Entrepreneurs Aren’t Exactly Doom-and-Gloomers

According to the U.S. Small Business Administration, many successful entrepreneurs have similar traits and characteristics, including:

• Persistence
• Desire for immediate feedback
• Inquisitiveness
• Strong drive to achieve
• High energy level
• Goal-oriented behavior
• Independent
• Demanding
• Self-confident
• Calculated risk taker
• Creative
• Innovative
• Vision
• Commitment
• Problem solving skills
• Tolerance for ambiguity
• Strong integrity
• Highly reliable
• Personal initiative
• Ability to consolidate resources
• Strong management and organizational skills
• Competitive
• Change agent
• Tolerance for failure
• Desire to work hard

In sum, they are not the kind of people who tend towards pessimism or who easily lose heart. With that in mind, the perspectives detailed by the nation’s largest non-profit foundation devoted to entrepreneurship in the following report, “Entrepreneurs’ Gloom Contradicts Wall Street Optimism,” should give (further) pause to those who believe a “V”-shaped recovery is at hand:

Kauffman Foundation poll of entrepreneurs suggests economic growth engine still in low gear

Nation’s primary job creators say government should do more

The Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation today announced the results of a new survey of American entrepreneurs showing that entrepreneurs and small businesses continue to struggle despite increasing optimism on Wall Street. One week before Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke made the statement that the recession is “very likely over,” two-thirds of entrepreneurs reported that the economy is heading in the wrong direction.

In the past year, more than one-third of the entrepreneurs surveyed have shed jobs while only five percent of entrepreneurs have added employees. A majority of entrepreneurs believe that the stimulus package has hurt entrepreneurial activity, and entrepreneurs want government to pursue a fundamentally different approach to encourage entrepreneurship.

“In America, entrepreneurial activity is a leading force in the health and growth of our economy,” said Carl J. Schramm, president and CEO of the Kauffman Foundation. “These results confirm that we’ve got a long way to go before we’re in the clear.”

Later this week the Kauffman Foundation will release details of a new initiative designed to enable entrepreneurs to have more influence on decisions that impact small business growth and job creation.

Kauffman Foundation studies have shown that entrepreneurs have historically been key drivers of economic recovery in past recessionary periods. Since 1980, companies less than five years old have accounted for virtually all net new job creation in the United States.

“Pessimism and revenue loss among entrepreneurs on the front lines of the economy indicate that the fruits of economic recovery have yet to hit Main Street,” Schramm said.

Other key findings include:

• 69 percent of entrepreneurs believe the recession will last one to two years longer
• 75 percent think the United States cannot have a sustained economic recovery without another burst of entrepreneurial activity

Pollster Doug Schoen surveyed more than 250 entrepreneurs and 150 “would-be” entrepreneurs from Sept. 8 to Sept. 12, 2009. An entrepreneur was defined as someone who has started a business and is currently running it. A would-be entrepreneur was defined as someone who would like to start a business.

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