Entrepreneurship is becoming more and more the currency to be talked about in this day and age. This generation of young people is forming their lives, their social circles and their work scenes around this charming word. Roadshows and startup coffee have, probably for the first time ever, entered the popular lexicon. Entrepreneurs are being celebrated, but the author of this article says don't make yourself look like you're running a "startup".
"Entrepreneurs" have turned the conferences, websites, courses and competitions of the start-up industry into a commodity. As founders of such a new industry, we have become so distracted that we can hardly tell if we are really getting guidance from such a start-up industry, where we are the product and not the customer. In order to attract the public's attention, we spend a lot of time creating PowerPoint presentations and then getting up on stage, giving presentations and analysing them. To make it profitable, we also sold tickets for the presentation, got people to fill in entry forms and so on. We all worked very hard and didn't see the rewards. If I could turn back the clock, I would love to start my career all over again.
Not going to any more events organised by entrepreneurs
This week I have been invited to four events hosted by entrepreneurs, which is a strange and crazy phenomenon. Things like startup workshops, breakfasts, retreats, showcases and so on. All of these things I would have turned down.
Startup events are considered the "best social network", but I only keep in touch with one or two of the entrepreneurs I'm interested in because I think they take up a lot of my time that I should be spending on my own team.
Your next project might be in publishing, health care, engineering or other industries, but never in a start-up industry again. At an event run by a start-up industry, you will only meet people from that industry who are not your clients either, and you should only be involved in events that are relevant to your potential client base.
Occasionally, you can choose to have dinner with your favourite entrepreneurs, which can help you get rid of the feeling of isolation. Otherwise, if you can't even go out and make a sale, you'll just have to get back to your office and bury yourself in work. Or just go home and spend more time with your family.
Don't get involved in a race between entrepreneurs
There are many different kinds of competitions between entrepreneurs. There are innovation competitions, pitch competitions, and business plan competitions. In some cases, investment in the company is offered as a reward.
Honestly, how would you like an investor to invest in your company at a cocktail party? For an entrepreneur, winning an investment is like getting a call from your bank and being told that you have been cleared to have an overdraft, which is very lucky.
However, it can also make things a little awkward. I had a call from a mainstream international consultancy who told me that we had won a big innovation award. They said to me very seriously that they could pay me €7,500 just to be able to tell the public that I had won the competition. Another time I was invited to be interviewed on a radio show about supporting entrepreneurs and just asked to sign a letter of agreement that they would claim on the radio to give us R188000, which I didn't agree to in the end.
You can also try to win some 'business support' or some MBA students to 'help you grow your business' in order to complete their projects. I would spend my own personal time with my newly established team in the competition, just to prove myself. I honestly wish I could turn back the clock and go back to those times.
If you do have the time to enter competitions and make sure that for those competitions you enter, they can afford the prize money, then you will win. It's not really about the product being entered at all.
Pay attention to the warm light that the media casts on entrepreneurship
The startup industry gets all kinds of coverage, it's packaged very nicely, especially in Africa, and the media coverage of startups is quite frequent, especially after you win a prize about a startup.
At Paperight, we keep a long list of posts and articles all about the startup industry that are well received, including 'We won the Startup and Innovation Award in London', 'Frankfurt and New York', 'Accenture Innovation Award' and 'The public congratulates the South African National Assembly'. We have a special selection of such articles "from the entrepreneur's point of view", which have been featured on CNN's website, Forbes and several other newspapers and magazines. We have even published a selection of articles on the subject of open business innovation in a book. To be sure, only awards of various kinds can generate relevant coverage.
But there has not been a single case where we have seen a wave of sales peaks corresponding to the media coverage. In fact, for an emerging industry to get on track, sales are vital. And there was a time when incentivising staff as an unanimously accepted behaviour, as well as inspiring confidence among investors, could not have much practical effect after the rewards had passed. So, in a start-up industry, don't just follow and believe the so-called reports. You need to find the media outlets for your industry.