Should Everyone Be an Entrepreneur?

The video Matt is reviewing today suggests that we ALL should be entrepreneurs. But how would that even work? Watch to see Matt debunk this suggestion.

There are tons of people out on social media giving business advice. Some of it is good advice, but most of it isn’t good. In this series watch CapForge’s owner react to different advice videos. He’s an expert in all things business and has 20+ years of experience under his belt. Some of the things he reacts to might even surprise you!

Video Transcript: 

Business Advice Video: 

Everyone should be an entrepreneur because if you get fired today, what’s your backup plan? Go on indeed.com and pray. Having an entrepreneurship where you can have your own business and if you start it right now you have the option. I know a lot of people who have very successful side businesses and they’re happy with their day jobs and that’s great. And there’s other people like myself that were always frustrated having a day job. I do believe there’s a misconception and something that most people get wrong is that you can’t do what you enjoy or passion or dream about and make a lot of money doing it. I don’t believe that.

Matt’s Review: 

Okay, I take issue with the idea that everybody should have their own business. If everybody has their own business, who is going to work at those businesses? There will be a million one-person businesses, and one-person business can’t actually do that much, right? One-person business can be fine doing something basic, graphic design, building websites, doing tax returns. But I’d like to see a one-person business build an airliner, or a bridge across a river, or a high-rise office building, or a ton of other stuff that no one-person business can accomplish, right? And try to manage 50,000 one-person businesses to build a high rise would be a nightmare. So no, everybody should not be an entrepreneur. If you’re suited, if you have a skill or ability to do something, and it makes sense to do it yourself instead of working for somebody, great. But that’s not a lot of people situations, and sometimes that changes. Different times in your life it makes sense to work for somebody, different times in your life may make sense to do your own thing, but everybody should not automatically be an entrepreneur. And you can get fired and immediately have five more job offers. It depends what you do, and what the timing in the market is, and everything else, where you’re working from, or can you work remote. So it’s fine to have a Plan B. I know a lot of people who’ve been in and out of work and never had a problem with it. So having your own business is not the solution automatically. And by the way, having your own business can be really hard. A lot of people have their own business and then quit and go get a job because they lost more money than they made doing it. So there’s never an always this or a solution that fits everybody. So I don’t know what product or business start-up plan he’s particularly pitching but I guarantee it doesn’t work for everybody. It’s not a fit for everyone. 

And I also think that it’s not necessarily accurate to say that you can make money doing whatever your passion is. Maybe you can, but maybe you don’t want to, right? If your passion is playing golf but then how do you make money doing that? You’re not good enough to be a professional golfer, so you go open a golf store. But now you’re stuck at the store. What you really like was playing golf, not standing behind a counter talking to people about golf bags, and trying to sell them golf clubs. It’s two totally different things. So sometimes there’s an alignment between your passion and what you can do in your business to make a living, but a lot of times there isn’t. A lot of times what you really should be doing, in my opinion, is growing your business to where it can give you time off to then go enjoy your passion, right? You do your business and you go play golf or you go scuba diving or you go do whatever it is that you love to do in your free time. Your business is now giving you the time and the financial freedom to go enjoy your passion. But not trying to build a business around your passion because a lot of times it just doesn’t make any sense.