Warning: Casual thought lies ahead!

I can imagine that some academic could come along and try to argue that everything–ok, all ‘market processes’–relates to entrepreneurship, but then the category (or ‘concept’) of entrepreneurship isn’t very practically useful. So in the name of being practical, perhaps we say that either something (a) relates to entrepreneurship, or (b) does not relate to entrepreneurship.

Let’s say that entrepreneurship and the state of being an entrepreneur are both objective phenomena.

Then suppose we begin saying that entrepreneurship requires value creation. Then those who sell products or services at a loss are not engaging in entrepreneurship? I have not read any research defining entrepreneurship as such.

OK. So entrepreneurship only requires the pursuit of value creation? Who doesn’t pursue value creation? A lazy chap who stays on the couch watching TV or staring out into space could argue that he is creating value by deriving new knowledge that he believes can be salable at a later date, in his head. Then everybody is engaging in entrepreneurship?

Is an entrepreneur based on (i) who you are (e.g. an ‘initial state’), (ii) what you are doing (e.g. behavior) or (iii) what you’ve found (e.g. value)? If option (ii), everybody is always an entrepreneur (or alternatively, it is fundamentally impossible to know whether somebody is an entrepreneur ex ante). If option (iii), an individual can be an entrepreneur one moment and then a non-entrepreneur the next moment. Imagine how painful it would be if you asked your friend Bob whether he was an entrepreneur and he gave you a different, seemingly random answer each time based on whether he made money that day or not. Option (i) represents the possibly the most useful meaning: “I’m an entrepreneur because I’m self-employed. Next year I will not be an entrepreneur because I have plans to work for somebody else.”

Option (iii) trumps option (i) because not everybody is self-employed. Option (iii) trumps option (ii) because very few people change jobs everyday.*

Yes, I chuckle as I write the immediately preceding sentence.

For the record, I think I’ve used the terms ‘entrepreneurship’ and ‘entrepreneur’ to represent all 3 of the above meanings, at some point or another, but while wearing an academic’s hat. (A paper under review–Hsieh, Nickerson, and Zenger–would agree that the entrepreneur is an idea-man/owner.) This post of mine speaks from a (arguably) more practical perspective: how we use terminology to efficiently communicate.

*Incidentally, insofar that entrepreneurs are merely the self-employed, why not just use one term or the other? Rough speculation based solely on experience talking to the type is that an individual calls himself ’self-employed’ if s/he is humble and/or low-ability. Individuals call themselves ‘entrepreneurs’ if they want to attract attention and/or are high-ability.