Disruption
True entrepreneurship is disruptive. You can certainly be in business without being disruptive, but I wouldn’t call that true entrepreneurship. If assumptions are not put to the test and, at least, revalidated, then the promise of enterprising work is betrayed. A new enterprise must try to cross “regions of unfitness” in the fitness landscape. Trips across these regions of unfitness are challenging. Images of mountain climbing and arctic expeditions come to mind.
Mountain Climbing in India (The Silk Road Group)
During these hazardous trips, it certainly pays to be well-prepared. But it pays even more to be agile and prepared to do whatever is necessary to get across. Just attempting this kind of agility changes our fitness profile. What looks like an impossible path to the unpracticed is often a cake walk for the seasoned mountain climber.
Here’s an obvious point to keep in mind: live to climb another day and take another trek. Fortunately, few business situations are hazardous to one’s life and limb. There are business analogies to sudden death that one should avoid; they are mostly related to accounting and the law.
In the normal course of events, the hazards of entrepreneurial treks are not nearly as dangerous as we imagine. Disruption is challenging, but rarely life threatening.
