Yesterday, I had a chat with a person (let’s call him Eric) I met during a squash game. After the game, while Eric and I were chatting, I briefly explained what I do for a living: build new businesses from ground up. Eric was curious what this meant and, at one point, he asked me what industry I worked in. I told him that I have been in a variety of diverse industries, such as scientific space exploration and commercial aerospace, biotechnology and life sciences, information technology (IT), and manufacturing. He was puzzled. He asked me how could I go from one industry to a completely different one and build a business. I tried to explain to him that the fundamentals were the same but each engagement I entered was a significant learning experience and that is what drives me. I told Eric that I take each engagement as a new challenge that I have to learn from the basics, but do it quickly and efficiently. I knew what to look for, how to gather the information I need, what to pay attention to and what to ignore, how to create support and raise funding. I went on and on, partially because I just love it and partially because I wanted to make it clear.
This morning, I received an email from a friend, who pointed me to a video his son recorded. As a side note, Kripparrian is entrepreneur I wrote about in an earlier posting (http://ferhanbulca.com/2012/07/25/have-a-vision-follow-your-dream-with-discipline/). Here is the video: http://tinyurl.com/9hc8u8l.
I found the most profound statement I should have said yesterday between 0:45-1:00 mark on the videa where Kripparrian states that “… the only thing you have from your previous [experience] is your ability to learn.” When I heard this, I thought this is the answer I should have given to Eric yesterday. Kripparrian summarized what I was trying to say in a succinct and eloquent way and I thought to myself “I wish I said that.”
I welcome your comments on my blog. Please feel free to contact me at ferhan@ferhanbulca.com with relevant comments, ideas and thoughts.
Filed under: business, Consulting, Entrepreneur, entrepreneurship, Innovation, Intrapreneur
