Three Minds of a Business Owner

byNumerous

1K followers

8 years ago

This is the third in my series of E-Myth Revisited posts. The E-Myth Revisited examines the core myth behind what people believe an Entrepreneur is and what it takes in reality to make a small business successful. This series of posts will cover the core topics explained in the E-Myth Revisited book and apply them to being a Wealthy Affiliate and making money online.

Three Minds in One

Previously we talked about the Entrepreneurial Seizure and the Fatal Assumption. The E-Myth points out that the fatal assumption comes from the mind of the technician. However, it points out that the mind of the technician is just one of the minds embodied in a business owner. In fact there are three separate minds.

The Entrepreneur

The entrepreneur mind lives in the future. It sees opportunity in every obstacle no matter how small. It creates visions of the future that it desires to build. The entrepreneur mind deals with abstract ideas and manipulates them to find new opportunities. It constantly seeks to change the world around it to suit its vision.

This need for change can result in a great deal of chaos to surround the entrepreneur. This can be a challenge for those around the entrepreneur, and their unwillingness to participate often becomes an obstacle for the entrepreneur. The entrepreneur will often be forced to coerce, bribe, shmooze, or use any other available means to get others to help them build the entrepreneur's vision.

The Manager

The manager mind seeks order and control. They seek to place everything in it's place in the appropriate box. The manager is the planner and the organizer that keeps everything moving smoothly. Without the manger the entrepreneur's vision would never come to fruition.

Of course, the manager mind is in such stark contrast to the entrepreneur's mind that there is inevitably conflict. While the entrepreneur is creating chaos and change, the manager is running around trying to put everything back in it's place and vice versa. When an entrepreneur and a manager are in harmony great things can be accomplished. When they are not they drive each other absolutely crazy.

The Technician

The technician mind is the one that actually gets things done. They figure out how to make things work. The don't dream about what can be done, they play with things to figure out exactly how they are done.

The technician is at odds with both the entrepreneur and the manager. The technician wants to be left alone to tinker, but the entrepreneur and the manager continually get in the technician's. The entrepreneur is always disrupting the technician's work with new ideas and demands. The manager is always trying to make the technician be part of a well oiled machine, which takes all the fun out the technician's work.

The Conflict

Obviously, without careful effort these three different minds are constantly in conflict with each other. This is an even greater problem because all three of these minds are embodied in the business owner, so business owner is constantly in conflict with themselves. They all want to be boss, and so they each compete for control inside the business owner's mind. As control continually changes hands the priorities and focus of the business owner continually change directions and nothing ends up going anywhere.

Tomorrow we'll take a closer look at this conflict and how it manifests itself differently between a traditional small business owner and an internet marketer. I hope you found something useful in this post and I look forward to your thoughts and comments.