BY MAGGIE SHAFER
hen my husband, Steven, and I got married, he was a milkman. As a liberal arts graduate fresh from Colorado State University, it had only taken a few months in the proverbial “real world” for him to realize no one was looking to hire an amateur literary critic at the height of one of the worst recessions our nation has seen. It didn’t matter how many classics he had read—or how many hours he scoured Craigslist. And so, he drove a dairy delivery truck. Then he discovered woodworking. Within a year, we opened a custom furniture business with Steven’s best friend. The venture ended nine months later—but not before Steven discovered he had the potential to be his own boss, that he works longest and hardest when no one is keeping time and that sometimes, when the right job doesn’t exist, maybe it just hasn’t been created yet.
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THE ENTREPRENEURIAL RENAISSANCE
Steven’s entrepreneurial spirit is no exception in our generation. According to a recent study by Forbes, 30 percent of Millennials have started a business while in college, and 92 percent see entrepreneurial education as “vital” to the economy. Simon Johnson, a professor of entrepreneurship at MIT’s Sloan School of Management, says this kind of “entrepreneurial renaissance” is common in the midst of an economic downturn. Limited career options, he says, inspire Millennials to use whatever resources they have to create their own job opportunities. In other words, more young people today are going to work for themselves simply because they are the only ones hiring. “Many have realized the job market is not coming back and you must innovate your way into the workforce,” says Scott Gerber, founder of the Young Entrepreneur Council. “The starting salary out of college is now only $20,000 to $30,000, often without health benefits. So more and more of them have nothing to lose.”
And with today’s widespread resources and their own web savvy, the price for innovation is just right. “Five thousand [dollars] is the new $50,000,” says Banks Benitez, vice president of partnerships for the Unreasonable Institute, a business incubator in Boulder, Colo. “The barriers to entrepreneurism are decreasing as technology catches up.” Specifically, the Internet has made the cost of advertising, communications, market reach and the supply chain minimal. Websites—the new global storefront—are vastly more affordable than a brick-and-mortar presence. But while affordable options and a hard-hitting recession are indeed part of what has galvanized entrepreneurism, they are not explanation enough for why this new wave of young people are choosing a path that is more stressful, unpredictable and consuming than a traditional career. More than profits, it seems, this generation is about doing what they love— and what they love is creating something meaningful. “We are a generation that shares a deep empathy for people and for the world, motivated to love people well and help them break free of the things that bind them,” Benitez says. “Social entrepreneurship is a way to do that. There is redemption in making something where there was nothing before.”
“I’ve had to cultivate self-discipline,” Chan says. “Being your own boss can be a doubleedged sword. You can sleep in, but you better be making it up later.” As the director of operations for Kulira Technologies, Chan relies on Skype and email to stay in touch with his business partner a state away. Aligning himself with smart people—people to whom he is accountable—has been key to maintaining momentum, he says. While serial entrepreneurs like Chan love the process of creating a business but not necessarily running one, others are creating their dream jobs—a place they want to be not just for 40 hours a week, but for 40 years. Austen Menges is the co-owner and founder of Two Shot West, a film and commercial production company based in Austin, Texas. Since his first high school job at a theme park, Menges has known he wasn’t cut out to work for someone else.
A GENERATION AT WORK
When David Chan started an online commercial book club in 2010, all he needed was a computer and some basic web design skills and—voilà—he was a business owner. Since then, the Northern Arizona University MBA graduate has started 11 companies, ranging from a custom bow-tie business to a biomedical engineering company. Today, he is actively involved in five of them—and the only consistencies in his average day are a shower and three eggs. After that, it’s anyone’s guess.
STEVEN SHAFER When he couldn’t find a job after college, Shafer started a woodworking company called Wild West Workshop.
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