Millennials Not Entrepreneural

They talk a good game when it comes to entrepreneurship but in reality Millennials don't go into business for themselves. For example, a full 70% of Millennials stated they had interest in business ownership with only 13% having a desire to work in a corporate environment. But, actions and not intentions speak the truth, as only 2% of Millennials are self-employed compared to about 8% for Gen Xers or Baby Boomers. The reason: fear of failure. Millennials carry huge student debt which makes taking risks untenable and entrepreneurship is nothing but risk taking and the unknown.

Starting a business is a very hard endeavor. It takes a lot of self-motivation and is very risky vs. a 9-to-5 job.  In starting Fund-House, I knew that a big part of my efforts would be spent nurturing ideas and concepts with Millennials in quelling their innate fear of failure and financial loss. To accomplish this I needed to understand the demands placed on Millennials so as to allay their fear of failure.

Mentoring and solid guidance in the areas of  self-promotion, branding, PR and planning (the most wanting business functions for Millennials) were essential to succeeding  as a start-up/emerging business consultant - investor.   Millennials are smart, self-sufficient, and possess a great capacity to overcome adversity, most importantly, they are energetic and willing to sacrifice but many are lacking in having a tolerance for ambiguity and find themselves running in sand when dealing with team-building and human resource issues.

Our main must-do at Fund-House is to make our Millennial clients entrepreneurial and managerial. You need both disciplines to succeed at starting a business and seeing it through the emerging and performing stages of business growth.

Jim Lavorato