entrepreneurial strengths and weaknesses and your specific venture opportunity, are there other
chunks of experience and know-how you need to acquire or attract to your team? (Be specific!)
Who are the people you need to get involved with you?
What other issues or questions have been raised for you at this point that you would like answered?
What opportunities would you most want to be in a position to create/pursue in 5 to 10 years? What are the implications
for new skills, know-how, mentors, team members, and resources?
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Part V: Thinking Ahead

Part V considers the crafting of your personal entrepreneurial strategy. Remember, goals should be specific and concrete,
measurable, and, except where indicated below, realistic and attainable.
STEP 1
List, in Three Minutes, Your Goals to Be Accomplished by the Time You Are 70.
STEP 2
List, in Three Minutes, Your Goals to Be Accomplished over the Next Seven Years. (If You Are an Undergraduate, Use the Next Four Years.)
STEP 3
List, in Three Minutes, the Goals You Would Like to Accomplish If You Have Exactly One Year from Today to Live. Assume You Would Enjoy Good Health in the Interim but Would Not Be Able to Acquire Any
More Life Insurance or Borrow an Additional Large Sum of Money for a Final Fling. Assume Further
That You Could Spend That Last Year of Your Life Doing Whatever You Want to Do.
STEP 4
List, in Six Minutes, Your Real Goals and the Goals You Would Like to Accomplish over Your Lifetime.
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STEP 5
Discuss the List from Step 4 with Another Person and Then Refine and Clarify Your Goal Statements.
STEP 6
Rank Your Goals According to Priority.
STEP 7
Concentrate on the Top Three Goals and Make a List of Problems, Obstacles, Inconsistencies, and So
Forth That You Will Encounter in Trying to Reach Each of These Goals.
STEP 8
Decide and State How You Will Eliminate Any Important Problems, Obstacles, Inconsistencies, and So
Forth.
STEP 9
For Your Top Three Goals, Write Down All the Tasks or Action Steps You Need to Take to Help You Attain
Each Goal and Indicate How Results Will Be Measured.
It is helpful to organize the goals in order of priority.
Goal
Task/Action Step
Measurement
Rank
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STEP 10
Rank Tasks/Action Steps in Terms of Priority.
To identify high-priority items, it is helpful to make a copy of your list and cross off any activities or task that cannot be completed, or at least begun, in the next seven days, and then identify the single most important goal, the next most important,
and so forth.
STEP 11
Establish Dates and Durations (and, If Possible, a Place) for Tasks/Action Steps to Begin.
Organize tasks/action steps according to priority. If possible, the date should be during the next seven days.
Goal
Task/Action Step
Measurement
Rank
STEP 12
Make a List of Problems, Obstacles, Inconsistencies, and So Forth.
STEP 13
Decide How You Will Eliminate Any Important Problems, Obstacles, Inconsistencies, and So Forth, and
Adjust the List in Step 12.
STEP 14
Identify Risks Involved and Resources and Other Help Needed.
Note on setting goals: Tear out Part V, keep a copy on file, and repeat the exercise at least once a year, or when a critical
event occurs (job change, marriage, child, death in the family).
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Case
oneworld
Preparation Questions
1.
2.
3.
Describe the nature of the challenge the team faces

as they seek to build a global company. What are
the strengths and weaknesses of their model?
Describe the sale cycle of the aviation industry.
What differentiating factors can oneworld focus on?
Discuss a marketing strategy for oneworld.
The Worlds Leading Quality Global

Alliance
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
Bringing together 11 of the worlds biggest and

best airlinesand 20 affiliateswith more signed
up to join in the next two years.
Providing its customers and carriers with services
and value no airline can deliver on its own.
Offering the market-leading range of alliance fare
and sales products.
Committed to innovation to improve customer
service.
Winner of more international awards for airline
alliances than either of its competitors.
Serving an unrivalled international route networkthe only alliance with a member in South
America, Australia or Asias Middle East.
The alliance with the strongest collective profitability record.
Eleven of the Worlds Biggest and Best

Airlines
oneworld brings together some of the largest airlines in
the world, all of which have high-flying reputations for
quality service:
Iberia, the top carrier between Europe and Latin

America.
Japan Airlines, the largest airline in the Asia-Pacific

region.
LAN Airlines, the leading Latin American airline.
Malv Hungarian Airlines, one of the highest quality

carriers in Central and Eastern Europe.
Mexicana, the leading airline in Mexico and Central America.
Qantas, one of the worlds top long-distance airlines

and among Australias strongest brands.
Royal Jordanian, the first Middle East airline to find

a home with one of the global alliances.
Another 20 or so airlines are affiliate members, including:
American Eagle, one of the leading regional carriers in the USA.
Comair and Sun-Air, British Airways franchisees in

