Episode 9: Myths Part 1
There are lots and lots of myths around startups and founders, such as:
- Starting a business is highly risky – NO, NOT ALWAYS
- You have to be young to be an entrepreneur – NO
- No one has ever thought of what I’m doing – NO
In this episode, Doug and Glenn blow past all the bluster.
You won’t want to “myth” this one!
Transcript
Glenn Suart 0:00
Sometimes people do have enormous success as the first crack at it, it happens. But they might not have the discipline or the understanding for future businesses. What it took to actually… they just happen to be at the right place, at the right time, did the right things. A lot of things are trial and error, and there’s also lots of entrepreneurs who failed, failed, failed, failed, failed, and failed… finally, to have a success, and because of …they learn from all those things.
Doug Ross 0:40
Welcome to Conversations on Startups, a podcast brought to you by Douglas Ross, author of the book, Spark Click Go: How to Bring Your Creative Business Idea to Life, and Glenn Suart, of Today’s Great Idea, a radio series featuring over 300 origin stories of businesses, brands and inventions that have changed the culture. Welcome to today’s conversation.
Glenn Suart 1:03
Welcome to Conversations on Startups. I’m Glenn Suart. In Canada, I help people start businesses and have a great time. And my partner in the US, Doug, why don’t you introduce yourself.
Doug Ross 1:16
Hi, I’m Doug Ross. I’m out of Boston, Canadian living here for about.. well, coming up to 20 years, Glenn, pretty soon [wow] you know what, I’ve got the language down, so at least we’ve got that going. So, my interest is varied in the startup world. I work in a startup, and I mentor some startups, and I’ve written a book called Spark Click Go. And I just enjoy having conversations with you, Glenn, about various topics. And today, I believe we are talking about myths of entrepreneurship.
Glenn Suart 1:52
There are a lot of myths in the entrepreneurial world. And so it behooves you as an entrepreneur, starting out, or even regular one who’s been doing it forever, is to challenge those myths and go and do some research and talk to people that really is the best way of getting rid of these myths. But you know, let’s get into them right now, Doug, do you have a favorite myth that you’re really into on a regular basis?
Doug Ross 2:16
Entrepreneurs are people who like to take risks? [Interesting] And I think it’s – maybe there’s an analogy here, Glenn, two jokes – people say that often with jokes, they’re partly true. And maybe there’s a little bit of that here around entrepreneurs…these myths or at least this myth around entrepreneurialism. So this is the idea that these folks take risks that normal human beings would not take. And, you know, I think there’s at least a couple of senses with that. It’s a sense of, of recklessness, maybe with spending, for example, something like that, that I disagree with. What my experience has been, is that entrepreneurs, in many ways, work to eliminate risk. And I certainly know the area that I work in a lot – in the med tech area – that’s what you need to do to attract investors – you have to reduce risk. It’s not enough to say, oh, there’s this interesting technology, and I think it’s going to work over here. Oh, really? Show me that. Start to take the risk out of that idea, and then let’s talk.
Glenn Suart 3:36
Makes perfectsense sense. I think, you know, where this myth arises from, is, lots of anecdotal stories. And of course, I’m one of those guys who promotes these kinds of stories. Not intentionally, of course, on the risk side, but people celebrate these. Oh, I risked everything, and you know, everything was on the line, and then I had this wonderful success. Yeah. And then you see these other people who are on Dragon’s Den or Shark Tank, and they’ve risked or put a lot of money into stuff, and it’s, oh, it’s not good. And you’re wondering what the heck they were doing. So it’s those kinds of examples that give the impression that entrepreneurs are risky, that I agree with you is not the case. Smart entrepreneurs, mitigate risk, just like you’re talking about. And the way you mitigate risk is you test stuff, very little money, you get pre-orders ahead of time so that, you know, you’re not hoping that somebody’s gonna buy this, you’ve actually got a cluster customer lined up. You do things like that on a regular basis to mitigate risk so that it doesn’t become this highly risky venture. Entrepreneurs who are successful sometimes are highly risky, but a lot of times they’re just smart at mitigating risk.
Ali 4:49
You’re listening to Conversations on Startups with Doug and Glenn, merci pour nous avoir joindre.
Doug Ross 4:57
Yeah, you know, and one that came to mind when you were talking about that is in the book publishing domain, it used to be that your publisher would take a risk, you know, how many copies are going to sell, and they would go out and print these things and send them out to their bookstore customers into the distribution chain. And now that whole business model has changed in many cases, at least I know with my book, it’s print on demand. So the business model has changed such that that inventory risk no longer exists. And I think that can apply maybe to some other businesses as well. But, you know, I think that this is a sort of a myth that stays around. Because it is true that as an entrepreneur, oftentimes you are breaking the status quo, or you’re doing something that other people haven’t done before, so it does look risky, and sometimes there’s a lot of money that ends up going behind the development in a certain area. But I think what people aren’t seeing are those mitigation steps that you talked about Glenn, or those small steps that get us from A to B and a lot of money spent. So yeah, interesting topic. What other myths are there, Glenn, and what comes to your mind when you think about this?
