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Tag: business

August 15, 2025By Paula Pant

#634: Wharton Professor: The 7 Hidden Types of Entrepreneurs, with Lori Rosenkopf

Picture this: you’re 26 years old, fresh out of Wharton, and you decide to start a business with two friends. You spend years building a digital marketing firm that eventually works with Dollar Shave Club and Madison Reed. You bootstrap the entire thing without taking a dime of venture capital funding.

That’s exactly what one Wharton graduate did — and her story represents the reality of entrepreneurship that most people never hear about.

Lori Rosenkopf, a management professor at Wharton Business School and head of Venture Labs, joins us to shatter the biggest myths about starting a business. The Mark Zuckerberg college dropout story? It’s not just rare — it’s misleading.

Research shows that the most successful entrepreneurs, those in the top 0.1 percent of venture-backed firms, average late 30s to early 40s when they start their companies. Many continue launching businesses into their 50s and 60s. 

Your age and corporate experience isn’t holding you back from entrepreneurship — it’s actually giving you an advantage.

Rosenkopf breaks down seven different types of entrepreneurs, from disruptors who overturn entire industries to bootstrappers who build profitable businesses using their own resources. You’ll hear about a founder who disrupted the hair color industry in her 50s with Madison Reed, and a banker who built an entire financial services division inside Square.

We cover the rise of direct-to-consumer brands in 2013, why 80 percent of entrepreneurs are bootstrappers, and how artificial intelligence is creating new opportunities for people to start businesses without massive upfront investments.

Rosenkopf explains her “six Rs” of entrepreneurial thinking: reason, recombination, relationships, resources, resilience, and results. She argues that most people already think entrepreneurially without realizing it — even parents who optimize their family routines are solving problems through innovation.

We explore the world of “intrapreneurs” — people who build new businesses within established companies — and discuss acquisition entrepreneurship, where people buy existing small businesses instead of starting from scratch.

Whether you want to start a side hustle, position yourself for a promotion, or eventually launch your own company, Rosenkopf’s framework shows multiple paths to creating value through innovation.

Keep reading...

September 27, 2019Written By Paula Pant

The eerie similarities between owning rental properties and running an online business

In June, I flew to Atlanta and toured a few of my rental units. This was the second visit I’ve made to these properties in four years.

During that visit, I met with my property manager and a few of my tenants, and I had lunch with my contractor. He and I met at a suburban Atlanta strip mall. 

We ordered a basket of spicy chicken wings and fries, then took out a water-logged spiral notebook and planned a $20,000 renovation.

Here’s what the early brainstormed edition of those plans looked like:

Keep reading...

August 20, 2018Written By Paula Pant

How to Live Louder than the Sound of ‘Should’

One month ago, I made a speech at the World Domination Summit in Portland about the importance of being yourself, even if this requires setting difficult boundaries or relinquishing your people-pleasing tendencies.

If you’re a creative entrepreneur, such as an artist, writer, musician, designer, craftsman, entrepreneur, or any other type of creator … this is advice you might not have heard before.

I argue that your best business move is to stop giving a sh*t about what other people think. Even your customers.

It’s a counterintuitive philosophy, one that runs contrary to the seemingly-benign “I want to help others” mindset that’s preached in the world of online entrepreneurship. I argue that your effect on others is outside of your control, so the best thing you can do is be yourself and let the chips fall where they may.

Bending over backwards to please others is inauthentic and, ultimately, ineffective. People will be served the most when they see a confident, strong person who is true to themself.

Keep reading...

May 7, 2012Written By Paula Pant

We Bought a Third Rental House!

I can’t believe I’m saying this: Dear Readers, I’d like to introduce you to Rental House #3.

“But Paula, didn’t you just buy a house? A couple months ago?”

Yep, it feels fast to me, too.

Check out the pics, and meet me below the photos to hear the details.
(If you’re reading by […]

Keep reading...

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