entrepreneurship Archives - Page 3 of 24

You Don’t Want to Be an Entrepreneur, You Want What It Represents

Friday, 25 July 2025 by Paul O'Brien

If you’re asking why you want to be an entrepreneur, you probably already shouldn’t be. That’s not snark (well, not only snark), it’s insight. I wanted to write this because becoming an entrepreneur, taking entrepreneurship studies, or questions about how to be one, are prolific topics in modern society. The things, entrepreneurs, real ones, aren’t

Published in Insights / Research, Startups, Uncategorized

17 Comments

We Already Know How to Do This: Stop Reinventing Startup Development Organizations

Friday, 11 July 2025 by Paul O'Brien

Recently, someone asked me, “How do you make a training center for entrepreneurs to be self-sustaining and not just dependent on investors?” And I nearly threw a stapler. Not because the question isn’t valid, because it is, but because we’ve been answering it for decades. The model exists. It’s tested. It’s been done over and

education entrepreneurship incubators property space startup development organizations

Published in Economic Development, Startups

27 Comments

Stop Pitching Your Startup Like It’s a Science Fair Project

Monday, 07 July 2025 by Paul O'Brien

Nobody cares about your startup. And it’s not because they’re stupid, or you’re too early. It’s because you’re saying the wrong damn thing. I’ve learned through my own startup, as well as working with hundreds of founders through incubators, that the answer to your frustration with this is always the same. The problem founders always

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Published in Startups

46 Comments

Why is “Are startup founders different?” Still a Meaningful Question??

Thursday, 03 July 2025 by Paul O'Brien

It’s always amusing when mainstream media stumbles into a conversation the rest of us have been having for, oh, I don’t know… decades? This week, The Economist decided to pose the bold question: “Are startup founders different?” as if it’s some new frontier of behavioral science. Imagine walking into a neuroscience conference and breathlessly announcing

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Published in Insights / Research, Startups

20 Comments

You Don’t Need Traction. You Need to Understand Why They Say You Do.

Friday, 13 June 2025 by Paul O'Brien

There’s a special kind of eye twitch that founders get the 37th time they hear, “We’d love to invest, but you need more traction.” It’s a vague hand-wave of a dismissal that sounds helpful, but is really just cowardice in a hoodie. And when you ask what kind of traction they mean, they blink like

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Published in Insights / Research, Raising Capital, Startups

11 Comments

From Texas to Tulsa: How Innovation Shifts to Opportunity

Wednesday, 04 June 2025 by Paul O'Brien

Differentiation If someone told you Tulsa was the next hub for startups, your first reaction might be to squint and wonder if they meant it ironically. Tulsa? Really? Isn’t that where Route 66 nostalgia and oil wealth go to retire? Here’s the thing: the people still asking that question are the same ones who laughed

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Published in Regional Development

11 Comments

New Collar Jobs and the Critical Distinction of Startups from Small Businesses

Thursday, 29 May 2025 by Paul O'Brien

Today at the Texas Venture Forum in Austin, TX, we had the honor of hearing from the 28th Administrator of the U.S. Small Business Administration, Kelly Loeffler. Loeffler, a former business executive, co-owner of a WNBA team, and founder of a commodity exchange, now carries a unique blend of corporate, public, and policy experience to

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Published in Economic Development, Startups

14 Comments