What we mean by Entrepreneurship?


Our view of entrepreneurship has been shaped by a definition David developed in teaching “Creativity & Entrepreneurship” to Bachelor of Business classes:

Entrepreneuring is the ability to install a new meaning in the marketplace.


This is the key to rare capability of an entrepreneur. It is an “end to end” capacity. And it is a conversational capacity from end to end.
  • Making new meaning is a conversational process –even if it has a large chunk of that special form of conversation with ourselves called “thinking”.
  • Conveying our idea to others is a conversational process.
  • Recruiting others to invest in  the development of our idea – investing their money or even a chunk of their lives – is a conversational process – and one that takes a lot of conversations to sustain!
  • Getting our idea into production, distribution or use is a conversational process


Few indeed can walk that talk from end to end. The sheer complexity and range of types of conversations mean that many fall at one of these hurdles. And someone who has an idea but can’t get it out is not an entrepreneur. Nor is someone who can peddle an old idea, but brings no new meaning, an entrepreneur.

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