ENTREPRENEURIAL

LEADERSHIPIf you are a block ahead of the parade you are leading it. If you are two

blocks ahead of the parade, you aren’t even in it

Dr. Lawrence Kratza

OBJECTIVES

ENTREPRENEURIAL

LEADERSHIP

LEADERSHIP

MODELS

STARTUPSOUTCOMES

PROS AND

CONS

WHAT IS ENTREPRENEURIAL

LEADERSHIP?

All entrepreneurs do not lead their

ventures the same way.

Entrepreneurs have a vision of

the company they want to build

and that includes images of a

growing business, fame and

personal wealth

(Bird, 1989)

Authentic Shared Transactional Transformational Vertical

LEADERSHIP MODELS

Confident, hopeful, transparent,

and gives priorities to developing

employees to be leaders

Luthans and Avolio, 2003

AUTHENTIC

A motivated workforce is essential for survival

in the global marketplace

(Hamel, 2000; O’Reilly and Pfeffer, 2000)

Motivation, decision making, task management, goal setting are done as a team

SHARED

Follet, 1924

The situation not the individual provides

the basis for leader

New venture top management team's performance is highly dependent on

building a unified vision of the firm's mission

TRANSACTIONAL

The situation, not the individual provides the

basis for leadership .

Leaders assess the situation to a number of factors:

potential outcomes, linkage between behavior and

outcome and the likelihood of the effort to obtain the

result.

Yukl, 1998

TRANSFORMATIONAL

Leadership is dependent upon charisma,

articulation of goals and definition of

roles, communication of high

expectations and engage in behavior

to arouse appropriate follower behavior

Weber, 1946

Transformational

leaders inspire and

excite their employees

with the idea that they

may be able to

accomplish great things

with extra effort.

gain extraordinary

commitment and

focus from their employees

VERTICAL

Transformational and empowering

types of vertical leadership are

essential for leading new ventures

toward high growth

Covin & Slevin, 2002

LEADER AS COMMANDER

Taylor, 1911

Scientific management movement in the early

20th Century

Shift to a more

collective model not

a singular leader

Bass, 1985; Burns 1978

ENTREPRENEURSHIP

According to Schumpeter (1934)

the primary function was

innovation

An entrepreneur organizes,

manages, and assumes the risksof a business or enterprise

Assumed to be the leader who relies on

people (e.g. venture capital, fiananciers,

employees, customers) to accomplish

purposes and objectives.

ENTREPRENEURa leader with the ability to define a vision of what is possible, and to attract people to rally around that vision and

transform it into reality

Becker-McKinneyIn 1957 this team did a series of interviews and identified two types of entrepreneurs.

Focuses on the past and present with specialized

technical education. This style also tends to have

low level of confidence and flexibility

CRAFTSMANOrientation to the future, advanced education

and social awareness.

OPPORTUNISTIC

The results supported the hypothesis that an adaptable firm lead by and opportunistic

entrepreneur will see the highest growth in terms of sales

Smith, 2009

CRITICAL

IMPORTANCE

OF ENTREPRENEURIAL

LEADERSHIP

WHEN

ESTABLISHING

START UP

TEAMS

Founding teams lead because no standard

operating procedures or organization

structures are available to fall back on as

there are in large corporations

THE START UP TEAM

Bryant, 2004

Founding top management will imprint a culture

into the company. The team creates a vision

necessary to attract resources (Baum, Locke &

Kirkpatrick, 1998). Founding management sets the

initial goals and reward structures.

CHARACTERISTICS OF

NEW

The leadership behavior of top management is likely to have a

greater and more direct impact on a firms performance. The

teams face more discretion and less bureaucracy

All ventures are not led the same way. Entrepreneurs have a

vision yet there is also a risk that the absence of

formalization may end up harming performance.

“

VENTURE TEAMS

ENTREPRENEURIAL

ENVIRONMENT

Many new ventures fail

because they are unable to

make adjustments quickly

enough

Stinchcombe, 1965

Clean slate, new

strategy formed,

survival and

nimbleness is key.

Characteristics of

Winning Startup Teams

5

SOLVE A

CUSTOMER

PAIN POINT

WITH YOUR

PRODUCT

1

If Henry Ford listened to his customers

they would have ended up with faster

horses”

Ability to deliver a positive customer

experience and to be flexible and

strike at the right point to continue

market share and revenue

growth

TIGHT TEAM ENVIRONMENT

2every employee also needs to be part of an innovative and collaborative

culture

Need to scale and replicate the success to retain the same

culture through nurturing, training and retaining employees

3 key elements

that create a

positive energy

Leadership

Trust

Strong Opinions

RELENTLESS

CUSTOMER FOCUS

3Discuss Product, People, Prospects and

Profits to give the entire team the big

picture and take customers

opinion

OPERATIONS AS A

COMPANY BACKBONE 4

Prevent future errors by learning from previous errors through the

learning cycle system

Link operations into tech

support, manufacturing, logistics,

and tie it closely to new

product introductions

START SELLING

EARLY

5

Early focus on sales is critical to future

funding and revenue growth

CONCLUSIONThe focus of leaders in the business should be to

build a strong company that can stand on

its own, rather than planning a specific exit strategy.

The right product, a tight team and a

focus on customers, combined with strong

operations and sales is a solid foundation for success.

There is no one-size-fits-all leader, but they do all

invariably have to be authentic to themselves and

to the team to achieve success with any venture.

CONTACT

www.trishcotter.com

pcotter@us.ibm.com , patricia.cotter@comcast.net

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