South Africa and Denmark.
Dragonair, named the Best Airline China for the

past seven years running by SkyTrax.
LAN Argentina, LAN Ecuador and LAN Peru, expanding coverage in South America.
S7 Airlines, Russias leading domestic carrier,

joined in 2010, expanding oneworlds network considerably in the Commonwealth of Independent
States.
Kingfisher Airlines, Indians leading domestic operator and only five-star airline, is on track to board in
2011.
Sharing One Vision
American Airlines, one of the biggest airlines in the

world.
British Airways, one of the leading international airlines.
Cathay Pacific Airways, one of the most highly regarded Asian airlines.
Making global travel smoother, easier, better value

and more rewarding.
Finnair, a major Nordic European airline.
Offering travel solutions beyond the reach of any

airlines individual network.
Providing a common commitment to high standards

of quality, service and safety.
This case was written by Daryl Tan of Singapore Management University, under the supervision of Yinglan Tan. Research assistance by Mike
Lee, with the kind sponsorship of Tan Wah Yuan.
To generate more value for customers, shareholders

and employees than any airline can achieve by itself,
by:
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Creating a world where customers always feel at

home, wherever their journey may take them.
A World of Difference for Customers
Delivering its airlines with savings and benefits

greater than any can achieve by itself.
oneworld enables its member airlines to offer services

beyond what any individual carrier can provide by itself
or bilaterally with another partner.
Some Vital Statistics
Global coverage: oneworld has an incomparable

route network, serving 800 destinations in nearly
150 countries. oneworld is the only alliance with a
member in South America, in Australia or in Asias
Middle East. The alliances airlines operate more
than 8,750 flights every day: that averages out at
one departure or arrival every five seconds around
the clock.
Better value: oneworld is the market leader for alliance fares and sales products, pioneering some of
the most innovative, flexible and attractively-priced
alliance fares availableand the first to sell any of
them online.
More rewards and recognition: Top-tier frequent flyers enjoy all of the privileges that their status entitles
them to, across all oneworld airlines.
More miles and points: Members of any oneworld

airlines frequent flyer programs can earn miles and
tier status points on eligible flights marketed and operated by any of the alliances carriers, and redeem
rewards across that wider network.
More lounges: Frequent flyers, depending on status,

have access to some 550 airport lounges worldwide.
Smoother transfers: Wherever possible, passengers

are checked right through to their final destination,
with oneworld staff and airport signs providing assistance in unfamiliar airports.
Superior quality: oneworld member airlines have

strong reputations for customer service excellence
and innovation. The quality of the oneworld customer journey, from lounges to in-flight products, will
help passengers arrive at their destinations fresh,
well rested, and ready to do business.
Greater support: Our airlines employ a quarter of a

million people across the globe to ensure oneworld
customers travel safely, securely and comfortably
every step of their journey.
oneworld airlines (including membership candidates S7

and Kingfisher):
Serve 800 destinations in almost 150 countries.
Carried more than 340 million passengers last year.
Operate combined fleets totalling more than 2,300

aircraft.
Offer more than 8,750 flights a dayan average

of one oneworld airline departure or arrival somewhere around the world every five seconds around
the clock.
Generate some US$100 billion in annual revenues.
Why Alliances?
The three main airline alliances, including oneworld,
now account for around two-thirds of the total world airline capacity (ASKs), with all but two of the worlds 20
biggest airlines signed up. Unaligned legacy carriers
account for around a quarter of world capacity, with
low-cost carriers accounting for the rest.
There are a number of reasons for the emergence of
alliances:
More people want to fly to more places more easily

and for greater valuebut government restrictions
and business economics make it impossible for any
one airline to serve all these markets by itself.
In the drive to reduce costs, particularly, in the recent financially difficult times for the industry, airlines can achieve substantial efficiencies through
working more closely together.
Alliances help boost airlines revenues and provide

opportunities to maintain more routes and frequencies and for growth, by feeding passengers between members networks.
Individual passengers and corporate customers are

increasingly recognizing the value and benefits
which alliance can offer them.
It will become increasingly difficult for airlines to

maintain their global market share unless they are
allied to one of the global groupings.
Competition in this industry is increasing between alliances, besides individual airlines.
An Unrivalled International Network

From Adelaide to Zurich, from Argentina to Zimbabwe,
oneworlds network reaches out to the four corners of
the earth, making it easier for travelers to reach more
places. Our member airlines together serve almost 150
countries with flights to 800 destinations, many more
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than any individual airline can offer itself. oneworld is

the only alliance with a full network in Australia and the
only alliance with any member airline in South America
or Asias Middle East.
An Extensive Range of Great Value

Fares
oneworld is the market leader for alliance fares and
sales products, pioneering some of the most innovative,
flexible and attractively priced alliance fares available,
and the first to sell any of them online. Theres something
for anyone interested in making an extensive journey
from captains of industry on a trip right around the
world to the student backpacker exploring one continent
or more.
oneworld Explorer: One of the most popular, simple, flexible, and attractively priced round-the-world
fares available in the market. Prices are based on
class of travel (Economy, Premium Economy where
available, Business, or First) and, uniquely, the number of continents visitedrather than mileage of the
overall trip. This keeps journey planning as simple
and flexible as possible, providing excellent value.
Flights can be on any of the oneworld carriers.
oneworld Explorer is the obvious choice for anyone
planning a global journey including sectors Downunder with oneworlds Qantas the only member of
a global alliance operating a full domestic network
within Australia, or in South America, with
oneworld the only alliance with a member airline
from that region. It was the first multi-airline roundthe-world fare bookable online.
Global Explorer: Another round-the-world fare, but
this time based on the distance flownand including some airlines which are not members of
oneworldincluding Aer Lingus, Air Pacific, Alaska
Airlines, Gulf Air, and some flights operated by Air
Tahiti Nui, Jetstar, South African Airlines, and Vietnam Airlines, extending the destinations covered
still further.
Visit Passes: Offering multi-sector flights on any