Glenn Suart 6:20
We have so many opportunities to talk about different myths here, we probably need a couple episodes. And we might go into another one about this. But the one that always strikes me as very close to my heart is: you need to be young. You can’t be an old person, being an entrepreneur. For sure, if you’re younger, you have more energy, you have less to risk. But you can be any age, as long as you really think about what you’re doing, and have an idea that is fulfilling a need and know how to get it to potential customers. There’s lots of classic stories of people being older and starting a business. Ray Kroc was a milkshake mixer salesmen in his early 50s, when he partnered with the McDonald brothers, to basically take McDonald’s to a whole new level from the two stores that they had, to obviously 1000s and 1000s. And whether you you like Ray Kroc, or not, the thing was, he was 52 when he did that, and he spotted an opportunity. And he had successes and failures before that. And then the other classic one, of course, another fast food guy, Harland Sanders, who had good success with a restaurant in his hometown, but then when the interstate highway in Kentucky, of course, by-passed his town, his restaurant went bankrupt, and at 65, he had nothing. So he took his Social Security check and off he went to convince restaurants across the US that if he had the best recipe for chicken, and if they liked it, and used it, they would pay to pay him five cents a meal. And that’s how he started Kentucky Fried Chicken at 65. So you don’t have to be young, it certainly helps. But you can be any age to be an entrepreneur, as long as you figure out… you do the basics. Makes sure you got some security, so you’re not worried about, you know, paying your bills, and you’ve got an opportunity / an idea, as I said, you mitigate the risk by having somebody already wanting to buy it or not. And you work with other partners. There’s a whole bunch of things you can do. But that’s, that’s one of the myths I always run into is oh, I’m too old to do this.
Doug Ross 8:30
Yeah, I think that’s right. And most of the people that I’ve worked with are, in fact, not that young, and they’ve got the benefit of having varied experiences and knowing what the drivers are for a successful business. I think that’s absolutely true. You know, and I think people may be young when they start, but some of them are… serial entrepreneurs, too. But I agree with that, Glenn, we see Zuckerberg’s face and we think, yeah, you have to be 21 with a hoodie to be an entrepreneur. It’s just not true.
Hey podcast listeners, we’re gonna take a short break now. If you’re enjoying the show, feel free to invite your friends, remember to subscribe, and if you want to help spread the word leave us a review on Apple Podcasts or your favorite podcast app. Each episode of Conversations on Startups focuses on a single topic. If you want to comment on something you’ve heard on the podcast, or suggest a topic for us to cover in a future episode, send an email to:go@todaysgreatidea.com or douglas@sparkclickgo.com. Glenn and I appreciate you and hope you find our uncut and unrehearsed stories, perspectives, and tips helpful. Speaking of helpful stuff-let’s pick up where we left off.
Glenn Suart 9:49
So, make sense. Doug, what other myths do you run into on a regular basis?
Doug Ross 9:54
That entrepreneurs are born not made. [Good one] Uh, you know, I’m just picturing…it’s true, some entrepreneurs, their cuddle toys are investor decks and little 3d printers and whatever else, you need to be an entrepreneur, you know, like a little tiny megaphone to get all the other little toddlers to follow you and your idea. So yes, some of them are born and they have what at least looks like they were born with it, and then a natural instinct. But if you break that down, I think a couple things tend to come out. One is that they may have grown up in an entrepreneurially oriented family, I see that one, and in fact, the couple of doctors that I’m working with out of Foothills in Calgary, one of them his father was an entrepreneur, and, in fact, is 81 and is still working, you know, he’s got an, like an embroidery and outfitting type of manufacturing company. [right] And so he sort of came by it, honestly, I would say versus being born into it. And he also saw other people around him that were small business people in one way or another. But so it’s not quite born, you know, necessarily, although there might be some traits such as not accepting the status quo might be one for entrepreneurs. But what I really think’s important, Glenn, is that people can learn this. It’s more of a craft, I think, then something that we should think is only possible for the Elon Musk’s of the world who want to set up a new colony on Mars. I don’t think that’s the case, I think there’s a discipline to it, we’ve talked about some of the steps that you can go through to really build momentum for your business, to mitigate risk. We’ve talked about a lot of these things. And I think also if people take on this, this journey – they want to become an entrepreneur, they can get better over time, even if their first venture doesn’t work. And hopefully, they’ve not financed their house, which I always recommend, never do. And it’s not a perfect success, perhaps the next one will be, or they can fix the problems in that first business and make it a success. So I think it’s not true that entrepreneurs are born.
