It's all about the Moxie!!
A recently released Kauffman Foundation study, "The Coming Entrepreneurship Boom," suggests that the United States might be on the cusp of a startup boom—not in spite of an aging population but because of it. Entrepreneurship, it turns out, is not just for the young. Colonel Sanders, after all, didn't really crank up his Kentucky Fried Chicken franchise operation until he was 65.
Drea Knufken, at Business Pundit, points out the advantages that accrue to late-life entrepreneurs; and they are significant.
Advantages of Age
* Money – If you know you want to start a business some day, you can put away cash for ten years and fund your business yourself until you reach cash flow positive. It helps to have assets.
* Connections – When you are 25, you don't know a lot of executives at other companies. By the time you are 40, your friends and co-workers will have switched companies, changed jobs, and moved up the corporate ladder. This gives you easier access to decision makers and the people you need to help you get your business off the ground. Many of your old friends and co-workers will be your first customers, and open doors for you in all kinds of places.
* Wisdom – You have much more business experience to pull on. You don't have to learn or invent many of the standard processes that exist at most companies.
* Patience – The longer you wait, the more pitches you will see. If you aren't compelled to swing at anything and everything just to try to get a hit, you can wait for that pitch that is in your sweet spot.
I often tell young people who visit me with startup ideas: I'm no smarter than I was at 20; but I have a lot more data. And I know many, many more people. Remember, who you know is what you know.
So, baby boomers, if you were wondering whether your next career might be as an entrepreneur, consider the words of Alfred, Lord Tennyson, from his poem, Ulysses ...
Come, my friends,
'Tis not too late to seek a newer world.
Push off, and sitting well in order smite
The sounding furrows; for my purpose holds
To sail beyond the sunset, and the baths
Of all the western stars, until I die.
Tho' much is taken, much abides; and though
We are not now that strength which in old days
Moved earth and heaven; that which we are, we are;
One equal temper of heroic hearts,
Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will
To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.
It really is all about the Moxie.
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