Can You Learn to Start a Business?
In a word, yes. But if you're at all serious about entrepreneurship, you'll learn there's much more to start-up than classrooms and homework.
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Teachers go to college for four years to train for their
profession. Doctors go to college, then medical school for an
additional four years. But there has never been such a tidy map to
becoming an entrepreneur. There is no one school, no one skill, no
one way into entrepreneurship—just ask the millions of
business owners out there. Some people start with no formal
training, while others spend years in prestigious MBA programs. But
is a formal entrepreneurial education the inside track to business
success? Can you learn to be an entrepreneur? Or are you better off
jumping in feet-first and learning as you go? Or is it even
possible to answer that question? The consensus seems to be, yes, you can learn the art and
science of entrepreneurship. In fact, it would almost seem
necessary, as hardly anyone knows instinctively what to do from the
start. (Well, maybe there are a few know-it-alls out
there—but for the rest of us mere mortals, knowledge must be
gained.) But entrepreneurial learning doesn't only have to come
from a schoolhouse. Doug Evans knows that to be true. This 35-year-old founder of
Servador
Inc., a print outsourcing provider in New York City, didn't
have any formal training when he started any of his three
businesses (Servador being his third). With only a high school
diploma to his name, Evans joined the Army and became a paratrooper
at 18. A graffiti artist in his youth, he decided to tap into his
artistic background upon leaving the Army. A business in graphic
arts and printing fit his meticulous nature to a tee-but he knew
nothing about the graphic arts business. "I knew I was going
to become a great graphic designer," says Evans. "And I
think the lesson there was having a mission." Content Continues Below
His desire to be a great graphic designer was stirred when he
met a mentor-in Evans' opinion, the greatest graphic designer
in the world-and soaked up all the knowledge he could about the
graphic arts industry. In the tradition of many great professors,
this mentor did not go easy on Evans. "He tore me apart,"
recalls Evans. "He basically told me I have no talent and to
do something else." Determined to show he was capable of
learning, Evans devoted hours and hours to his informal
training. One common thread running through all of Evans' businesses?
His complete devotion to learning everything there was to know
about his pursuits. When he was courting a big consulting account
from a cosmetics company, he made it his business to know the ins
and outs of the makeup biz-he researched in trade journals, talked
to women consumers and basically wowed the company, and he won the
contract. Now with his third and most successful business to date, Evans
expects Servador to bring in roughly $12 million in sales for 2001.
And while he's certainly pleased with where he ended up, Evans
is candid about the school thing: "In retrospect, I think the
process of going to school would have [taught me] a lot of
communication skills. I would've learned how to deal with
people on a sophisticated level," he says. "I literally
walk by college campuses and see these young kids having
fun—so I feel a little bit of a void. I think I would've
enjoyed [college]."
Originally published in the December 2001 issue of Entrepreneurs Start-Ups magazine
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