Justifying the selfish act of entrepreneurship

Why entrepreneurs have to be real with themselves to be successful

Yes, entrepreneurship is generally a good thing, but don’t act like most of it is not primarily beneficial for you, the founder (owner, entrepreneur).

I’ve been thinking about this notion a lot lately, as a self critical introspective person would.

Most of the time when people become entrepreneurs, it’s because they think they can do things better. That’s pretty selfish in its nature, and also pretty egotistical.

It takes a fair bit of gut to honestly accept that’s the case, and you’re not just trying to build a better world. You might build a better world in the process, but you’re really trying to build it your way because you think other ways are either dumb or inefficient.

That’s not a bad thing. A bad thing is when you get caught up in the ego of it and stop trying to make things better, but just better for yourself. It’s when you start paying your employees sub-par and pay yourself more than king tut because you think you’re the worth of the company.

It’s when you stop valuing your employee’s input more than your own.

It’s when you stop leading with your heart and mind, and start leading with your ego and pride.

That’s when the problems with entrepreneurship come about.

The greatest part of entrepreneurship may seem like getting to write your own source code for how your work operates and laying the foundation and steering the ship in the way you want it to go — but that’s not it.

What is the true greatest part of entrepreneurship is being able to offer that to other people — your employees.

When you finally get to a point where you start hiring people who are better than you, and suddenly what you can provide to your customers is better than anything you could have ever done on your own — that feeling is intoxicating.

You never want that feeling to stop, so you try to keep your employees happy, and what do you think would make them more happy than anything else?

Well, why did you start the company to begin with? It begins with their place in their work, their emotional state with the work, and how much say they have over the process.

If you’re hiring people that are better than you at certain areas of your business (which should always be the case) why not let them adapt the processes to something that would be far better than anything you could come up with on your own?

Why not let them have all the freedoms you have, that you craved when you started the company — to make their own schedule, to have freedom of location and time, and to have a comfortable salary that lets them not have to think about their income as much anymore. Why not?

I want entrepreneurial thinkers at my company, I want people who will bounce into the walls and break things only to create better processes in their wake. I won’t get that if I create an environment that an entrepreneur would want to flee from.

These are the greatest pieces of being an entrepreneur. They are also selfish though, and you have to be okay with that.

I want my company to be the best it can be, I want people who would be entrepreneurs working at my company because I think their brain power is what makes companies successful. I don’t want them to be my competitors though, I want them to work with me.

I also don’t want to have to do everything in my business, that’s selfish within itself. Every job I’ve hired for and every job that I will hire for in the future I could do myself, but I know that someone is better than I am. I am constantly hiring myself out of a job, and you have to be okay with that to scale effectively and be successful.

Just because entrepreneurship is a selfish pursuit in its essence doesn’t mean that you can’t be productive for others in the process. It doesn’t mean that you can’t create an environment where other entrepreneurs would be happy to be employees. It doesn’t mean that you have to lead by ego and pride rather than by empathy, understanding, and integrity.

It’s a constant balancing act between keeping things cohesive for the business you’ve created, and making sure your employees are happy and looking out for the greater good of the company.

So if you’re going to be an entrepreneur, understand that it’s a selfish pursuit, but you should be unselfish in your actions.

That’s the end of my rant, thanks.