by Rich Lazzara on March 11, 2010
You can be very successful being either.
Many like to think of themselves as innovators, however if you’re honest with yourself you’ll see that the ideas you have are merely replicating or duplicating something that has already been done. Which is perfectly fine. In fact many companies have been hugely successful replicating ideas that had already been done. Apples most successful product of all time, the iPod, was not an innovation, it was actually one of the last mp3 players to the market. Facebook is another example. Companies like Friendster and MySpace were ahead of Facebook with the idea of social networks. On the other hand being an innovator certainly has its’ advantages. Just look at the Nintendo Wii success for an example.
So as your developing your ideas you can choose to innovate and develop something new or duplicate, put your own twist on something existing. What are the positives to innovating vs duplicating?
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by Rich Lazzara on March 9, 2010
Green, Yellow or Red?
Every color is clearly represented at your company. Your job is to figure out who’s which color and then navigate your ideas accordingly.
There are the Green light people whom are always open to new ideas, looking for ways to keep things evolving and moving forward. These are certainly good people to present your ideas too, however depending on there credibility they might have the reputation of saying yes to everything and be less affective at helping you move your ideas forward than others.
Then you have the Yellow light people whom are cautious about anything you bring them. The Yellow color people aren’t dangerous to you but they will question the things you bring them. These are actually very good people to bounce ideas off of because they can help prepare you for the objections you are going to see later from the Red color people.
The Red light people, just like the red stop light, seem to have an uncanny knack of putting a stop to ideas on a regular basis.
Now it would be easy to say just present your ideas to the Green light people and be done with it. The problem is that most of the time you are going to need approval or at least support from all three, Green, Yellow and Red. Just like a traffic light your ideas success will be based on getting cohesive buy in from all three. In fact if you can bring a representative from each of those three groups your idea will become more powerful than if its supported by just one faction.
Get moving now and get that project green lighted.
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by Rich Lazzara on March 5, 2010
A friend approached me the other day about starting a conference for entrepreneurs. Certainly not an original idea but none the less I think the timing for something like this is very good. As more and more people branch out and become entrepreneurs there certainly has to be an opportunity to learn from those who have been there before. One of the traits that will make up successful entrepreneurs going forward is their ability to learn and share new ideas with and from each other. I can see a conference being the perfect opportunity to bring both successful and aspiring entrepreneurs together to dialogue on the latest trends, techniques and technologies.
Now I’ve been to a bunch of conferences in my time and we certainly don’t need something else to fill our time. However for this I could see it being made up of a very small group of attendees and presenters. Say 200 attendees and 10 presenters. Each of the presenters would represent a different aspect of being an entrepreneur. Things such as raising capital, utilizing the Internet, manufacturing and servicing, money management, creative thinking and leadership could all be topics of discussion. Instead of presentations though I’d like to see that panel take real world examples from the attendees and see how they could help right there. Perhaps other parts of the days would be filled with stories from successful entrepreneurs on how they made it. Something to think about for sure.
Let me ask you, are there any existing entrepreneur conferences that you know of?
Any that you have been to and thought were good?
What types of things would you like to learn at one of these conferences?
Leave a comment below, who knows maybe we’ll take this idea and do something with it.
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by Rich Lazzara on March 4, 2010
The discussion of whether entrepreneurs are born or made is certainly an interesting one. I believe they’re made and I believe anyone can be one. In fact if you have a job you’re already an entrepreneur and probably don’t even know it.
Let’s look at what you had to do in order to get the job you have.
First, you probably attended schooling of some sort, if not a college or technical school at the very least you received a high school degree. From there you filled out applications, had interviews, met someone or were recruited to start working somewhere. Now you may not see that as an entrepreneurial process but look closer.
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by Rich Lazzara on March 2, 2010
A good article appeared over the weekend that analyzed over 500 entrepreneurs and in that study a consistent pattern appeared. Entrepreneurs are made not born. It’s something I’ve been preaching for awhile.
If entrepreneurs are not born then how are they made?
“They simply got tired of working for others, had a great idea they wanted to commercialize, or woke up one day with an urgent desire to build wealth before they retired. So they took the big leap.”
It really is that simple. At Lazzara Yachts we sell to very successful entrepreneurs and I make it a point to find out how they got to where they are. Nearly all of them have very humble backgrounds and quite frankly unremarkable stories as to how they were able to go from nothing to multi millions in a matter of years. Now I say unremarkable with the utmost respect for what they have done, taking nothing away for their hard work, risk taking and vision needed to be as successful as they are. The point is though that there isn’t a complex back story to their success. They are generally as simple as, having an idea and moving on that idea. For most they didn’t start out with clear visions of exactly how successful they would be, more a general idea that they had something that could work.
Everyone’s an entrepreneur is something I continue to say and while I realize not everyone will choose to be, I truly believe that everyone has the ability to be. Whether you choose to exercise that ability or not is up to you. Just know that you can be made into a successful entrepreneur you don’t have to be born “into it” .
What do you think? Leave a comment below and let me know? Can anyone be made into an entrepreneur?
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