Which Entrepreneur DNA category you fit in?
Why do you do what you do? Find out who you are.
Who are you? Why do you run your own business? What makes you get out of the bed in a morning?
It’s not a rocket science to say that all entrepreneurs are not alike and they all have a different reason, motivation and objective behind what they do for living. One particular motivation that is a perfect fit for one person may not be suitable at all for another.
I recently read a book called Entrepreneurial DNA and the author of this book has a very interesting stance on types of entrepreneurs. According to the author, there are four types of business entrepreneurs. In other words, there are four entrepreneurial category types. Everyone is strong in at least one category with portions of other categories may be mixed in. Here are the entrepreneurial DNA categories described by the author:
Find out which one you best fit in.
Builder
This entrepreneur is highly motivated and proud of being able to create something. As the name suggests, this person likes to build and is very happy about growth of the company he created and gives a jack’s #$%# about personal income. As such, a definition of success for this person is simply more people on his payroll and more company cars on the road.
The focus is clear and his vision and mission are all mapped out. As a result, builders tend to grow quickly and more often than not, turn their little start-up into large corporations.
So what’s the downside? The relationships and roadblocks that get in the way of progress may be seen as an annoyance. This is exactly why builder entrepreneurs are seen as ‘jerk’ by his colleagues because they don’t care about chit chats and they don’t try to put their message nicely. They are straight and mostly cut it short. In other words, the upside is the downside as well.
It is important for others to note that sometimes seemingly cruel nature is nothing personal against an individual. It is just a part of the DNA of a builder – something that comes with the package. However, they are often misunderstood, seen as cruel, but what they do is vital to their task of building value. They help in a growth of the business and everyone associated with it.
Opportunist
Opportunist entrepreneur tends to be in a hunt for money-making opportunities. And once they find one, they go at it like no one else will. They are highly motivated by personal incentive that they are going to get at the end of the journey and for that they are ready to work day and night until get there. This breed of entrepreneurs is very positive about their goal and is willing to go any length to achieve that because they see the pot of gold at the end.
Unlike builders, they are very engaging and relational. Their customers and colleagues love them for their friendly nature. They invest a good amount of time in listening to life stories and make people feel liked and valued.
They want to quickly reach their goal and that’s why they are also multitaskers and try to juggle so many things at once. This is the reason they lack focus. The absence of focus and quick decisions means varying results. If they look back at their track record, it will show they have gone forward two steps, back three, forward two, and back again. However, that won’t be stopping them at all. They are positive, see failures as a lesson and move on. Because life is full of opportunities and they’re always ready for the next one.
Specialist
This breed has specialized in a particular set of skills. A skill acquired with good education and/or experience and they have become a pro at it. They have worked for others and that’s how they mostly start out. However, being a pro, they have become quality-centric and they don’t like loose ends. After becoming frustrated about how things are handled, they will eventually break away.
They break away to be their own boss and remove all hindrances that are stopping them from doing things right and introduce quality back to their work. They are totally focused and proficient at what they do. Their achievement is in producing a service or product that stands out. Customers love them because of the quality satisfaction they have and as such they rarely lose a customer.
So, what’s the catch now? Well. As specialists, these entrepreneurs are very good at what they do but they don’t have a good grasp on the business development side. They’re in fact not concerned about business development at all. Their pride is in producing a good quality product/service. This is why their business seldom develops beyond a certain level. They need someone to remind them to serve more customers, expand business and make more connections.
They are all set with what they do, but they will see extravagant growth only if they get help from someone in their business development side.
Innovator
Let’s walk one step further from specialists and we have the innovators — the mad creatives.
They hate doing ‘same old, same old’ and love to redefine things. They are happy to dedicate all their time just to be able to have a satisfaction of doing something new. These are the people who invent things that touch and change lives at a very large scale. Their work excites not only them but others too.
They do not care about the commercial aspect of what they do and hence they are not driven by profits or personal gains. The innovators are simply focused on their mission. In these regards they are slightly similar to specialists.
Their decision making is completely emotion-based in their efforts to help others. Like specialists, innovators need a good support system from others to develop and run the business side of their products and/or services.