oneworld carrier in a specific continent and also
within Mexico and Central America, and Japan.
They offer a great value way to travel around a
region. oneworld is the only alliance to offer this
sort of pass covering all six continents. Prices are
based on the number of sectors selected and their
length.
Circle Explorer: Similar to oneworld Explorer, but

does not require travel to North or South America,
so you can fly halfway around the globe and then
back again, without actually circumnavigating the
planet (for example, London-Hong Kong-Sydney-Johannesburg-London).
Circle Pacific: Another Explorer variant, this time for

trips around the Pacific Ocean, covering Australia
and New Zealand, Asia and North and South
America (for example, Los Angeles-Tokyo-SydneyLos Angeles).
Circle Asia and South West Pacific: Covering North

East and South East Asia and the South West Pacific.
Circle Atlantic: Covering Europe and the Middle

East, North and South America.
businessflyer: Offering medium- and small-sized

corporate customers discounted fares in return for a
more regular relationship with the alliance and its
airlines. Available in Germany, France, Netherlands, Switzerland, Belgium, and now also Italy,
with more than 7,000 companies signed up
so far.
oneworld fares earn frequent flyer points and miles, and

oneworld Explorer and the Circle fares are available
for group travel. Lead-in prices from most countries, a
travel planning tool, a booking facility for oneworld
Explorer fares, and other useful information about all
these fares is available at www.oneworld.com/ow/
air-travel-options.
More Recognition for Frequent Flyers

oneworld offers more opportunities to earn and redeem
frequent flyer rewards as well as more airport lounges to
use on your travels.
Earning miles: Members of any of the oneworld airlines frequent flyer programs can earn miles or
points on eligible fares and flights marketed and operated by any oneworld airline. Eligible flights also
count towards their tier status.
Redeeming miles: Frequent flyers can also redeem

their miles or points on any flights operated by
oneworld airlines. They can be used for flights on
any individual airline in the alliance, or for journeys
involving sectors on any number of oneworld carriers, including round-the-world journeys. oneworld
is aiming to be the first alliance to enable members
of any of its frequent flyer programs to book
online reward flights throughout the alliance network.
Privileges: Top-tier members of oneworld airlines

frequent flyer programs (Emerald and Sapphire
card holders, see below) are eligible to use any of
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the almost 550 airport lounges offered by our member airlines before their oneworld flights. At many
lounges, passengers are offered refreshments, telephones and computer facilities. At some locations,
there are showers, a wider range of business services and meeting facilities.
Because oneworlds airlines all have different names
for the top three membership tiers in their frequent flyer
programs, the alliance has created a tier of names,
based on gemstones, that are common right across
oneworld:
Emerald denotes the top tier in any program.
Sapphire denotes the second tier.
Ruby denotes the third tier.
Cathay Pacific and its Dragonair affiliate carried

25 million people last year on a fleet of some 150
aircraft, serving more than 70 destinations in 30
countries.
Finnair, the national carrier of Finland, serves more

than 60 cities and 30 countries with more than 250
daily flights. The airline is currently undergoing substantial expansion in Asia, with its Helsinki hub an
ideal gateway for travel between Europe and Asia.
Iberia, the leading carrier between Europe and

Latin America. Worldwide, the Spanish flagcarrier
serves some 125 cities in 50 countries, with its
main hub at Madrid, carrying 32 million passengers in 2008.
Japan Airlines, the biggest carrier in the Asia-Pacific

region, and one of the top airlines in the world on
any count. From the groups main hubs of Tokyo
(Narita and Haneda), Osaka (Kansai and Itami),
Nagoya (Chubu and Komaki) and Okinawa
(Naha), Japan Airlines and its oneworld affiliates
operate flights to more than 80 destinations in some
25 countries and territories. JAL and its four
oneworld affiliates carried more than 52 million
passengers in the year to end March 2009.
LAN Airlines, widely recognized as Latin Americas

leading airline, serves some 70 cities in 20 countries, carrying more than 15 million passengers in
2009. LAN has as its main hubs Santiago de Chile,
Buenos Aires, Lima, Quito and Guayaquil. LAN Airlines is a oneworld member, and LAN Argentina,
LAN Ecuador, LAN Express and LAN Peru are all
oneworld affiliates.
Malv Hungarian Airlines, one of the highest quality

carriers in Central and Eastern Europe, whose Budapest base provides the alliance with one of the
best hubs in that region. It serves more than 50 destinations in 35 countries. Malv carried three million
passengers in 2008.
Mexicana, oneworlds latest recruit, which joined in

