The Entrepreneurial Mindset

SPEND IMAGINATION INSTEAD OF MONEY. Many of the ideas presented here are not expensive to implement. They have little downside and represent few risks. They spend creativity and imagination instead of funds. In a world of increasingly ruthless competition for shareholder returns, parsimony is essential. As you continue to build your own entrepreneurial arsenal, look for ways in which people can be encouraged to utilize their own creativity before asking for material resources

ical outcomes as it is to result in a successful entrepreneurial business. The key problem for the entrepreneurial manager is to balance the tension between creativity and novel thinking and the need for businesslike attention to costs, potential losses, and upside gains

In any highly uncertain venture, the proportion of assumptions you need to make relative to the knowledge you have is considerable. We refer to this proportion as the assumption-to-knowledge ratio

When entrepreneurial wanna-bes come to us with business plans, we actually insist that before they even think about spending a dollar on assets or expenses, they provide us with the names of at least five customers with a demonstrated willingness to buy.

Competitive weaknesses can lead you to discover new opportunities, which emerge as you learn to overcome weaknesses through the creation of new combinations of skills, assets, and systems—or competences. New

ated by new developments in the near future.
___ We are facing enormous pressure to reduce prices or to offer more value for the same prices.
___ For one or more links in the consumption chains for our most important segments, the customers’ needs could be met in completely new ways.
___ For one or more links in the consumption chains for our most important segments, the customers’ needs are being met by competitors from an industry other than the one we primarily associate ourselves with.
___ Many new entrants have come into our markets, but are serving customer segments that we don’t care about.
___ Solutions developed for market segments that we currently find unattractive are improving rapidly in terms of price, functionality, or other attributes.
___ The factors that kept our customers loyal seem to be losing their potency.
___ We seem to be facing a wave of consolidations and acquisitions in our industry.
___ We are experiencing completely new sources of competition compared with those we have historically faced.
___ Customers increasingly view our offerings as commodities

IS THERE POTENTIAL FOR RADICAL RECONFIGURATION OF THE CURRENT BUSINESS MODEL

__ One or more steps in our value chain could be completely eliminated by new developments in the near future

The entrepreneur decided that his friend’s irritation was an opportunity waiting to be captured

Observe Behavior to Uncover Need, Uncover Need to Discover New Markets