The Art and Science of Business

I teach a course to experienced business and technical women (ACTiVATE) and was amused when one woman with a PhD in BioChemistry shared that she was surprised by how much art was involved in starting a business. She thought that it would be more scientific, more structured, more defined. Penny Pompei, who until recently ran the National Women’s Business Center relayed that she received calls weekly from people looking for the manual on starting a business. Some even wanted to know how they can get their grant from the government to start their business. If only it was this easy!

The truth is starting and growing a sustainable business is a careful mix of art and science. The science part is where you make sure you bring in more money than you spend. The art is finding something - a service or a product - that enough people or businesses will spend money on. It sounds much easier than it is for a number of reasons:

1) Just because you need something does not mean everyone or anyone else does, too. Or that they’ll be willing to pay enough for it that you can make a profit.
2) It is easy (and common!) to overestimate the willingness of people to change what they are doing, who is providing their service, or how they are getting their needs met. The best opportunities lie where pain is alleviated by making a change.
3) Many entrepreneurs underestimate the amount of money or time required to get a business idea off the ground. It always takes longer to reach your intended audience and requires more money than you think it should.

So does that mean that entrepreneurship is just about luck? Not totally. While timing is an important element of success in business, luck is merely the collision of opportunity and vision.

From what I have seen, the companies that focus on the market - what their customers want and how best to get it to them - are the ones that have the highest probability of success. The technology or service provided must be good, but it doesn’t have to be the best. Look at Windows. Bill Gates is a genius. His product was not the best on the market when it came out, but he built partnerships to get more applications on his operating system than his competitor (IBM). He also used innovative (some may call monopolistic) ways to get his product to his customers by having PC’s preloaded with Windows by the manufacturer. Brilliant! People who say otherwise are mad they didn’t think of it first.

Next week, I’ll look at why people decide to go into businesses for themselves. Drop me a line if you’ve got a good story to tell about what made you dive into self employment.