November 2009, is the leading airline in Mexico
and Central America. Together with its oneworld affiliates MexicanaClick and MexicanaLink, it serves
nearly 70 destinations in 15 countries, carrying almost 12 million passengers in 2008.
Qantas, the worlds most experienced airline and

one of Australias strongest brands. It offers an unparalleled network in its home continent. Worldwide, it serves more than 70 destinations and 15
countries. With its main base in Sydney, it carried
28 million passengers in 2008.
Royal Jordanian, the first airline from the Middle

East to find a home with any of the global airline
alliances and the first in the region to be privatised.
Its Amman base provides the alliance with one of
Membership cards issued by all oneworld airlines carry

a oneworld symbol in the appropriate colour, to ensure
these most frequent flyers always receive the recognition
and privileges to which they are entitled, no matter
which oneworld airline they are flying.
High Flying Service Standards

All members of oneworld are proud of their reputation
for high quality service and for setting standards for
the rest of the industry to follow. To ensure a consistently high level of customer service across all member
airlines, oneworld has established a set of quality
standards which are monitored regularly. They cover
areas such as check-in, lounges, boarding experience, cabin crew, meals, seat comfort, punctuality, inflight entertainment, aircraft cleanliness, and baggage
handling.
Members of oneworld comprise:
American Airlines, one of the world's largest carriers. Together with its regional affiliates, American
Eagle and AmericanConnection, it serves more than
250 cities and 50 countries, carrying 112 million
passengers in 2009 on almost 900 aircraft. It operates major hubs at Dallas/Fort Worth, Chicago
OHare, Los Angeles, Miami, and New York JFK
and LaGuardia.
British Airways, one of the worlds leading international airlines, and currently Business Traveler magazines Best Airline worldwide. With its affiliates, it
serves almost 170 airports and 80 territories, with
its main hub London Heathrow, the worlds busiest
international airport. It carried almost 35 million
people in its latest full year.
Cathay Pacific, one of the most highly regarded
Asian airlines and current holder of the Airline of
the Year award from SkyTrax, the independent airline quality organization. Based in Hong Kong,
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the best hubs for traveling around the regionthe

worlds fastest growing for air travelwhere it
serves more destinations than any other carrier. RJ
flies to more than 50 destinations in nearly 40 countries, carrying almost three million passengers in
2008.
oneworld also has some 20 affiliate members, airlines
who provide regional services in association with the
alliances members. They include American Airlines
regional affiliates American Eagle and AmericanConnection; British Airways franchisees Comair (of South
Africa) and Sun-Air (Denmark); Iberia Regional Air
Nostrum; Cathay Pacific sister Dragonair; JAL group
subsidiaries JALways, JAL Express, J-AIR and Japan
Transocean Air; LAN affiliates LAN Argentina, LAN
Ecuador, LAN Express and LAN Peru; Mexicanas
MexicanaClick and MexicanaLink; and QantasLink
carriers Airlink, Eastern Australia Airlines and Sunstate
Airlines.
S7 Airlines, Russias leading domestic airline, is a
member elect and became part of oneworld in 2010.
It serves 75 destinations in more than 35 countries.
Kingfisher Airlines, Indians leading domestic operator and only five-star airline, is on track to board in
2011. It serves 70 destinations in eight countries.
Award Winners
oneworld and its member airlines are among the most
frequent award winners in the airline industry. oneworld
itself has won more international awards for airline alliances than any of its competitors.
oneworld was named the Worlds Leading Airline Alliance for the seventh year running in the 2009 World
Travel Awards, which describes itself as the travel industrys Number One awards scheme, based on votes
cast by more than 100,000 travel agencies professionals from 200 countries. oneworld has retained this
award since it was first presented. It has also been twice
named the Worlds Best Alliance by Business Traveler
magazine.
oneworld also took the best alliance title in the
2009 Cellars in the Sky awards, for wines served in
flight.
Its partner airlines regularly gain more accolades
than members of both its competitor alliances in the industrys key award schemes. Cathay Pacific is current
holder of the Airline of the Year title awarded by SkyTrax, the independent airline quality organization,
while British Airways is Business Traveler magazines
Best Airline worldwide.
oneworld Online
The alliances Web site, www.oneworld.com, offers
a wealth of useful tools, information and download-
able brochures on key aspects of its services and

products in many languages, as well as an interactive map showing every destination and route served
by the alliances member airlines and their codeshare partners.
In December 2008, oneworld became the first alliance to sell any of its consumer fares online,
through the booking tool for oneworld Explorer
round-the-world fares. Surf its pages, and you can
check out:
Flight schedules for all oneworld member airlines,

including a full alliance timetable that is downloadable to PCs, PDAs or for printing.
Details on the alliances innovative and attractively

priced fare products, including lead-in prices
and a tool for helping plan oneworld Explorer
round-the-world journeys, along with the booking
tool.
Frequent flyer benefits.
Real-time arrival and departure information for all

flights by oneworld member airlines.
Local city information for many major destinations,

along with visa and health requirements for every
country in the world.
How to transfer between oneworld airlines at key

connecting hub airports.
Press releases, images and other media information as well as a downloadable oneworld screensaver.
Offering Better Facilities on the

