Innovation is the new word for entrepreneurship. It needed a new tag since the Alan Bonds of this world sullied what used to stand for a lot of the good things like: thinking outside the nine dots, taking a punt and doing a lot of hard work.
Of course winners write the history, as they say, and with the indomitable West Australian out of jail and once again appearing in Australia’s rich list you have to ask “What is it about this guy and is he good or bad for Australia?”
Well, we would never have won the America’s Cup, that’s for sure. And in this country where sport is one thing everyone is really serious about – that should count for something.
Of course, some of Australia’s latest round of mining heroes (now gracing the rich list for the first time) are in Nickel, a previously unpopular investment on the stock market, but one that Bondie had in fact identified and was trying to get off the ground when his debt laden empire went all pear shaped and a billion dollars in luckless investors funds evaporated overnight.
Of course if a Nickel boom had propped Bondie up at the time who knows what he would be doing now? Sir Alan has a nice ring, for an expat pommie.
Which goes to the crux of the matter: “Can entrepreneurs never make a mistake?”
One only has to look at the UK’s undisputed greatest entrepreneur, that other knight, Sir Richard Branson’s chequered history to know the answer: Yes, they can and what’s more they usually do, often!
The real art of entrepreneurship is not so much with coming up with a new discovery, invention or technology but having the persistence to deliver on the idea – which in most instances will involve numerous misadventures or wrong turns, lots of nasty surprises/financial glitches and take decades to finally payoff.
This is compounded by the reality that the bigger the idea the more capital usually required and ergo the involvement of more investors to keep the founder’s ‘dream’ afloat.
When it succeeds wildly, everyone is happy and we have a great innovator. When it fails miserably, we have just another entrepreneur and a lot of out of pocket investors.
In a 21st century society, seemingly hung up on fast living and immediate riskless returns, the prospects for a quick return to a country willing to take a longer term view on ground breaking investments that carry no cast iron guarantees seems a long way off.
When you consider all the backbone industries that have made Australia the prosperous country it is today, they have always involved great risk.
For example, Agriculture – is there anything on earth riskier than being a farmer?
Mining – prospectors looking for a pot of gold – what else needs to be said?
The internet – the latest Nirvana for innovators and wannabee entrepreneurs - doesn’t sound quite so bad with company like that, does it?
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