Glenn Suart 12:24
I agree with you. I think the obvious first thing is get rid of the label, don’t even think about the word entrepreneur. If you’re curious, and you have an idea, try something out. And you don’t have to be super at math or all these different things. You’re just somebody trying out a new idea. And think of it that way. Because sometimes that entrepreneur word means exactly what you’re saying, Elon Musk, Steve Jobs, etc, etc. I’m nowhere near as successful as those guys are. They had a lot of failures in their life, just as you mentioned. And they they’re successful, because they’ve had the failures. You have to learn those things. And nobody’s somebody born to be suddenly magical. Sometimes people do have enormous success at the first crack at it, it happens. But they might not have the discipline or the understanding for future businesses – what it took to actually they just happen to be the right place at the right time did the right things. A lot of things are trial and error, and there’s also lots of entrepreneurs who failed, failed, failed, failed, failed, and failed, finally, to have a success. And because of the learn from all those things. So I think it is absolutely learned behavior. There’s no way it happens to be born. It would be nice, but, no.
Doug Ross 13:43
Okay, any other myths come to mind Glenn? Maybe we can take the time on one more.
Glenn Suart 13:49
This is one I have a lot of fun with usually. The myth is that no one has ever thought of this before – this idea, concept, prototype. [Yeah] 99 times out of 100 somebody has. Sure there’s the one in 100 that is totally new. It’s different. But 99 times out of 100, most people have thought about something before. If you go into it that way, then it becomes this understanding of, okay, somebody has done something like this before, maybe I should try to figure out whether it’s been successful or not, or what the challenges were that they had, so that I can actually improve on it, instead of wasting a lot of time and research doing what everybody else is doing. I’ve actually learned from other people so I can spend my time on what really matters to take it to the next level and be successful. Does that make sense?
Ben 14:41
You’re listening to Conversations on Startups with Doug and Glenn. Thanks for joining us.
Doug Ross 14:49
It totally makes sense. I saw this constantly, you know, when I was in the pharmaceutical business. Take an area like, Alzheimer’s. It’s a huge problem. People want to solutions, all of that. But cracking that particular nut has been very difficult, and so you get down a track and you have a certain theory or vision, this is going to work. But trial and error may show that it doesn’t. So yeah, you’re best to figure out a new way. Or maybe this is one of those things where you end up abandoning it, if you really don’t see an opening, or you don’t think you’re gonna have the resources and the persistence to get this thing over the finish line.
Glenn Suart 15:35
Starbucks did not invent coffee, what they did was… Howard Schultz had gone over to Italy and seen how people were gathering in cafes on a regular basis and paying a premium for espresso in an environment. That’s what he brought back to create Starbucks in Seattle, then expanded elsewhere.
Doug Ross 15:53
A great way to bring new businesses [is] to travel and see different things, and then bring it back. I really, really like that. It opens eyes and gives people a different perspective.
Glenn Suart 16:05
The other one that jumps to mind is Vince, the ShamWow Guy, not a great human being Vince potentially, what he did smartly was, he sold the shammy, which every store sells a shammy, it’s a commodity. But with his stick that he did very well… he raised that shammy to something that people needed to buy. Again, I think I told this before, my daughter, she saw the commercial, she wanted to buy a shammy. It’s like, wow, and you know, you got a premium for this, you know, [Did she have a car?] she didn’t, she wasn’t cleaning mine, either. But it was the power of what he did with the marketing to make it work as a premium. You know, other people thought of it- sure? lot of people thought of selling shampoos, but they didn’t think of selling it the way he did. A lot of times an idea has been out there. It’s how you package it, how you market it, finding the right audience at the end of the day. But pretty sure that most people, most ideas have been thought of in some way, already. So take that extra step, and think about doing some research on what other people have done and why they’ve succeeded or failed. That’s my suggestion.
Doug Ross 17:17
Well, I like the idea of doing something imaginative with it, even if it has been done and you can do it. But if you do it in the same way, you shouldn’t expect to have superior returns. You’ve got to have an advantage or you’ve got to be customizing to a group, or catering to a particular group, or bringing it out in a new distribution way, something! You got to do something [different] if you really expect to do well with your business, if it’s exactly the same as what’s already out there.
Glenn Suart 17:46
All right. Well, let’s summarize this week’s myths. One, entrepreneurs really are made, they’re not born and maybe don’t use the word entrepreneur.
Doug Ross 17:57
It’s hard to spell anyway, you know? [Exactly] We should get rid of it.
Glenn Suart 18:02
You don’t need to be young to be successful. Being an entrepreneur doesn’t mean taking lots of heavy duty risks.
Doug Ross 18:09
Yeah, exactly, or being reckless.
Glenn Suart 18:12
And what was the other one?
Doug Ross 18:13
That entrepreneurs are not born? At least many of them are not, it’s a craft, it can be learned, there’s a discipline to it.
Glenn Suart 18:21
Yep, and also, no one’s thought of this before, as we just talked about. So make sure that the idea is there somewhere. somebody’s done something with it, so do the research. I think next week, we’ll have another myth episode. ‘Till then, we’ll talk some more.
Doug Ross 18:41
Conversations on Startups is a production of Glenn Suart and Douglas Ross. We hope you’re having fun listening but mostly that you take action on your business idea. For more inspiration visit our websites: todaysgreatidea.com and sparkclickgo.com. Another episode of COS will drop soon, or is already available to binge. Thanks for joining us, and remember to subscribe and invite your friends. See ya next time!
Transcribed by https://otter.ai