Entrepreneurship isn’t easy. It requires bold action. On the following pages, we spotlight 50 entrepreneurs who dared to go big in the past year—and who can inspire us all to dare even bigger.
Elon Musk
The Right Kind of Daring?
Two business professors square off on today’s most talked-about founder— and why entrepreneurs should (or shouldn’t!) be like Musk.
Tesla is a well-publicized mess—behind on production, abandoned by its executives, and embroiled in an SEC investigation. Musk, too, often appears to be a mess—increasingly erratic on Twitter, lurching from one PR crisis to the next. But in 2018, his company SpaceX launched and landed a giant rocket (and then booked the first passenger for a trip around the moon), his hyperloop technology scored a contract with the city of Chicago, and his battery-making Gigafactory hit new strides. So is he a model to follow? Our experts square off.
He’s an Inspiration!
by Leonard Sherman,
professor of business,
Columbia University
Entrepreneurs are dreamers: To succeed despite the many obstacles ahead, they need to not only have a unique vision, but to also be relentlessly devoted to it. This is what makes Musk such a model worth following. Yes, he may at times be self-destructive, egomaniacal, and quixotic, but he’s also in the pantheon of greatest innovators of all time. May we all be so bold.
Steve Jobs, another flawed genius, might as well have been writing about Musk when he scripted the voiceover to Apple’s iconic “Think Dif - ferent” TV spot that aired in 1997. It kicked off: “Here’s to the crazy ones. The misfits. The rebels. The troublemakers.” And its bold conclusion: “Because the people who are crazy enough to think they can change the world are the ones who do.”
This story is from the November 2018 edition of Entrepreneur magazine.
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This story is from the November 2018 edition of Entrepreneur magazine.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 9,000+ magazines and newspapers.
Already a subscriber? Sign In
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THE INTELLIGENT READS
Hardika Shah founded Kinara Capital in 2011 with the mission to address the acute credit gap in the micro-small-medium-enterprises (MSME) sector in India, by providing fast and flexible business capital to small business entrepreneurs. Despite operating in highly competitive and tough market of collateral free loans, Kinara Capital has been steadily growing in Hardika's leadership. In conversation with Entrepreneur, Hardika shares insights on her favourite books.
THE CURSE OF GROWING TOO FAST
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There's No Perfect Answer
I worked the same job for 19 years. I hated it, but it paid the bills. Then, in 2017, I entertained an exciting but terrifying question: Could I be an entrepreneur? I wasn't sure, so I needed something that felt like a guarantee. I searched for signs that would feel like a big, clear \"yes!\"
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How to Become a Main Street Millionaire
It started when I bought one little laundromat. Now I have a whole portfolio of small local businesses that bring in tens of millions in revenue a year. Here's why following my playbook could be your ticket to financial freedom-and saving America's local small businesses.
Want to Better Serve Your Clients? Become Them.
As a designer for brands, starting my own product company gave me a dose of humility-and it changed the way I relate to clients.
How to Succeed With Gen Z Workers
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