Ground
oneworld member airlines operate from some of the
best airports in the world.
By working together on joint ground facilities, they
are able to create far better facilities than any of them
could justify on their own, and at better unit costs.
oneworld members have combined ticket offices, checkin facilities and lounges at some 50 airports worldwide.
In October 2009, member airlines serving London
Heathrow completed the alliances biggest yet colocation project, consolidating from across all five of the
airports terminals into just twothe GBP4.2 billion
(UD$7.6 billion) new Terminal 5 and the adjacent existing Terminal 3, which is now undergoing a massive upgrading programme.
In Madrid, all online member airlines moved into the
EUR6 billion, new Terminal 4 at the Spanish capital in
February 2006.
These two initiatives provide oneworld with worldclass, state-of-the-art facilities at the alliances two main
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European hubs. At its other main hub in the continent,

the new Helsinki airport, home of Finnair, is regularly
voted the worlds best airport for its size.
In Asia, the existing member airlines operating at
oneworld hub Tokyo Narita consolidated operations in
January 2007 alongside Japan Airlines in Terminal 2,
which has undergone a multimillion-dollar improvement
program.
The alliances existing main Asian hub, Hong Kong,
home to Cathay Pacific and Dragonair, is regularly
voted the worlds best airport.
In early 2008, oneworlds member airlines serving
Beijing and Shanghai consolidated operations in the
airports new terminals.
At oneworlds main North American hub, Dallas/
Fort Worth, the new US$1.2 billion international Terminal D opened in October 2006. Elsewhere, American
Airlines is virtually rebuilding its New York JFK and Miami terminals. LANs Santiago base is widely recognized as the best airport in South America.
In November 2007, the first airport lounges in
the world developed as a oneworld project opened
their doors at Los Angeles International Airports Tom
Bradley International Terminal. British Airways, Cathay
Pacific, and Qantas collaborated to design and develop
the facility, which includes separate lounges for First and
Business Class passengers. The lounges are also available to premium passengers flying with the alliances
other two carriers operating from the terminal
Japan Airlines and LANand oneworld Emerald or
Sapphire tier frequent flyer cardholders from any
oneworld member airline when flying on any of the alliances carriers.
Delivering Benefits To Shareholders

oneworld gives its members an additional competitive
edge, beyond what any airline can achieve individually
or bilaterally by:
Building revenue
Reducing costs
Adding shareholder value
Providing additional customer services and benefits
Spreading a members brand nameand distributionfurther
Sharing best practice
oneworlds members have benefited by billions of dollars through revenue generation and feed flowing from
their various multi-lateral and bilateral agreements, and
from cost-saving initiatives like airport co-location and
joint procurement.
Revenues from oneworld alliance activities are growing at a faster rate than revenues earned by its member
airlines from their overall passenger activities.
In 2008, oneworld earned revenues totalling some
US$850 million for its member airlines through its fare
and sales products, up 25 percent year-on-year, with
yields remaining strong.
The eight million passengers transferring in 2008
from flights by one alliance partner to another generated revenues totalling US$2.4 billion.
oneworld activities now account for one in every
US$30 of revenue earned by the alliances airlines from
passenger services, and for one customer in 30 to
board their flights.
These efforts helped oneworld maintain its position
as the airline grouping with the best financial track
record. oneworld is the only alliance whose member airlines have collectively achieved net profits in
decade since it was launchedwith oneworld
carriers combined net profits since 1999 totalling
US$8.3 billion, compared with cumulative losses by
Star members of US$3.4 billion and by SkyTeam of
US$32.6 billion.
oneworld is also the only alliance without a member
airline having to resort to court bankruptcy protection.
Managing the Alliance

