What is an empirical entrepreneur? Could it be that there are empirical entrepreneurs? Who is more likely to achieve success: someone who gets a career or someone who gains the knowledge little by little to the university of life? Does having all the knowledge and being a capable, talented and brilliant person guarantee you success in business?
Many of my most successful clients, I dare say the majority, do not have formal university studies or perhaps they do, but they obtained a profession very different from the business they built. Others obtained formal university degrees, even after setting up their own company. Does having specialized knowledge really guarantee success in business?
My clients have “complained” about wanting to have a career and they even put pressure on their children to first go to college to get a career and then go about starting their own business or working in the family business. I will not write about this today, I will in another article.
The Royal Academy Dictionary says that an empiricist is one who is governed by experience. When we say "that's an empiricist", we think of a person who had no formal knowledge at a university and who acquired his knowledge from experience.
For 30 years, working with empirical entrepreneurs has given me the opportunity to see them act, make decisions, negotiate with clients, negotiate with suppliers, generate new business ideas, come up with improvements and add innovation to their businesses or products. And they say they have no knowledge. Of course, they have them and enough. They also develop them every day.
Maybe they don't have a title hanging on the wall of an office with the name Lic. Juancito Domínguez or MBA Marta por Siempre. I learned to respect these empirical entrepreneurs since I was a young accountant visiting small bazaars and shops, about 30 years ago. Many of those small entrepreneurs later became great entrepreneurs, some formidable.
Someone very kind sent me an email, several weeks ago, with this comment:
“I have read your articles very carefully. Thank you very much. Your knowledge is very valuable to me. Those of us who are empirical entrepreneurs always make mistakes; but with a teacher next door, in less easy to be wrong. So thank you very much. By reading my story in one of your articles, I will not deny that I was moved by remembering many things and mistakes that I have made. I know I still have a long way to go to learn how to run a company. I am afraid of making mistakes, I know it is because of the delays I have had due to my failures. But, now it is different. I am more attentive, with open ears, very open to listen to tips to put them into practice in my new project ”
I am moved to read this type of message, for various reasons. First, because I generally read what they write in the morning, I also write in the morning. So, I am energized to read these stories of effort, hope, guts, and enthusiasm. Keep doing it. And second, because these testimonies come from the soul, from the depths of a person who wants to achieve success and is the effort to achieve great goals.
Those stories taste like a “traveled path”. They taste like "knocked knees" as I say at the 30 Mistakes Conference.
Coincidentally, in this conference I send several messages that are very strong, very forceful, very vehement. The following is one of them:
“To be successful in the business world it is not enough to be a brilliant, intelligent and talented person, it is not enough to have all the money in the world, nor is it enough to have a spectacular business idea, nor is it enough to have a market looking forward to the product we have ”
The email from this empirical entrepreneur speaks volumes about the knowledge that is necessary to achieve business success. Two of the 30 Worst Mistakes are these:
- Lack of specialized knowledge Believing that being an expert is enough to succeed
To a very well-studied and qualified close friend, I frequently comment the following: “knowing too much can become a barrier to success”.
Knowledge truly is power, but only potential power. You must acquire specialized knowledge to achieve success in any activity you want to do in life. I got three races; but the titles never interested me, they will be in some box; but I have never stopped studying and reading a single day. So much so, that some fourteen years ago, in an article published by the newspaper La República on young entrepreneurs and professionals, he said about me in the headline: "Self-taught by conviction."
Finally, we are all "empirical". I would be happy if we are all "empirical entrepreneurs" as well. The doctor is an empiricist, the lawyer, the orator, the artist, the virtuous, the architect, the consultant, in all professions. They acquire knowledge in the universities; But it is in the performance of their profession and through years of experience that they become experts, successful and well-priced.
Same with the businessman. The same as the entrepreneur. One day he "marries" a business idea. He becomes obsessed with her. He is passionate about the vision of turning that business idea into a great company. That leads him to dedicate soul, heart and life to building his empire. He focuses all his attention on achieving his greatest goals. That passion, that obsession, that deep desire, that perseverance, that energy and that energy will lead you to acquire all the knowledge related to the project you have in mind. He ends up becoming an expert on the product, the client, the market and everything related to his business idea.
This is how these "empirical entrepreneurs" achieve success in business.
Do you want to be a successful businessman too? Do you want to turn a business idea into an empire? Do you want to take your company to the next level of growth? Do you want to achieve financial freedom, wealth and prosperity in the business world? So go ahead and take all the knowledge you have and use it to build a great company, to live the spectacular lifestyle you want and that you know you deserve.
