Black Swans and the 4th Grade

 

Bob Biehl is a great consultant, an excellent speaker, and one of my favorite authors.  I’ve read almost everything he’s written; I’ve also attended two of his one-day seminars entitled “A Day with Bob Biehl.”  These workshops are usually held near an airport so that executives and ministry leaders from around the country can fly in the morning of the event and depart early that same evening.

 

I was so impressed by the first “day with Bob” that I took my son, my son-in-law, and a young sales manager from work the second time around.  The president of Focus on the Family, a Vice President from Chick-fil-a, a number of successful business owners, and directors of multiple international ministries were among the attendees.  

 

At the end of the day Biehl fielded questions from the audience on any topic.  One attendee asked, “Can entrepreneurship be taught?”  Biehl’s answer was, I thought, profound.  He stated that although some people can learn entrepreneurship later in life, most entrepreneurs surface in the 4^th grade.  Jaws dropped around the room, and before mouths could close, Biehl asked, “How many of you in the room are entrepreneurs?”  A number of hands went up. 

 

Beihl pointed at those raising hands one by one with the same question, “What were you doing in the 4^th grade?”  Without exception, all answered with statements like, “I had a paper route at 5:30 every morning,”… “I asked my dad for a job at his business,”… “I mowed lawns for extra money,”…”I fixed bikes,”…”I strung tennis rackets.”   I was stunned, and sobered at the reality of Biehl’s illustration – a point he had made at similar meetings for over twenty years.

 

Yesterday I downloaded version 2.0 of the iPhone software.  Several weeks ago I downloaded a video of Steve Jobs’s announcement of the upgrade to his industry leading communication tool (leading by about 10 light years).  The iPhone is a Black Swan (good bird), so is the iPod.  Both changed the rules in their respective industries.  I’d love to ask Jobs what he was doing in the 4^th grade.

 

Do you see the buds of a growing entrepreneur in your son; even if he’s only in the 4^th grade?  If you do, I encourage you to cultivate it and allow him to be involved in entrepreneurial activities beyond his age.  You may be planting the seeds of dreams that could result in Black Swans that rock the next generation – maybe the next iPhone, maybe the next cure…like this teenager:

 

 

What’s Your Home Run?

I borrowed that question over a decade ago from my soul brother Doug Tatum (who, by the way, just released a great business book entitled No Man’s Land – check your local Borders).   I’ve used the question with corporations, friends, and family.   It’s great for a business creating new products or strategic direction – it’s also a “fog cutter” for an individual to help him or her verbalize their life dream.

Let me rephrase the question by borrowing from another individual I highly respect, author and consultant Bob Biehl:

If God told you that you could do anything; you had unlimited resources – time, energy, money, etc. – and you knew you could not fail, what would you do?

Popular author John Eldredge calls it our God-given “Desire”;   I have another friend who is building an entire ministry around “Dreambuilding”.   Young men need dreams – they need to have the freedom to think about how it would feel to hit it out of the park with their life, doing what they do best:

I want every young man to answer the question – “What is your home run?”

But first they need the tools to answer the question.