THE DREAM IN ACTION

What skills do you think the perfect entrepreneur needs to have? My answer would be (and I assume yours would be similar), the perfect entrepreneur has every skill that a business requires in order to get started and grow, then that same entrepreneur would have to have the leadership skills to guide a newly acquired group of people to continue to grow and eventually sustain that business.

In order to be perfect that single person would have to be able to take a startup from the foundation stages of a company, all the way to the operation stages of a full fledged business. It goes without saying that one person who has all of these skills is incredibly rare.  There are plenty of entrepreneurs who are phenomenal fund raisers, or fabulous technology/product people, and others are business model guru’s who know how to extract every penny from a customer. Then there are guys like Eric Ries who dominate when it comes to optimizing the startup process through concepts like minimum viable product and customer development. But still, it’s tough to find someone who can take you from nothing, to something, to something huge, then sustain it.

The Perfect Entrepreneur

The skills can be broken up into 3 categories, Finance, Product, and Leadership. I’ll clarify what each of them means to the business, then try to find someone who fits the bill. I think you know who I may chose.

Finance

An entrepreneur doesn’t need to be a statistician or a derivatives trader on Wall Street, but a certain level of financial competency is critical. Whether it’s going through the process to raise capital or  accounting, having a mathematical mind is important for a ‘business focused’ entrepreneur.

Product

Whether you’re working on the web or are selling mangos, the same principle applies, you have to know your product. It’s difficult for someone who doesn’t know anything about web design/development to be competitive in a web startup. And, similarly, if you were to try and open up a fruit stand and didn’t know anything about growing or selling fruit you’ll have a tough time. It’s critical that a savvy entrepreneur has a deep understanding of the industry and the product that they are working with.

Leadership

Whether you’re the product/technical guy, or the finance/business guy, leadership is the final straw that is necessary in the ‘successful entrepreneur equation’. It really doesn’t matter which person is the leader but in order to go from a nothing startup to a sustainable business you have to see the big picture and you have to be able to lead your team towards that big picture. That is leadership. When you’re raising venture money or hiring your first few employees you have to be able to paint the picture of where the company is going and communicate in that direction. If your goals are foggy and your mission is unclear you won’t convince VC’s to fund you, or be able to convince top notch employees to join your squad. After all it’s their lives your messing with so you better be able to deliver on your promise :)

Elon Musk

I read a lot about entrepreneurs who have been successful. I study their backgrounds, watch interviews to learn more about their persona and leadership styles. I emulate their positive traits as much as I can and think about how I can execute my story in a similar fashion. After studying Elon Musk I’ve found one of the most well rounded, complete entrepreneurs out there. He’s served as both CEO and CTO to many of the companies he’s founded and has had an incredibly successful (and profitable) track record with that model.

The minimum acceptable grade is excellent. That’s the way I believe startups should be run. -Elon

Currently, Elon Musk serves as product architect (product & technical) and the CEO (finance & leader) of the Tesla Motor Company. Tesla builds the worlds fastest 100% electric sports car. The Tesla Roadster is the envy of every big CEO & VC in the valley. Elon’s other company, Space X, who’s largest customer is NASA, and by the way, he’s the CEO and CTO of, is working on getting us (normal people, not just astronauts) into space. No small task.

Prior to SpaceX, Musk co-founded PayPal (originally X.com), the world’s leading electronic payment system, and served as the company’s chairman and CEO. Musk was the largest shareholder of PayPal until the company was acquired by eBay in 2002.

Before PayPal,  Musk co-founded Zip2 Corporation in 1995, a leading provider of enterprise software and services to the media industry, with investments from The New York Times Company, Knight-Ridder, MDV, Softbank, and the Hearst Corporation.  He served as Chairman, CEO, and Chief Technology Officer and in March 1999, sold Zip2 to Compaq.

Musk’s background extends across a wide range of advanced technology industries, from high energy density ultra-capacitors at Pinnacle Research to software development at Rocket Science and Microsoft.  He has a physics degree from the University of Pennsylvania, a business degree (Economics) from Wharton, and originally came out to California to pursue graduate studies in high energy density capacitor physics & materials science at Stanford. (background information from Planetary.org) Elon is about as well rounded and complete as they come in the entrepreneurship category.

Elon’s Interview at Web 2.0 Summit

How can you become more uber?

It’s more simple than you may think. You’ve got to continue learning and do not silo yourself within your domain of expertise.

For the business focused entrepreneur, step out of your comfort zone and have a technical discussion with your developers. Learn not just what they’re working on, instead learn why. Your ignorant perspective may just shed some light on something they are working on. Technical co-founders, take a minute to review the finances, look at the revenue and cost projections, you may have an insight into the timeline of delivery that will significantly help forecasts. Don’t spread yourself thin by trying to do every job, but it is your responsibility as an entrepreneur to understand the different components of your business. You may not have Physics and Economics degrees like Elon Musk but you do have the ability to get out of your desk chair and check out the other aspects of your business that you previously ignored.

How have you been able to become a more complete entrepreneur or contributor to your business?