| 1. |
While normal, boring corporate men and women are forced to be in
at 9 a.m. and out by 5 p.m., hard-driving entrepreneurs can get in as early as they want—and stay
as late as they like. They don't have to wait for the cleaning staff to open up in the morning. They've
got the keys!
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| 2. |
The entrepreneur is respected for a level of dedication that might, in
other settings, appear excessive. Fritz may be scarfing down a day-old doughnut at midnight, but if he's
an entrepreneur, nobody's going to say, "Boy, what a wonk Fritz is for letting his life decay to the point
that he can't allow himself a decent dinner." The lucky entrepreneur has the freedom to work 80 or 90
hours a week, and nobody's going to think less of him.
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| 3. |
Entrepreneurs always have a topic of conversation that they feel incredibly
passionate about: themselves. Not so for the typical business person, who often can be heard for hours on
end talking about sports, politics, the weather, management philosophy or other operationally fruitless topics.
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| 4. |
Busy entrepreneurs don't get depressed by the monotony of 5 percent
salary increases. Their lives are far more adventurous! Yes, while the rest of us are making do with
tedious, regular wage increases with no significant upside potential, they can dream about going from,
say, $5,500 today to (dare we say it) $1 million in the blink of an eye! In fact, with economic growth
in the future almost a sure thing, a double-digit salary increase for the lucky entrepreneur is
practically guaranteed.
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| 5. |
The hungry entrepreneur isn't forced to endure those interminable business
lunches, eating rich food and drinking outlandish beverages, while business acquaintances massage one
another's already plump egos. A sandwich at your desk? Delicious!
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| 6. |
Speaking of meals, entrepreneurs don't have to suffer through the tedious
task of filling out expense-account forms upon returning from lunches and dinners. Their private funds are
their expense accounts, a convenient arrangement that eliminates whole levels of paper work.
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| 7. |
Entrepreneurs don't have to waste a lot of office space on such frivolities
as big, fussy executive bathrooms. In fact, every place they go immediately becomes the executive bathroom—just
because they're in it!
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| 8. |
Organizational types who carry beepers, portable faxes and cellular phones
everywhere like strolling gypsies are widely viewed as weenies so terrified of failure they need to be in
touch with their superiors every single minute. Not so for the crafty, high-tech entrepreneur. Just watch
him set up his entire office in your outer office, while he waits for his unscheduled appointment with you.
He's on the ball!
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| 9. |
Entrepreneurs can concentrate on what's on their plate at the moment, and
not get diverted by a lot of incoming calls. No frivolous bleats from importunate vendors, inquisitive
headhunters or obnoxious customers ringing up out of the blue. They can work in peace for hours on end.
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| 10. |
Most of us don't have the time to stay in touch with former business friends
as much as we would like. But entrepreneurs suffer no such deprivation. They stay in constant touch with the
folks they once knew on the inside. Just this month, for instance, I received a call from Ned Zabrisky, a
fellow I used to know in Human Resources. He has his own consulting firm now and is very busy, mind you. But
he still has time to call me a lot, just to shoot the breeze and find out "what's going on." I tell him,
"nothing right now, Ned, and probably for the rest of this year and most of 1992." "I'll call again in a
couple of weeks, OK?" he replies. And he does, too! I think that's nice.
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| 11. |
Once or twice a year, corporate drones have to pack up informal clothing
and haul themselves off to some remote location—like Bermuda or Marco Island or Hilton Head—and
indulge in days of eating and drinking and retreating. Thrifty, practical entrepreneurs are never forced
to indulge in that kind of foolishness. If they want to get together with employees for a little no-agenda
interfacing, they can invite them over to the house for a nice, festive barbecue. Nobody has to fight over
the tennis courts, the burgers are delicious, and when people start bobbing for apples, things go nuts. And
there's no chance that anybody from sales, marketing or even public relations will drink too much and make
an inappropriate remark to someone of the opposite sex—not when everybody has to drive home in a couple
of hours without smacking into a tree or something.
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| 12. |
The organization person has precious little time to spend with the family,
doing things that really count. The happy entrepreneur can literally mint quality time, bringing his or her
brood together on a toasty evening to help build value wife and husband stuffing envelopes with promotional
fliers, while the kids are having the time of the lives learning to type and input spreadsheet data. On a
sunny Saturday, when most young people are out wasting time at malls and pizza joints, the entrepreneur's
offspring are learning project-management skills. What more precious asset can a parent bequeath?
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| 13. |
And how do you think corporate children feel when they are asked to describe
their parents' jobs? "Oh, my Mommy's in marketing." What is marketing? Even some adults can't explain it.
This is no problem for the children of the entrepreneurial mother who has selected her chosen path personally.
When her offspring are asked what she does, they can proudly answer: "My Mommy makes the little metal hooks
that go into the plastic armature that makes up the central portion of a coat hanger, allowing you to put
that hanger right on a crossbar without turning it back and forth."
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| 14. |
Entrepreneurs are able to develop a visceral feeling for the value of
each and every dollar that passes down the pipe to the bottom line, a quality that is most valuable
in the 90's. Every time they write a check, no matter how small, every time they buy something, no matter
how insignificant, it means more to them personally than any purchase—no matter how large a corporate
vice president will ever approve.
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| 15. |
Corporate insiders barely know that there is weather, let alone feel it.
Just the other day, it was a tad cold in the office, the first signs of winter approaching. I would have
gladly slapped on a couple of sweaters to keep warm. But within seconds, I could feel our heat come on.
That needless expenditure is exactly the kind of thing the economical entrepreneur would never approve.
You can really feel the seasons when you're working for yourself!
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| 16. |
The entrepreneur never has to deal with petty, incomprehensible changes
in the company's health and retirement benefits not to mention tons of other dumb, bureaucratic stuff.
Come to think of it, it's a rare entrepreneur who even thinks about a retirement package at all. No,
there's too much going on right now for the entrepreneur to worry about such bogus and nonbusinesslike
concepts as "the future."
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| 17. |
The entrepreneur rarely has to worry about downsizing, about laying off loyal
people who have been with the company for years and years. There are no such people!
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| 18. |
In big institutions, you never get to do anything for yourself. There's
always somebody in the way who insists on performing some crucial function. Entrepreneurs, free, from
layer upon layer of inefficient support staff, are blissfully free to answer their own phones, make their
own reservations, butter their own muffins, and fill out their own magazine renewals.
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| 19. |
Entrepreneurs don't have some rumpled droid standing between them and their
computers. Does the hard drive need defragmenting? They do it themselves. Was the floppy controller fried
by a power surge? They get it up and running again. What know-how! What moxie! What verve!
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| 20. |
In short, entrepreneurs are the masters of their own fate. If it runs,
they made it walk first. If it ain't broke, they don't have to fix it. Talk about a feeling of mastery
normal people can only dream of! Go ahead! Talk about it! Then do it!
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