I have a healthy contempt for pretty much all modern politicians, but occasionally, they break with tradition and say something that makes sense. And so it was this week, when David Cameron suggested that entrepreneurship and enterprise should be taught and celebrated in schools.
The gist of his argument is that it’s through entrepreneurial effort that jobs and wealth are created – and I wouldn’t argue with that – but I think there’s another reason it’s important…one that is central to every one of us reaching our full potential. And it goes way beyond what being an entrepreneur normally means.
Much as it pains me to admit it, not everyone agrees with me all of the time. (in fact in my own household, nobody does – ever!) And even here, in the comparatively safe company of the people who read my books, newsletters and blogs, I get the odd protest. “That’s all well and good” they say “but not everyone is an entrepreneur. Some of us have to work for someone else for a living.”
It’s a fair comment – much of what I write here and elsewhere IS written with entrepreneurs in mind. So what about everyone else? Well here’s the thing – I reckon employees should be entrepreneurs too…or to be more accurate, employees should at least think and behave like entrepreneurs. In fact there’s no other sensible option for running your life Let me explain what I mean.
A typical employee mentality might be expressed something like this… “I’m an employee of this company, I work for them, they pay my wages. I rely on them for my wages and financial welfare. It’s up to the company to look after me and ensure that I’m trained correctly to do the job. I get paid to do a job for them, and that’s what I try to do. No more and no less. If the company don’t need me any more at some point in the future, that will be a big problem for me.. My income will disappear and I might find it difficult to get other work. There’s little I can do about that though, other than hope, I don’t have any other income, and this job is pretty much all I’m trained for. My financial destiny and lifestyle are in the companies hands.”
An employee with an entrepreneurial thought process would look at the situation very differently. “I’m managing director of my own company…Me Ltd. It has one employee…yours truly. At the moment I have a contract to hire out my companies services to a larger company in return for a regular fixed fee. I’m always looking for ways to improve on the contract I have with them, and to get a better return from it . I know that if I provide better value, the contract will probably become more lucrative. I consistently try to find new ways to increase the value I offer . This one contract doesn’t define my business though. No company should rely on one contract. I’m always open to the possibility of new projects and contracts to run alongside the existing one
Like all businesses, mine has several departments and functions which need regular attention… .finance, marketing, human resources, training to name but four. I need to keep on top of all of these if the business is to prosper. If I take my eye off any of these functions, I put the whole company at risk.
Because I only have the one employee, it’s particularly important that I manage his welfare well and train him up to be the best he can be. Without him being at his best – physically, mentally and intellectually – the business is going to suffer. It’s nobody else’s responsibility to ensure this happens. It’s my business, and it’s up to me to manage it properly.”
Can you see the huge difference between the mindset of a typical employee, and that of one with an entrepreneurial approach.? As a typical employee, you prostrate yourself at the feet of an employer and effectively say, “do as you will…my fate rests with you”. As an employee with an entrepreneurial approach, you take full responsibility and control over your own destiny. It’s little more than a change in mindset but the resultant effect on actions and outcomes is likely to be huge.
I have a suggestion for you; take a sheet of A4 paper and write ‘Your Name’ Ltd at the top. Make a list of your assets and liabilities, just like a regular company. Draw up a profit and loss account. Write out an analysis of the opportunities and challenges the enterprise faces. Be honest about any shortcomings in your ‘workforce’, and resolve to take action to plug any gaps through development and training. Look at all the departments in turn…finance, marketing, human resources, training…to see where there may be room for improvement, and then make an agreement with yourself to have regular ‘board meetings’ where progress can be assessed and monitored.
You may think I’m taking the analogy too far, but you would be wrong(!) And I know one thing for sure…if you take this approach on board, you’ll work a lot harder and more effectively for ‘Your Name’ Ltd’ than you ever would for some third party employer. When you do that, you’ll provide greater value all round, and the rewards will come harder and faster as a result.
Everyone wins, but the biggest winner of all will be you.
* My latest book ‘Why Didn’t They Tell Me? – 99 Shameless Success Secrets They Don’t Teach You At Eton, Harrow Or Even The Classiest Comprehensive’ is now published. Go to www.streetwisenews.com/why for full details.
Hi John
This is very sound advice and I heartily endorse it. I have always considered myself as a one man business and have subscribed to having several sources of income, so that I am covered if any one source dries up.
Now in my 73rd year and having sold my mail order business six years ago I continue to run a small property business.
I still look out for new ideas and opportunities
You’re so right John. I’m retired now, but always gave the people I worked for my very best. That was proved I think, when I left one position and was replaced by 5 people. That did rather make me top and think perhaps my work/life balance wasn’t quite right.
All good advice until you realise and/or experience those operations run by those who couldn’t compliment anyone other than their own precious ego. The boss at one recent place talked to staff like slaves.
If they could afford to walk away in an instant, that would be one enterprise mortally wounded!
Good Morning John,
I have been reading your items for a number of years and even bought several, sadly I’m not a millionaire yet! I can’t say that you are wrong about anything.
I have held great responsibility in the past and made millions for other people. There was one employer (He’s dead now), he was the most cynical and evil man I ever met but he was devoutly religous and tried to push his religon to anyone who would listen.
I was the works engineer and he used to go away for three months at a time and leave me in charge of his seventeen million pound factory. (Thirty years ago seventeen million was actually worth something).
In his weaker moments he would talk to me about his strategies. One of them was to pay his staff as little as he possibly could.
This had nothing to do with getting the best value for his company, his attitude was that if the staff had enough to live on they would start to get ideas above their station in life. As long as they were down trodden and practically on the bread line, they would not dare to refuse him anything.
I could write a book about him and his excess’s but nobody who needed it, could afford to buy it!
