The “Others’ Mistakes” Fallacy
Every weekend I help my parents at their small business (it’s a mom ‘n pop convenience store). It keeps my feet on the ground, it reminds me of the importance of a few business fundamentals (like treating customers better than they expect to be treated when they walk through the front door), and it puts me in touch with a lot of interesting people.
Recently I was working with my mom when a friend of the family stopped for lunch. Pleasant man; Invariably he asks how college is going, and about what I plan to do when I graduate.
I told him that I’m not sure yet – that I’m working a few channels, but that I intend to be in business for myself.
“Get a job,” he told me.
Hate that.
He followed up by saying
“Go to work for someone else. Learn from his mistakes.”
That’s a little better – at least he supports his argument with some logic. And it’s buttressed by the adage, “A smart man learns from his mistakes. A wise man learns from the mistakes of others.”
I nevertheless take exception with this line of thought. Because it’s an oversimplification. Because it’s an easy way to encourage entrepreneurs to take up “real jobs.” And because it’s the product of a culture that is paralyzed by a fear of mistakes.
I argue here that while working for other entrepreneurs can afford up-and-comers valuable insights into the entrepreneurial experience, it’s only one way to learn. And moreover, it may be an inferior way.
It’s an argument for learning to start a business the way we learned to ride bikes: By falling, by trying again, and by making our own mistakes.
Because those lessons stick with us.
We can always (re: should always) have a mentor. In the bike analogy, a parent or a friend to coax us on our way. In business, someone who’s been there before, and who will challenge us to reach higher, perform better.
But for the time we spend working for someone else we (probably) aren’t in business for ourselves. And that sets a hurdle for what we must learn from “real jobs” in order that they should compensate not only for the time we could have spent developing our own enterprises, but also for what we could have learned by making our own errors. By testing the waters. By operating without a safety net.
Why assume that working under another entrepreneur is the best – or worse, the only – way to acquire the skills and abilities to start businesses?
Why not make some mistakes of our own?
Brian Lash is founder of The Tipping Blog and writes about the entrepreneurial experience at BrianLash.com
One Comment
Lawrence of a USA
March 18th, 2007 at 8:37 pm
obviously there’s pros and cons of each.
but i say: go ‘n do
start it up yourself, and learn the ropes - if you’re lucky…you’ll prosper.
if not, the lesson will be more valuable to you then if you’d learn it working for someone else.
…earn your stripes
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