3 ms·
The choice of words is telling. Serious entrepreneurs (even unsuccessful ones) are not "fetishizing" failure at all. To be an entrepreneur is to live and brea
by dasil003 14y ago
The choice of words is telling. Serious entrepreneurs (even unsuccessful ones) are not "fetishizing" failure at all. To be an entrepreneur is to live and breathe execution, and fetishizing something is not effective execution under any circumstances.
The "cult of failure", as the author puts it, is nothing more than entrepreneurial common sense; an inevitable reaction against the status quo of safety-seeking behavior that causes people to be so failure-averse as to avoid risking anything. Such common conservatism is of course anathema to the essence of entrepreneurialism, and therefore it gets a lot of ink in the echo chamber.
But don't confuse this budding nugget of conventional wisdom as the cause of a wholesale exodus from common sense. The whole article is setting up a giant straw man that could only be applicable to people who are so hopelessly mired in the mythology (and/or tabloidism) of the startup world as to be effectively impotent in actual execution, and thus unworthy of any serious consideration to begin with.
In other words, no one seriously believes that failure is an end unto itself.
- wtvanhest 14y agoI agree with you fully. My experience has taught me that the people I want to associate with have a narrow definition of risk and are not willing to fail. I have met "entrepreneurs" who have said things like, "if this fails, we will just do another project! No big deal, failure is part of the process" conversely I have met people in corporate America who assume that any financial or personal risk is completely ridiculous to take. The 3rd group I have met are entrepreneurs who are willing to take a personal and financial risk while assuming success will be there's despite the odds. They never talk about failure because it simply isn't an option until it is inevitable. They stay consistently focused on execution and do not worry at all about the potential for failure because at their core it doesn't matter. People in the 3rd group are the people I want to work with every time. They take well calculated risks naturally and deliver results.
- Evbn 14y agoCare to fill in the explanation of how people who ignore assign 0 probability to failure take well calculated risks?
- deleted 14y ago[deleted]
- wtvanhest 14y agoThe basic idea is that people who assume things will work out make better decisions. If you think you will be successful, individual interactions take on less importance, and you can execute in an efficient way.