The Age of Entrepreneurism

Dear CSS Members and Colleagues.

Enclosed is an article entitled “Age and High Growth Entrepreneurship” sent to me by one of my classmates at HBS. I thought it would be of particular interest as I am guessing the average age of those who will see this message is around 43-45? While this article by Azoulay et al considers the age of successful entrepreneurs from the standpoint of their start-ups, I would suggest that every one of you is an entrepreneur every day. You might be a businessperson, a surgeon, or perhaps your passion is music or art. Each of us strives to get better at what we do and those who succeed take risk (the definition of entrepreneur) and balance this with their day-to-day job stability. At HBS this is called Ambidextrous Leadership.

This article therefore, makes it clear that most of us are at, or slightly past, our maximum potential. In fact, Malcolm Gladwell writes in his book “Outliers” about the 10,000 hours of practice we need to reach our greatest potential. This article confirms this scientifically. Don’t worry about all of the methods, just read the abstract and the conclusion and ask yourself, “What will I do now?” ….just a little nudge from your friend and colleague JP.

Kind Regards,

“JP” Warner

Founder, CSS