Is the Term "Entrepreneur" Overused amongst New Starters? 11 Experts Weigh-In

Photo by Ian Schneider / Unsplash

For me an Entrepreneur is someone who owns a business, employs people and is able to step away from that business if they have to for a brief period of time whilst it grows and they rest.

Over the years I’ve met a lot of people who have referred to themselves as entrepreneurs. Some of them were in fact entrepreneurs, but the rest of them were individuals who were either freelancing, just setting up shop or running their businesses by themselves without any hired help.

What I have come to notice lately amongst the next generation of business owners is that the word entrepreneur is thrown around way too much. From individuals sitting on ideas, or just having launched a blog they immediately start calling themselves entrepreneurs.

Some of them do go onto being successful entrepreneurs, but the majority of them don’t ever really get their ideas, businesses or blogs off the ground as they would have wanted to…but still they call themselves entrepreneurs…

So it got me thinking. We look at people like Richard Branson, Bill Gates and Elon Musk – they are called entrepreneurs in their field of expertise as they’ve been able to help change thousands, if not millions of lives over the course of their careers.

Then we look at the next generation of business starters calling themselves entrepreneurs, do you think the word “Entrepreneur” is being overused amongst new business starters?

I decided to drop a quick tweet on Twitter to a few people and asked them what they thought about the situation. Obviously my tweet wasn’t as detailed as this article, but they caught on to what I was talking about.

Do you think the term “Entrepreneur” is overused amongst new starters?

@Jacquesvh nope- doesn't matter what you call it as long as you are moving forward and taking shots! :)

— Jaime Tardy (@eventualmillion) January 30, 2015

@Jacquesvh Yep. Totally. I think it's kind of a douchebag term that's ego-loaded. Not in every case but too often.

— Jordan Harbinger (@TheArtofCharm) January 30, 2015

@Jacquesvh Maybe. Either way, what you call yourself isn't thing that matters. It's what you do that counts.

— James Clear (@james_clear) January 30, 2015

@Jacquesvh Not sure. I don't mind the term. As long as you are doing something somewhat innovative.

— Dan Norris (@thedannorris) January 30, 2015

@Jacquesvh No. You earn the right to be called an Entrepreneur when you get up every time you are knocked down

— Tom Corley (@RICHHABITS) January 30, 2015

@Jacquesvh Entrepreneurs imho is someone who builds a company that employs at least one other person full time.

— Dan Martell (@danmartell) January 30, 2015

@Jacquesvh The question is "Are they REAL entrepreneurs?". Do they have a 'company', employees, a customer base? Or are they just trying?!

— Chris Ducker (@chrisducker) January 30, 2015

@Jacquesvh yes. Sadly it's come to mean "startup" rather than fast growth.

— Daniel Priestley (@DanielPriestley) January 30, 2015

@Jacquesvh entrepreneurs have their biz pay their bills.

— noah kagan (@noahkagan) January 30, 2015

@Jacquesvh I guess so. Just because there are so many wantrepreneurs out there.

— Brian Dean (@Backlinko) January 30, 2015

@Jacquesvh no

— Grant Cardone (@GrantCardone) January 30, 2015

Conclusion

At the end of the day, James is right about what he said. It’s not about what you call yourself, but rather about what you do on a daily basis. Are you building your dream or are you building someone else’s dream for them?

Let me know what you think in the comments!