Very Short Interview No.1

For this assignment I interviewed entrepreneur and business owner Michele Meyers. Meyers started a nail salon, several art galleries, and is now the owner of soap company. 

What Does it Mean to be an Entrepreneur?

For me, being an entrepreneur represents a freedom for me to take my creativity, vision, determination and tenacity and turn it into a business that can support me at the same time feed my inner desires to achieve more.   It also allows me to set my course in my direction and not that of others.  I believe that being a business owner doesn’t necessarily make one an entrepreneur.  It has been my experience that to be an entrepreneur one probably has an insatiable appetite for "what ifs."  My mind reels constantly with what if I did this or that or was here or there.  As an entrepreneur you take risks that many aren’t willing to take and you have to be able to look outside the box and find where your ideas fit.  It requires many sleepless nights wondering if the funds will be there to meet the demands as well as hoping others see in your business what you see.   I have always known that I wasn’t meant for mainstream even though I tried it for many years.  Given the unknowns, the worries, the ups and downs, the long hours, having to be jack of all trades and everything else that comes with building my own business, I could never trade it for a 9 to 5.  For me, that would mean settling and I don’t think an entrepreneurial spirit ever “settles.”

What do you think I should learn in an Entrepreneurship Course?

I believe you should pay special attention to how to set goals for you and your company and then applying those goals.  You should learn that numbers matter.  Know your numbers!!  You should also learn Location, Location, and Location.  It doesn’t matter if your business is a brick and mortar depending on foot traffic or you work from an internet site.  You must know that your business is in the right location for success and what locations dictate success for your type of business.  You also need to learn that you can’t be everything to your business.  You should always surround yourself with people smarter and more experienced than you.  Otherwise, you can’t grow outside of your own strengths as well as weaknesses.  Most importantly, I believe you should be made to read Think and Grow Rich by Napoleon Hill.  The secrets to success are all within that book if one applies it and I hope your professor introduces it to you.   All of these things are tools for your tool chest in owning and operating a business.  Entrepreneurship, I believe can’t truly be taught.  Entrepreneurship is a passion…you just have to learn how to apply the business skills to make the passion a reality.

What do you wish you had been taught in school before setting out on your own path as an entrepreneur?

I have a BA in Business Administration and what I found was that I had enough book knowledge to dip my toe in the pool of business ownership but I had little or no practical application knowledge.  What often sounded good in book theory didn’t apply to my business.  I wish I would have been taught more practical application and less theory.  Coming out of college I wasn’t prepared for the demands being self-employed would have on me.  I believe I needed a much stronger understanding of the numbers and how they apply.  Being able to prepare a pretty balance sheet does one no good if they don’t know how it truly applies to their business. I also wish I had learned more about commercial real estate so that maybe I wouldn’t have made some very costly mistakes when negotiating commercial leases.   Another obstacle I wasn’t prepared for was how to grow a business once it had a strong foundation.  All but one of the businesses I started is still in existence and thriving.  I birthed them and then passed them on to others to grow.  I admit I did this partly because the challenge and thrill was gone but also because I didn’t have the tools in my tool chest to take the business to the next level.   Above everything else I would have liked to have been introduced to applications contained in “Think and Grow Rich” by Napoleon Hill.  The techniques contained in this book, had I learned and applied them early on, would have probably lead me down different paths.  Maybe I would have set the world on fire or then again maybe I would have struck the match and let others build the fire.  Either way, it would have been my choice and not because I wasn’t prepared for my own success. 

What surprised me about this assignment was how passionate Mrs.Meyers was in her responses. Throughout the interview, Meyers shows deep passion when talking about entrepreneurship. This made me step back and really think about how entrepreneurs have to be fully invested in themselves and in what they are doing. Just like Michele Meyers said, "Entrepreneurship is a passion". Another thing that surprised me was the emphasis Meyers put on surrounding yourself with people who have more knowledge and experience than you. Some entrepreneurs go at success alone and that is often not the recipe for success.