Are you an "Intellectual" Entrepreneur?
Dear CSS Colleagues:
Do you have what it takes to be an intellectual entrepreneur. It takes courage, persistence, and patience to innovate and change a clinical paradigm when it comes to established care. Examples of individuals who were able to do just that are Dr. Paul Grammont who developed the Reverse Shoulder Replacement and Prof. Reinhold Ganz who developed the Hip joint preservation approach that led to hip arthroscopy for such conditions as Femoroacetabular impingement. Each of these entrepreneurs boot-strapped their innovation with no grants or external funding.
As we may each view our potential as an intellectual entrepreneur and leader in healthcare, it would be wise to do so through the lens of the enclosed short article from HBS Working Knowledge. This article considers characteristics of successful entrepreneurs. I bet both Grammont and Ganz had some of these characteristics. However, while they each clearly had the ability to “identify opportunities” + “comfort with uncertainty” + “a low satisfaction with the status quo” they worked largely independently. Modern entrepreneurs and founders need more skills in getting from a vision to a viable solution or product. It is also interesting to see how males and females may have different strengths and weaknesses.
Context is also important. Grammont and Ganz innovated at a time and in a place with a less complex regulatory environment though they probably received great criticism for their innovative ideas that threatened the status quo. In the current climate of large AMC’s (Academic Medical Centers) and prevailing regulatory barriers to innovation, it is even more difficult to have the courage to see problems in a different light and take calculated risks to devise new treatments and products for our patients.
Kind Regards,
“JP” Warner, MD
Founder, The CSS