oneworld was the first of the global airline alliances to
establish a central unit to drive the management of the
alliance, its future growth and customer offerings. The
oneworld Management Company (oMC) was established in Vancouver, Canada, in May 2000.
It is headed by John McCulloch, former senior executive with Cathay Pacific, reporting to the oneworld
Governing Board, comprising the chief executives of
each of the oneworld member airlines, who meet regularly to set strategic directions and review progress. The
board is currently chaired by Gerard Arpey, chairman
and chief executive of American Airlines.
Reporting to the managing partner are function
heads for Commercial, IT and Cost Reduction, Airports
and Customer Experience, Membership and Operations, and Corporate Communications.
Activity across the alliance is managed by the oMC,
in liaison with working groups drawn from executives
across all member airlines.
To help them work across their many different time
zones, they make widespread use of technology, such
as email, eRooms, and a dedicated Intranet.
Vancouver was selected as base for the team because it is possible to do business with all oneworld
members during the same working day, because it is
independent as far as oneworld carriers are concerned, because it is a handy crossover point between
Asia, North America, and Europe, and because it is a
highly cost effective city in which to operate.
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oneworlds History
2010
February
Kingfisher Airlines signs a memorandum of understanding with oneworld as its first step towards membership, subject to Indian regulatory approval.
American Airlines and Japan Airlines apply for anti-trust immunity for a joint business agreement between North America and Asia.
Japan Airlines reaffirms its membership of oneworld and its commitment to expand cooperation with its
alliance partners, after a review of its alliance strategy prompted by its overall business restructuring.
2009
December
oneworld becomes the first global airline alliance to enable corporate customers to complete contracts
electronically.
Mexicana joins oneworld, along with affiliates MexicanaClick and MexicanaLinkadding Mexico
and Central Americas leading airline to the worlds leading quality airline alliance.
Visit Mexico and Central America pass launched as oneworlds latest consumer fare.
A Spanish version of its popular round-the-world booking tool is launched, making oneworld the only
alliance offering an online booking facility in any language besides English.
oneworld is named the World's Leading Airline Alliance for the seventh year running in the World's
Travel Awardsretaining the award every year since this category was introduced.
All oneworld member airlines serving Stockholm co-locate to the airports newly expanded Terminal 5.
November
October
September
July
May
February
2008
December
oneworlds biggest airport co-location project to date is completed, with Qantas and British Airways
Australian routes transferring from Terminal 4 to Terminal 3, to operate alongside all the other alliance
carriers serving its biggest European hub, with the remainder of BAs services in the brand new Terminal 5. It brings the alliances operations together from across all five of the airports terminals into just
two.
All oneworld member airlines serving Barcelona co-locate to the airports new Terminal 1.
All oneworld member airlines serving Helsinki co-locate in the airports Terminal 2, following the opening of its extension.
Iberia and Qantas are the latest oneworld partners to code-share.
S7 Airlines, Russias leading domestic carrier, elected on board as a oneworld member designate, to
join the alliance in 2010. At the same time, the airlines network is covered by the Global Explorer
round-the-fare that features all oneworld member airlines and some selected airlines not part of the alliance.
Indias leading carrier Kingfisher Airlines starts participating in Global Explorer, the round-the-fare that
features all oneworld member airlines and some selected airlines not part of the alliance.
oneworld marks its tenth birthday with a host of initiatives:
The unveiling of a standard oneworld livery that all member airlines will adopt on a proportion of their
fleets as a symbol of their renewed commitment to the alliance.
A 10 percent cut in the price of all of oneworld consumer fares for ten weeksrepeated later in the
year. It is the first time any of the global alliances has offered this kind of special promotion across its
full range of consumer fares.
The launch of its latest consumer fareCircle Atlantic.
Online enhancements to make booking flights on all of its member airlines easier than ever before
whether they are frequent flyer award redemption flights or regular tickets. This puts oneworld on track
to be the first alliance:
To enable its airlines frequent flyer program members to book online award flights on all oneworld airlines.
With every member airline selling through its own Web site flights operated by all its global alliance
partners in conjunction with its own flights.
A chance for customers to win a pair of Business Class tickets for travel all the way around the world
on oneworlds airline members, simply by saying what services and benefits they would most like the
alliance to offer in the future.
oneworld becomes the first in the travel industry to sell multi-airline round-the-world fares online with
the launch of its Internet booking engine for oneworld Explorer. This is also the first time any alliance
fare has been sold online.
oneworld named Worlds Leading Alliance for the sixth year running in the World Travel Awards.
Affiliate LAN Ecuador gains rights to launch a domestic network within Ecuador.
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November
October
August
March
2007
December
November
September
April
March
February
January
2006
American Airlines chairman and chief executive Gerard Arpey succeeds his Qantas counterpart
Geoff Dixon as chairman of the oneworld Governing Board.
oneworld links with WestJet to launch a joint corporate sales program in Canada.
Alaska Airlines and its regional affiliate Horizon Air start participating in Global Explorer, the roundthe-world fare that features all oneworld partners and selected other airlines.
American Airlines, British Airways, Finnair, Iberia and Royal Jordanian apply for anti-trust immunity,
enabling them to work more closely together. American, British Airways and Iberia also announce
plans for a joint business agreement covering their flights between North America and Europe.
Finnair becomes the first oneworld member in Europe to decorate aircraft in a special oneworld
livery to mark the tenth anniversary of its invitation to join.
Mexicana elected a member designate, to join oneworld in 2009 along with affiliate Click
Mexicana.
LAN Argentina becomes the second airline in the alliance to decorate an aircraft in a special
oneworld livery, to mark the first anniversary of its joining.
oneworlds biggest yet airport co-location project begins with British Airways beginning its move into
the new Terminal 5 at its London Heathrow base.
oneworld voted Worlds Leading Airline Alliance for fifth year running in World Travel Awards.
Dragonair joins as an affiliate member.
First airport lounges in the world developed as a oneworld project opened their doors at Los
Angeles.
businessflyer extended to Italy, as it becomes a key target market for the alliance.
Japan Airlines, Malv and Royal Jordanian start offering oneworld services and benefits in the
alliances biggest expansion since its launch in 1999.
LAN Argentina and LAN Ecuador join as affiliates.
Aer Lingus withdraws from oneworld with its new focus on the low fare, point-to-point market no
longer in line with the alliances strategy of serving the multi-sector, premium, frequent international
traveler.
Visit Japan and Circle Asia and South West Pacific fares launched.
To mark Japan Airlines impending accession, oneworld links with the Visit Japan Campaign to
support its drive to boost tourism to Japanand JAL reveals a special oneworld livery that it will
paint on a number of its aircraft.
oneworld becomes the only alliance with a member airline in South America, as Varig leaves Star.
oneworlds member airlines consolidate operations alongside recruit Japan Airlines at its biggest
international hub Tokyo Narita in the alliances biggest co-location project to date in the Asia Pacific
region.
December
October
Dragonair elected on board as an affliate, to join in 2007.