He used to say to me “Thank you David, You’ve transformed my factory!” I knew from other things he had said to me, that he believed thanks and compliments cost nothing and were frequently more effective than wages.
Maybe I’ll write the book one day but at the moment I’m still writing my world war one novel, “Zeppelition”. I’ve designed it so it can be the first in a whole series of books with a sort of WW1 James Bond lead but this central character is Lt Kevin Wellington RFC. It’s got most of the basic ingrediants, glamourous uniforms, mud and guts warfare and heroic air battles, huge class distinctions of the period, a beautiful heroine and an incredible climax when the hero explodes the vast mine buried below the mountain top chateau by crashing a stolen Zeppelin into it and brings down half a mountain on top of the enemy and of course, “They all live happily ever after.”
One day when I’ve finished it I’ll probably ask for your advice on how to find a publisher.
Good luck with your business
Dave Hodgson
making my living in the theatre and TV there was no choice but to freelance – ever! So I have always taken a keen interest in what goes on in the hoped for financial field of the web. Self employed always means you have an open mind and over the years one learns how to avoid the villains. The signs are always in the first mailing of an offer. John is not one of them I hastily add. Right now I am working with 2 and both are profitable so just keep looking and read everything that lands on the doormat, carefully – you never know!
Victor I completely agree with you about mentoring at a an early age, what a gift it would be for any young person. I wish someone would have offered me the opportunities which I offered to a person in her mid 20’s, she was made redundant from her mortgage and lettings firm so I encouraged her to start out on her own and even paid upfront for a web site and other stuff (too númerouse to mention here) with a view to taking just a very small percentage of profits as renumeration. After everything was paid for and set in motion she decided she couldn’t take the risk! Result? I’m left with a dormant lettings and mortgage company and no hope of ever getting back any ‘investment ‘ money that I so willing paid out to help this girl. I’m a 65 year old lady who first encountered this person when I started out with my property portfolio and she was became my mortgage brocker, in which capacity she was very able. There are some people one just cannot assist due to their lack of ambition and drive.
Its a sad fact of life that most young people don’t “wise up” until they get into their twenties and begin to realise a few facts of life, myself included. To have been mentored at an early age and imbued with a spirit of enterprise would have changed my life of that I am sure. And I think what is true for me would be true for many young people today.
Funnily enough, that’s exactly the subject of my new book which is published on Monday 18th November. Full details will be going out to all our customers by email over the weekend.
John
I have enjoyed your letters and opportunity offers for some years now.
So far there has been very little I could disagree with you about and I agree modern Politicians are basically a bunch of fairies.
I would like to point out that along with every other Father in the country our children think we know nothing and are probably the worst parents around. The fact you are a highly successful business man counts for nothing even though a lot of the outside world think you are great.
Sincerely
John
PS You did not write this to yourself I’m just another John
Hi John,
many views expressed about employee’s attitudes. But surprisingly no-one so far has picked up on your first sentence “… healthy contempt for … modern politicians.”
Endorsed! There are no doubt some well motivated & honest people among them but as a class they come across largely as a crowd of lying toads. Worse, far too many of them take an entrepreneurial clever- dick approach to working out their expenses, so largely a crowd of expenses- faking crooked lying toads.
Hello John,
I read your comments and books and am always open-minded. I enjoy and inwardly digest your thoughts and insights (even though I am a Lancastrian !)
I feel that since the end of WW11 successive governments have completely ‘messed things up’. Don’t get me started on manufacturing, engineering, infrastructure, social care…..
It is now up to the individual to turn things around and no government will help us but will take the credit for ‘providing the wherewithall’ for us to build the framework of tomorrow.
I apologise, this was just a rant by a cynical, sceptical old fuddy-duddy who still enjoys taking a risk and intent on making a fortune by whatever means possible.
ITs easy to say but Employers do not encourage much enrepreneurship I have found in my working (employed parts of my life)Its a great pity as idea’s make money! and its important that young people especially should be encouraged to think outside the box . This is ,after all how business evolves and moves forward or they stagnate and die . It can be something as simple as devising a new way to keep accounts or a new filing system etc but the obvious one is about designing new products to sell. A lot of employers are still old school, and want to maintain th status quo with their products or Services, but one needs to stay ahead of the game to survive, and this requires imagination and encouragement to test the water/design/advertisingetc whatever the company needs .
Well John, The Cameroon is doing it again – Talking through his fundamental orifice! He is just mouthing words that it is considered to be beneficial to his survival as P.M. Rather like his ‘promise’ to hold a referendum on the EU membership. Now, I ask you, How can an Academic even begin to understand entrepreneurship? Let alone teach the subject! They have all settled for a nice steady income and never once put their all on the line to make their business survive. Rather like the Management books that they write, all based upon theory with no practical application in support. I am biased because, with 20 years as a Management Consultant under my belt, I do have practical experience. And, yes, I have turned Companies around. I was also a Business Advisor for ‘Young Enterprise’ at Uppingham School (the private one) for eight years. You would be amazed at the business ignorance of the pupils. Even worse was the number that wished to be Accountants. Definition of an Accountant : A contraceptive on the penis of progress! I think that may be enough for now. The Cameroon is obviously desperate to continue his life as P.M., what a pity that he has no experience of real life and what it takes to earn a living.
I’m afraid it will always be the way. I doubt we’ll ever see anyone with entrepreneurial spirit enter top level politics again. The public scrutiny and accountability required today will almost certainly rule it out. Entrepreneurs aren’t much good at being answerable to anyone else or consulting on decisions.
I’m living proof that you are wrong John…I worked (attended) for British Steel for 33 years and never struck at bat….nobody ever noticed…took redundancy and all ended up very nicely!
You say that, but the state of your car would suggest otherwise! (This man is known to me)