A lot of people promote the idea that you have to be an entrepreneur to run a successful small business. To which I say, "poppycock". (I would say something stronger, but this is a family-friendly enterprise.)
For instance, Michael Gerber, founder and chairman of E-Myth Worldwide and author of Awakening the Entrepreneur Within, said, in an interview with Chris Attwood of Healthy, Wealthy & Wise,
"... very, very few - an infinitesimal number-small business owners understand. They are not really inventors. They really aren't entrepreneurs. They're what I call technicians suffering from an entrepreneurial seizure. They simply create a job for themselves, and they create a business to do that job. Entrepreneurs don't do that. Entrepreneurs invent."
Mr. Gerber goes on to explain four other realties of the entrepreneur:
- entrepreneurs don't buy business opportunities; they create them;
- entrepreneurs love to be loved;
- businesses must grow; and
- everyone possesses the ability to be an entrepreneur.
Now personally, I don't see anything wrong with people creating jobs for themselves. And I take issue with the point about businesses having to grow; if people running businesses are making the living they want to make and are satisfied with the way their businesses are running, I don't see anything wrong with them continuing to do what they're doing rather than trying to grow their business.
While Mr. Gerber and others seem to feel that everyone needs to learn how to become an entrepreneur, I believe that a thriving business community needs both entrepreneurs and technicians. After all, who's going to buy the business opportunities the entrepreneurs have created?
So if you are what Mr. Gerber would call a technician and you want to start a business or buy an existing one such as a franchise, don't be put off; you don't have to be as ambitious as Ray Kroc to run a successful business.