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The following article was published in the Charleston Post & Courier's Business Major, a featured monthly column in the Business Review Section on March 2, 1998. Corporations a spring board for entrepreneursBy DOROTHY P. MOORE Special to The Post and Courier The correlation between organizational experiences and the types of businesses entrepreneurs create is fairly well established. In our study, "Women Entrepreneurs, Moving Beyond the Glass Ceiling," 71 percent of the entrepreneurs had previously worked in a field very similar to the business they were now in. Nearly 90 percent said they used information gained from their former organization. For some, the corporate world provided a complete package of information, opportunity and motivation. "My business came about because a competitor to a former employer asked if I would help with their business development," recalls Dianne Semingson, owner of the Philadelphia firm DLS International Inc. and its affiliate, New Source Management. "Layoffs in construction and downsizing left people in the company overworked. No one was marketing the firm and building up a project pipeline. My company developed to fill this niche." Susan Weiner started a business that developed customized training programs for Americans doing business with Japanese companies. The idea came from her experience in trying to help the members of her previous firm adjust to dealing with the Japanese. In the words of Elizabeth Morris, a Dallas entrepreneur who today runs a research firm, "I think the business kind of came and got me. It developed out of previous work I had done." Entrepreneurs with prior corporate experience benefit because the organization, in effect, functions as a learning laboratory. Learning the ins and outs of a field of business, acquiring the skill to deal successfully with problems and people, gaining managerial savvy, and acquiring the confidence are all part of the real world education. Corporate experience confers other advantages, too. "I rose fairly quickly within the organization," says Cincinnati entrepreneur Mary Tanner, "I had tons and tons of very expensive training, within the organization and training outside. They pumped a lot of money into me as a manager." Even bad organizational experience produces valuable lessons. One investment consultant recalled being pressured by her former firm to increase the turnover in customer accounts so that the company would earn more commissions. Frustrated and appalled because the interests of her clients were not well-served, she began to explore the possibility of opening her own business. Kris Schaeffer, Founder of Kris Schaeffer & Associates, a San Francisco-based company, had built entire training departments from scratch in corporate life. She learned to avoid the limiting effects of bureaucratic routines. "Corporations reduce everything down to six or 10 steps," she notes. "Everyone wants an `add water and stir' solution. "It ends up not being performance driven ... In your own business, things happen because you make them happen. You create the 9,000 options. You figure all the contingencies. In the corporation, human interactions with differing perspectives create bottlenecks and get in the way of completing successful projects." Two types of female entrepreneurs emerge from corporate backgrounds. One group, the intentional entrepreneurs, always intended to start their own business. For them, working in the large organization was a necessary educational stepping-stone. The second group, the corporate climbers, entered companies with goals of reaching the top, or at least getting up high. Somewhere along the line, for a variety of different reasons, they became interested in owning their own businesses. There are distinct differences in the approach to organizational life between the two groups. Corporate climbers tend to consider managerial experience more important than do the intentional entrepreneurs. Reflecting on her approach when she was in corporate life, Janet McCann, a Chicago-area interior designer, says, "If I had planned on having my own business, I would have watched the financial, the marketing, but I didn't. I just liked what I was doing. I was learning my particular skill and I had no thoughts about the rest of it." Her approach was not atypical. One of the key advantages of entrepreneurial firms competing with much larger rivals is the ability to identify and serve a specific market niche in a superior fashion. Corporate climbers who later turn to entrepreneurship may be less aware of the importance of this critical competitive competence and, therefore, less sensitive and responsive to shifts in the marketplace. By contrast, during their organizational tenure, the intentional entrepreneurs tended to value marketing and technical training more highly than people skills. Once in business for themselves, they were suddenly confronted with the people-related problems of sales and management. As Anne Sadovsky, CEO of a Dallas-based market, consulting and seminar firm and author of "101 Thoughts to Make You Think" points out, "You can build a better mousetrap, but if you don't have a way to let people know about it, you're going to starve to death." The point that you will not do any business until people know you are there seems obvious, but it is often overlooked when people go into business for themselves. Says a Midwestern entrepreneur, "I have worked with a lot of start-ups. When you start talking about selling, they say, `What do you mean about selling? All I want to do is do the work.' If you don't want to sell yourself, then go work for somebody." Management skills are equally critical. The lessons for people just starting out - whether aspiring entrepreneurs or corporate climbers - are clear. You can take advantage of the invaluable experience offered in an organizational setting. Aspiring entrepreneurs would be wise not to burrow in too narrowly too early. They should balance organizational education in product, market and finance with the people skills of sales and management. Corporate climbers should avoid a career path of management-only experiences that can be a mile wide and an inch deep. Even if not interested in going into business for themselves, they would be wise to remember no one knows what the future holds. For Questions/Comments about this site, contact moored@citadel.edu. Site designed by Jackye Cocoros. |