LAN Argentina and LAN Ecuador elected on board as affiliates, to join in early 2007.
Qantas group chief executive officer Geoff Dixon becomes chairman of oneworlds Governing Board.
oneworld launches its first external advertising campaign for five years, in the key target markets of
France and Germany.
oneworld's businessflyer corporate sales product extended to Belgium.
September
oneworld member airlines serving Bangkok co-locate their operations at the citys new Suvarnabhumi
airport as it opens for business.
oneworld named Worlds Leading Airline Alliance for the fourth year running in the World Travel
Awards, which describes itself as the industrys biggest award scheme.
oneworld launches its new Web sitefeaturing an interactive map showing all the destinations and
routes its members serve.
August
July
June
Three of oneworlds most popular consumer faresthe round-the-world oneworld Explorer and two
Circle passesare opened up for group travel.
Japan Airlines elected on board. It is expected to start offering the alliances services and benefits in
early 2007.
Three of the alliances most popular faresoneworld Explorer and its two Circle ticketsare opened
up to group travel.
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February
2005
November
October
September
May
April
March
2004
December
September
July
June
March
January
2003
December
October
September
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All oneworld airlines serving Madrid move into the airport's new EUR6 billion Terminal 4 in the alliances biggest co-location activity to date.
Malv elected on board. It is expected to start offering the alliances services and benefits in early
2007.
oneworld named the worlds leading airline alliance for the third year running in the World Travel
Awards.
businessflyer extended to the Netherlands.
Japan Airlines announces it is seeking membership.
Royal Jordanian elected on board. It is expected to start offering the alliances services and benefits at
around the turn of 2006/2007.
businessflyer extended to Switzerland.
oneworld is named the worlds Best Airline Alliance for the second year running in the 2005 Business
Traveler awards.
oneworld launches a new downloadable timetable showing schedules for all its members and their
code-share partners.
oneworld becomes the only global alliance to enable customers to fly throughout its network, with multiple connections, on electronic tickets only, with the completion of interline e-ticketing links between all
its member airlines.
oneworld launches a special Web site for its Japanese-speaking customers. oneworld-jp.com is a complete replica of the alliances main Web site, but in Japanese.
Travel agents in France are the first to be offered their own dedicated oneworld Web site, supporting
the alliances sales activities in the country.
British Airways and Iberia confirm they will increase their cooperation by operating their services between London and both Madrid and Barcelona as a joint business from 1 January 2005.
oneworld named the worlds leading airline alliance for the second year running in the Worlds Travel
Awards.
Connecting between oneworld member airlines at London Heathrow, the alliances main European
hub, is made smoother and easier with the grouping co-locating facilities at the airports Flight Connections Centre.
British Airways sells its 18.25 shareholding in Qantas, but the two airlines stress their alliance remains
unaffected, with the joint services agreement governing their cooperation between Australia and Europe recently approved by the Australian regulators approved for a further five years.
oneworld launches a global frequent flyer promotion, offering up to 15,000 bonus milesits first such
promotion in five years.
The alliances Latin American partner completes the change of its name from LanChile to LAN Airlines.
British Airways and Cathay Pacific combine arrivals desks at London Heathrow Terminal 3.
American Airlines is the first airline in the world to offer interline electronic ticketing with all its global
alliance partners when Aer Lingus and Iberia are the final oneworld partners to start offering this service with the U.S. carrier.
Iberia President Fernando Conte succeeds his Finnair counterpart Keijo Suila as chairman of
oneworlds Governing Board.
Swiss International Air Lines released from its commitment to join oneworld after an agreement between the airline and established oneworld partner British Airways to drop the bilateral commercial
agreement they signed in October 2003, which was a fundamental condition of it becoming a member of the global alliance.
businessflyer extended to France.
American Airlines and British Airways extend their code-sharing to their first transatlantic routes, between the USA and the U.K. regions.
British Airways and Iberia granted the European equivalent of anti-trust immunity, enabling the partners
to deepen their cooperation.
oneworld named the Worlds Leading Airline Alliance at the tenth World Travel Awards.
American Airlines, British Airways and Cathay Pacific open a shared transfer facility at London
Heathrow Terminal 3.
American Airlines and British Airways launch code-sharing.
Cathay Pacific and Qantas launch code-sharing.
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Chapter 2
June
March
January
2002
December
November
October
September
August
June
April
March
February
January
2001
November
April
March
businessflyer sales product launched, initially in Germany, offering small- and medium-sized companies
fare discounts in return for a regular relationship with the alliances carriers.
John McCulloch succeeds Peter Buecking as oneworld managing partner.
The four oneworld airlines operating at ZurichAmerican Airlines, British Airways, Finnair, and
Iberiamove their passenger facilities into new amenities at the airport developed specially for them.
The two-letter code used to search in the travel industrys computer reservations systems for flights operated by any airline member of the oneworld alliance changes, to *O.
American Airlines and Cathay Pacific launch code-sharing.
oneworld calls for the development of a third runway at Londons Heathrow Airport in response to the
British governments request for views on the future development of air transport in the U.K.
Heads of the Engineering and Maintenance functions at each oneworld member airline agree to develop common specifications as widely as possible across their engineering and maintenance activities, to align their policies and procedures, to work together to develop and support solutions that can
be applied throughout the industry and to share best practice, enabling them to reduce costs through
bulk buying and by sharing parts between one another.
Finnair President Keijo Suila appointed chairman of oneworlds Governing Board.
British Airways and Iberia expand their code-sharing arrangements to cover their services between
their London Heathrow and Madrid and Barcelona hubs in the first phase of a wider commercial
agreement between the two airlines. This will also see them carrying out joint network planning, coordinating capacity and pricing and sharing more airport facilities to improve transfer services at
Madrid, Barcelona and London.
Qantas starts moving alongside American Airlines at Los Angeles, smoothing transfers for passengers
flying between Australia and the USA.
LanChile and Qantas link their Santiago and Sydney home bases by direct flights for the first time, with
the South American carrier flying the route three times a week, via Auckland, with its services also carrying the QF code.
oneworld named the worlds Best Airline Alliance in what is believed to be the first major award recognizing this sector of the travel industrythe 2002 Business Traveler Awards, based on a poll among
some of the worlds most frequent flyers.
Content in Spanish, Chinese, Germany, French and Portuguese added to the established English at
www.oneworld.com.
American Airlines and Finnair granted anti-trust immunity.
A series of key initiatives launched to deepen working relationships between member airlines, including a major extension of alliance activity, beyond the traditional passenger business, into the areas of
cargo, engineering and maintenance, flight operations training and revenue accounting.
Circle Explorer and Circle Trip Explorer launched.
American Airlines and Finnair become the first airlines from different continents to introduce e-ticket interlining, as oneworld becomes the first of the global alliances to commit to introducing the system
across its members.
American Airlines and LanChile expand code-sharing to another five U.S. routes.
American Airlines and Qantas expand code-sharing activities, with the number of U.S. destinations
served by AA flights with QF codes increased by around 50 percent.
Finnair and Qantas link their Helsinki and Sydney hubs with a daily code-share service over Bangkok.
Cathay Pacifics Hong Kong hub and Finnairs Helsinki base are linked for the first time, with Finnair
flights.
Chief executives of all member airlines agree to accelerate plans for deepening working relationships
between oneworld carriers.
Cathay Pacific deputy chairman and chief executive David Turnbull becomes chairman of the
oneworld Governing Board.
oneworlds network expands with the integration of the former TWA operation into American Airlines.
September
World airline industry crisis leads to a change of focusonto helping members achieve cost savings
and build revenues beyond what they could accomplish individually.
Visit Asia pass launched.
Visit Africa, Australia/New Zealand, North and South Americas passes launched.
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2000
August
June
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May
Visit Europe pass launched.

