I’m gradually putting together a list/biography of female entrepreneurs, so the obvious ones like Anita Roddick to less well known / feted like Cath Kidston.
I am interested in how they broke out of their original careers or lives to become incredibly successful. I wonder how single minded and determined they had to be. It was a well known fact that Roddick’s bank manager rejected her business ideas before she went on to develop The Body Shop into an international brand.
What makes these women tick, how did they structure their time in those early days, was it business acumen, luck or sheer bloody mindedness that drove them to win? Did they know when to stop, when is enough enough? And how do their families and friends cope with their success?
How and why do entrepreneurs, and presidents for that matter, decide to ‘give it a shot’?
I’m beginning to be fascinated by the process by which people make decisions. For example, according to the Telegraph mag (Richard Wolffe 22 Aug 09), Obama decided to run for president because: ‘I came to the conclusion that the times might be such that I would have to give it a shot’
In his analysis of what makes a great president, Obama said ‘ Everybody who has been elected president was a great person in some aspect or another, but what makes a great president is the juxstaposition ofthat president’s personal characteristics and strengths with the needs of the American people and the country. And when you are a president who happens to come into office at that juxtaposition, there’s an environment for you to be a great president.
‘Reagan would probably go down as a great president, it was just his time.’
Obama, it seems, is a curious mixture of rebelliousness – running for the White House relatively early in his political career, against the Clintons, with little name recognition and no money of his own - and calculation. According to Richard Wolffe, he has a peculiar combination of risk and self-discipline: No sudden moves, no rash judgments. But burning ambition and a burning sense of injustice about the poor and powerless.