Note to Young Entrepreneurs: Shut Up!
A fascinating article in the New York Times provides a perfect object lesson for young entrepreneurs on the subject of Executive Foot in Mouth (FIM) Disease.
The background: There's a very cool program in Boston, Inner City Entrepreneurs, that helps small business owners who are new to entrepreneurship figure out how to grow their businesses. The group of 25 entrepreneurs meets like an MBA class and has lectures, projects, and sharing of ideas.
One of those entrepreneurs is Alex Whitmore, co-founder of Somerville, Mass.-based Taza Chocolate, which make stone ground organic chocolate bars. Alex is trying to decide whether to hire a sales director — a big decision for a 25-person company. Here's the FIM moment…I've added bold-face to reinforce my point.
Mr. Whitmore said he asked his classmates whether he should hire an experienced marketing manager: "Is now the time to hire a $60,000 or $70,000 sales director?"
Taza, Mr. Whitmore's company, produces […]