Aer Lingus and LanChile start offering oneworld services and benefits.
Canadian withdraws following its purchase by Air Canada.
Central management team starts work, based in Vancouver.
1999
December
September
1 February
oneworld adopts UNICEF as its charitable cause.

Finnair and Iberia start offering oneworld services and benefits.
oneworld is born. Founding members start offering oneworld services and benefits.
1998
September
American Airlines, British Airways, Cathay Pacific, Canadian Airlines and Qantas announce their
intention to form oneworld and launch an intensive employee communication and training program.
NOTES:
oneworld benefits are available only to passengers on scheduled flights that are both operated and marketed by a oneworld member
airline or on a oneworld member airline affiliate. Marketed means there must be a oneworld airline flight number on the ticket.
At peak periods, access to certain lounges may be restricted due to capacity constraints. Access is available on the day of departure
when the next onward flight is with a oneworld airline. Access may not apply at a limited number of lounges operated by third parties.
Access is not available to AAdvantage members travelling on solely North American itineraries.
American Airlines AAdvantage and British Airways Executive Club members can earn and redeem miles, and earn tier status credit, on
all eligible flights except:
American Airlines AAdvantage members will not earn or redeem miles or earn tier status credit on British Airways transatlantic
flights between the USA and U.K. AAdvantage miles and top-tier status credit may be earned though miles may not be redeemed
on all American Airlines code-share services operated by British Airways when the booking is made under the AA code.
British Airways Executive Club members will not earn or redeem miles or earn tier status credit on American Airlines transatlantic
flights. BA miles and tier points may be earned though miles may not be redeemed on all British Airways code-share services operated by American Airlines when the booking is made under the BA code.
Each oneworld alliance airline reserves the right to change its frequent flyer program rules, regulations, travel awards and special
offers, and to end its frequent flyer program, in accordance with its relevant frequent flyer program rules. Miles/points may be
earned only on purchased, published fares.
American Eagle, AAdvantage, AAdvantage Executive Platinum, AAdvantage Platinum and AAdvantage Gold are marks of American Airlines Inc. American Eagle is Americans regional airline affiliate.
All data in this document covers all oneworld members and members elect.
All information contained in this document is correct at time of going to press but is subject to change without notice.

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The Entrepreneurial Mind: Crafting

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