Where Did You Learn How to Grow a Company?

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18 ^% of the Inc. 500 CEOs surveyed had an M.B.A.

Sharkey: So it teaches you how to minimize the risk?

Rebh: Minimize the risk and build consensus.

Sharkey: Right now I'm starting a company in Argentina. And everybody is saying I'm crazy for doing that, because of the economic turmoil and the chaos down there. Normally, in chaos everybody is paralyzed, so whoever can move in, that's the opportunity. Of course, minimize your risks as best you can, but there's always going to be something.

Rebh: And we curiously are expanding our business into Argentina as well. We just signed Wal-Mart down there. And I suspect we wouldn't be able to find [such retailers] in normal times.

I never would have considered starting a business right out of business school. That wouldn't have been prudent. My on-the-job training has given me the confidence to make a lot of essential judgment calls. But having said that, I don't think Floorgraphics would be where it is today if it were being run by someone who hadn't been to a business school. For starters, I don't think we would have gotten funded without a formal business structure -- that is, the business plan and the financials and the analyses -- because the idea was relatively unstructured.

Sharkey: Both experience and business school, in your case, definitely helped. But I believe that, even with experience, if you don't have certain personality traits, you can start all the companies you want, and unless you're the luckiest son of a bitch in the world, it ain't gonna happen.

Rebh: I totally agree. A successful start-up is based on a great idea that generates a whole lot of momentum, people dedicated to persevering through the inevitable disappointments, and a lot of luck. If you don't have all three, you won't make it.

Thea Singer is an associate editor at Inc.

A Little More Than Kin

Inc. 500 acorns often turn up in the vicinity of entrepreneurial family trees. Asked who inspired them to start a business, many CEOs over the years have cited their fathers and mothers. Elizabeth Harrison, cofounder of Harrison & Shriftman (#347) -- a special-events, publicity, and marketing service -- traces her role model a generation further back.

"My mother has often said that I have my grandfather in me," says Harrison. "But until recently, I didn't see it. My grandfather, Sandy Smith, was one of the founders of the Anne Klein fashion label in 1968. But his entrepreneurial roots go deeper. He made the money that permitted him to launch Anne Klein by introducing fake fur to the United States.

"To me, my grandfather was the essence of glamour and success. He and my grandmother would pack their Louis Vuitton steamer trunks and travel to exotic places. He had a beautiful mansion in Woodmere, Long Island; beautiful cars; and a lavish lifestyle. While intimidating to my mother and her brother, he was extremely loving and approachable to me. My entrepreneurial drive, I think, derives from that mix of adoration and admiration.

"Like my grandfather, my mother, Marianne Smith, saw entrepreneurship as a way to control her destiny. It was also a way to escape the boredom of suburban Connecticut. Trained as a knitwear designer, she'd stopped working when I was born. But when I was 12, she borrowed money from the bank and secured it with our home. Then she and Jill Kollmar -- her best friend from boarding school, who also happened to be the daughter of gossip columnist Dorothy Kilgallen -- rented a tiny office in the garment district, and Smith Kollmar was born. Her customers included the best department stores and specialty shops in the country.

"Smith Kollmar flourished, but after seven years my mother decided to move on. Her entrepreneurial instincts came to the fore again 15 years ago, when she and my father spotted a dilapidated 1820s plantation house in Beaufort, S.C., and decided to restore it as an inn, even though neither had previously set foot below the Mason-Dixon Line.

"When I started Harrison & Shriftman, in 1996, my parents were anxious but optimistic. Today my business partner, Lara Shriftman, and I have 35 employees; offices in New York, Miami, and Los Angeles; and clients that include Miramax, Jimmy Choo, and Cartier. In 2000 we jumped to $2.3 million in revenues -- an increase of 488% over two years before. I guess that's when I realized I really did have something of my grandfather in me."

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