The Important Lesson July 4th Teaches About Entrepreneurship
Entrepreneur Office Hours - Issue #239
It’s the beginning of July, which means a holiday week here in the United States. As a result, I’ve only got one new article to share below. Instead of writing a second article, I wanted to take few paragraphs thinking about July 4th and American “independence.”
No, I don’t mean that in all the normal contexts you’re used to. This isn’t a post about freedom from tyranny, democracy, American exceptionalism, or any of those other cliches.
Instead, no matter where you’re from or your relationship to the United States, let’s all take a moment to hop into our imaginary time machines and travel back to July 4, 1776. Think about what we would have actually seen.
Would we have seen a bunch of colonists sign a piece of paper, declare their independence, and… BAM!… fully formed country?
Of course not!
In a way, the fundamental conceit of July 4th reminds me of the biggest delusions about entrepreneurship around timelines and how long things actually take. In the case of American independence, the country celebrates July 4th as though that’s the magical day when America became America. As a result, it’s easy to imagine the transition from colonies to successful, independent country was immediate. But, of course, nothing could be further from the truth.
On a micro scale, July 4, 1776 was only the day the continental congress adopted its independence declaration. Most participants in the congress didn’t sign it for another month (August 2nd). And the Revolutionary War went from 1775 to 1783. In other words, in a literal sense, independence took more than a day.
On a more macro scale, the United States had a civil war 85 years after declaring independence. That civil war is a pretty giant clue that America didn’t exactly become America on the 4th of July. It still had lots of growing to do.
The same thing happens with successful startups. We look around and we see companies like Google, Meta, OpenAI, TikTok, Amazon, or whatever other startup success story you can think of, and we imagine them to have emerged roughly how they currently are.
But, like with the mythology of celebrating America on July 4th, nothing could be further than the truth.
The greatest things in the world don’t magically appear in a day. Heck, they don’t appear in a week or a month or even a year. They take decades to mature. Some things even take generations. Why? Because success takes time.
To be clear, I’m not suggesting we shouldn’t celebrate countries or companies or any other big successes in the world. I’m just adding a disclaimer. Let’s call it an asterisk: July 4th*.
In the footnote, we’d see the following text:
*July 4th is the representative day Americans celebrate US independence. The actual revolutionary war, where the American colonists won their freedom, took approximately eight years, and the current system of government in the United States wasn’t established for another six years."
I realize, nobody is going to actually include that asterisk anywhere, but hopefully you get my point. It’s a reminder that establishing something new and revolutionary, and then growing that thing into a massive success — it all takes time. Lots and lots of time. That’s as true for countries as it is for startups. Because of this, good entrepreneurs learn to judge their work and careers over longer time horizons. They don’t care about what they accomplish in a week, month, or year. They think about decades. Heck… some even think in terms of lifetimes. After all, the most important and valuable revolutions in the world always take lots of time.
-Aaron
This week’s new articles…
The Most Important Indicator for Startup Success That Entrepreneurs Always Overlook
Founders obsess about finding huge markets, but the size of a market doesn’t matter nearly as much as they think.
Office Hours Q&A
———————
QUESTION:
Hi Professor Dinin,
Thank you so much for taking the time to consider my question.
I believe strongly in the value, power and freedom that entrepreneurship gives people. I run two successful businesses right now, and they’ve given me the ability to do and see things I could have never otherwise imagined.
I also have two young children at home. I want them to appreciate and value entrepreneurship, too. Since I know you’ve mentioned having young children as well, I was wondering: Are you doing anything to encourage their interest in entrepreneurship? And, if so, what?
Thank you for sharing,
Veera
----------
I love this question. I think it’s maybe because I’ve often wondered similar things for my kids.
To be fair, I should add a caveat. While I’m a huge believer in entrepreneurship, I recognize and appreciate that entrepreneurship isn’t right for everyone. In fact, it’s right for a very small number of people, and there’s certainly a world in which my children will live a… umm… let’s call it “less stressful” life by not taking the entrepreneurial path.
However, if you’re genuinely interested in encouraging your children to be entrepreneurs, as best I can tell, it’s something you’re going to do naturally simply by being an entrepreneur yourself. Simply put, as a parent who’s building and running your own companies, you’re going to be teaching your children they can be doing the same thing.
This insight comes from a combination of personal experience and from talking with lots of other entrepreneurs.
Specifically, when I think back to my own entrepreneurial journey, I realize I was mostly inspired by my parents. Both my parents owned their own businesses. They weren’t billion dollar tech startups or anything like that. But they were solid small businesses that paid the bills.
As I got older, I began to suspect that seeing my parents run their own companies is what taught me I could do the same thing. And I began to confirm this suspicion back when I was running my podcast, Web Masters. I interviewed 100+ of the most successful entrepreneurs in history, and a common thread I noticed linking almost all of them was the fact that they came from families with at least one entrepreneurial parent, uncle, grandparent, etc.
In other words, more than anything, I suspect simply being an entrepreneur yourself is going to teach your children it’s possible. Whether or not they become entrepreneurs as a result is a completely different issue. But the best instigator of entrepreneurship is growing up in a family where entrepreneurship is appreciated and demonstrated. Since it sounds like that’s already happening in your family, you’re well on your way toward raising entrepreneurial children (for better or for worse… 😉).
Got startup questions of your own? Reply to this email with whatever you want to know, and I’ll do my best to answer!
