My last quarter in Northeastern University's Technology Commercialization program included an entrepreneur assessment. Throughout the short assessment, I just had to laugh at some of the obvious questions; Would you be willing to risk your savings or mortgage your home for an opportunity? Are you willing to quit your job to pursue this venture? Do you believe your new venture has excellent potential for success? Of course the answers are YES, YES and HELL YES! But I was shocked to see just how many fellow students failed to answer with an enthusiastic entrepreneurial YES. They all thought of themselves as visionaries and entrepreneurs. But when you respond that you certainly wouldn't quit your job or risk your savings to pursue your venture, then you have to scale back to visionary and forget about the entrepreneur moniker. You certainly can't expect an investor to [pony up their hard earned cash if you're willy nilly. And you can't expect your partners to take all the risks for you.
This brings us to the topic of today's post, partners. Like a marriage, a partnership is a very committed relationship. Before committing to a partner or partners, make damned sure each answers "YES" to at least the three questions in the previous paragraph. And don't stop there, actions or priorities of the partner might be another good indicator of entrepreneurial and therefore partnership qualifications. The entrepreneur will forsake the vacation for the venture, attend a graduation but then pop back into the office to contribute, make his or her daughter's ball game but answer the cell when you call. Pseudo-entrepreneurs, however, seem to take every possible excuse to not work like an entrepreneur. They'll proudly draw the line and place the venture second or third or further back in their line pf priorities.
Look, I'm not saying this is wrong. But it's not entrepreneurial. Make up your mind and don't waste my time. If you're talented but not committed, I'll take the risk and hire you later.
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