Jonathan King '87, Stonewall Kitchen

Diane Jackson Cole '74, DJC Design Studio

Peter Getman '90, Barrett McDevitt '85 and Michael DesRochers '86, MicroArts

John Laymon '73, JRL Enterprises

The Entrpreneurial Edge

Are you ready for the roller-coaster ride of your life?

See also:
Educating the Entrepreneur
Are You an Entrepreneur

By Kimberly Swick Slover

ohn D. Rockefeller and Andrew Carnegie took decades to become billionaires. Jeff Bezos of Amazon.com, Jerry Yank of Yahoo!, Meg Whitman of eBay and Steve Case of America Online became billionaires in fewer than five years. God bless the new economy!

With such examples before them, more than a million Americans launched their own businesses in 2000, seeking independence and wealth. But becoming an entrepreneur is risky, and failure can be every bit as sudden as success, as the "dot-bomb" phenomenon in the stock market illustrates.

"The entrepreneur today is a creative visionary, constantly in the process of identifying and exploiting new opportunities," says Mike Merenda, a 24-year veteran professor of strategic management. "But the dot-bombs showed us that while it's great to catch a new wave, entrepreneurs stand a much better chance when they have a solid understanding of business fundamentals."

The Whittemore School of Business and Economics has been preparing students for entrepreneurial success for 33 years. It has just launched a new option for business administration majors called "Entrepreneurial Venture Creation" (see Educating the Entrepreneur). But everyone associated with EVC is quick to note that their purpose is not to teach people how to become entrepreneurs. In fact, they say, that's something that probably can't be taught.

"Our intent is not to create entrepreneurs, but to make them successful," says Bill Naumes, associate professor of management. "By the time students get to us, a lot of social and environmental factors have already had a major impact on their orientation as entrepreneurs. They are independent self-starters and risk-takers who aren't willing to work within the structure. We show them how the basics of business apply to small, but potentially rapidly growing, companies."

In preparing this article, we interviewed a number of UNH graduates who run their own businesses, asking each what it takes to be a successful entrepreneur. Their experiences in growing their businesses (described by one grad as "the roller-coaster ride of my life") suggest that successful entrepreneurs are both born and made. They start with extraordinary drive and capacity for hard work, develop a healthy sense of self-confidence and a strong work ethic (shaped in large part by nurturing families and mentors), and acquire essential knowledge, skills and insight through a good education.

Interestingly, none of these entrepreneurs bears much resemblance to better-known corporate icons famous for their aggressive tactics, down-sizing prowess and laser-like focus on the bottom line. Instead, they've built businesses around their interests and skills and convinced others to join them in pursuit of a vision. They've maintained a competitive edge, moved into new markets, embraced new technologies and pulled through tough times. In the process, they've empowered rather than exploited the people around them, and each has achieved his or her own version of the American dream.