Erb is a member of the generation we've come to call "Y" (or "Generation Why?" the "Me Generation," the "Net Generation," the "iPod Generation," "Echo Boomers," and most recently, "Generation O" for the enormous role they played in President Obama's election). They were born between 1977 and 1997, and you can call them what you like; I call them the entrepreneurial generation. There are approximately 77 million of them, and their sheer numbers, combined with the rate at which they're starting businesses, will make them a force to be reckoned with. And because their approach to entrepreneurship is so different from that of previous generations, these "Upstarts" are destined to have a profound effect on the economy and specifically on the small-business landscape. It's the purpose of this book to document this revolution and to paint a narrative portrait of this entrepreneurial generation.
"Starting your own business is the most creative thing you can do. It's a living, breathing work of art." -- Shazi Visram, Happy Baby Food
Upstarts! began to take shape three years ago, after the publication of my first book, Alpha Dogs: How Your Small Business Can Become a Leader of the Pack (Collins, 2005). Alpha Dogs chronicled the success of eight extraordinary companies that had achieved entrepreneurial greatness not by virtue of what they make or sell, but because they were masters at setting themselves apart from the pack through their sophisticated business strategies -- strategies that all small businesses must master if they want to survive and thrive in an increasingly cutthroat economy. In Alpha Dogs, I mentioned four compelling competitive challenges that are forcing small businesses to become more strategic: the growing number of demanding and fickle consumers; industry consolidation, which breeds huge competitors; advances in technology, which allow big competitors to look small and intimate and small ones to look formidable; and market saturation by a burgeoning number of products and services.
But shortly after I began to speak to audiences about Alpha Dogs, I realized that something huge and exciting was happening in the world of small-business creation and that I needed to add a fifth challenge: An emerging group of young, brash, and highly educated "upstart" entrepreneurs was beginning to raise the bar for mature companies in every industry. Everywhere I looked, I saw Joel Erbs.
An Entrepreneurial Revolution
Technology, it seemed, was helping entrepreneurial dreams come true for a whole new demographic. Company founders were getting younger and smarter, and they appeared to be undaunted by -- or naively unaware of -- the challenges that make small-business survival such a risky proposition. If a young person were inspired and inclined, he or she might dip a toe into the world of commerce with a mere click of the mouse. Fifteen-year-olds could make a killing on eBay or, like Joel Erb, pass themselves off as seasoned Web developers not by means of deceit, but simply by cloaking themselves in the anonymity of the Internet.
"When I started the company, I had to go to customer dinners with a fake ID." -- Rachel Hennig, Catalyst Search
Like previous generations of entrepreneurs, they're driven by the desire for financial independence, motivated by the sudden perception of an unmet market need, eager to sell a newly conceived product or service, or convinced that they can improve on something that already exists in the marketplace. Or maybe they're just having fun. To them, the decision to start a business is not particularly intimidating; for better or worse, it's often not thoroughly planned out. It may start out with a tiny germ of idea like, "Hey, I really like design, and I'm good with computers, so let me take a crack at mocking up some Web sites for clothing designers." Startup costs? Nil. Risk? Nonexistent. Support? Abundant. Parents, teachers, and mentors provide everything from words of encouragement to advice to financial backing, sending a "can-do" message that may have seemed imprudent or indulgent 10 years ago. Welcome to the new lemonade stand.
Some of these young CEOs approached me directly; others made their way onto my radar screen via a great number of breathless public relations pitches, which I typically ignore unless I begin to discern a trend. In this case, I most certainly did. But I was captivated by more than just anecdotal tidbits about "baby" CEOs.
A study by Intuit and the Institute for the Future predicts that "Generation Y will emerge as the most entrepreneurial generation ever." Sean Rush, Junior Achievement Worldwide (JA) CEO and president, says that JA's curriculum is now being taught to more than 4 million U.S. students, some as young as five years of age; that represents a 50 percent increase over 10 years. The organization, which teaches kids workforce skills, the basics of entrepreneurship, and financial literacy, also polled 1,155 teenagers and found that 69 percent of them wanted to start a business. The SBA recently started partnering with JA to launch a business portal for teens and reported that nearly two-thirds of college students want to start their own businesses. According to the Kauffman Foundation, a Kansas City not-for-profit that tracks and funds entrepreneurship initiatives, there are more university-based programs than ever to help them do just that -- a phenomenon that's a direct result of exploding demand among student populations and one that's helping foment a new kind of entrepreneurial revolution.
