As I’ve pondered my passion for entrepreneurship I’ve decided on two things. First, I definitely need to find myself a nemesis. Someone to compete with, someone to motivate me to excel. Plus, I just love saying the word nemesis and to actually have one would be pretty nifty. Second, I’ve read many postings and articles on the phrase “Serial Entrepreneur”. I can’t locate the source of the most recent one but it tended to bother me quite a bit. It had to do with the argument that no such thing exists, and entrepreneurship is not something someone does. Well, I have to disagree.
I feel that serial entrepreneurship is as real as being called a ‘Software Engineer’, or a ‘Policeman’. Over the last 7 years I’ve worked for, or on my own, startups. I am ABSOLUTELY driven by building ideas and fostering innovation. My companies range from Real Estate and Mortgage Lending, to Food Delivery, to Digital Signage, to green concepts, travel websites and more. I don’t particularly say I’m an expert in any one of those fields, or any expert in anything for that matter, BUT, I do see a pattern developing. A pattern for taking a new idea and running with it until I’m blue in the face. Behind every failure is a success, and success is not an entitlement.
I’ve decided to coin the name Entreprovator, as long as nobody else has of course because I’ve learned my lesson on IP law. The term to me closely aligns with what a serial entrepreneur might be. An entrepreneur who is CONSTANTLY innovating, constantly working on new ideas. Maybe you take a company and build it to failure or build it to success, but you move on and work on something else because you constantly have ideas or innovation in your mind.
I seem to have 3-5 ideas in my pocket at any time that I’m working on. Some more than others, but plenty of coals in the fire. Some may call it a distraction, and I could validate that point; however, while I may be focused on one main project, I can’t just turn off the valve and stop ideas from flowing. They motivate me, they empower me, and they certainly bring in aspects to my main project that I may not have thought of. It’s important to keep that valve open. It doesn’t mean you have ‘fallbacks’ all the time or that you are not committed to your main project, although a VC might tell you otherwise, it means you are constantly striving to innovate, which provides for learning and self-betterment.
Innovation is the driving force behind the true stabilization of an economy. Without it, a lot of suffocation will occur and we will continue down a path of always doing what we’ve always done, which will always give us what we’ve always got, except for the fact that we will stare at the entreprovating people, economies and countries passing us by. Long live the entreprovator and the people committed to constant creation, and the entrepreneurs out building a new economy. Now…..about that nemesis.
