Entrepreneurship Defined: What It Means to Be an Entrepreneur

What entrepreneurs do

An entrepreneur identifies a need that no existing business addresses and finds a way to solve it. Entrepreneurial activity can include developing and starting a new business, building a marketing plan or even creating a product with the end goal of eventually selling the company for profit.

Entrepreneurship isn’t just theory; it’s surging in practice. The U.S. Census Bureau reported more than 470,000 new business applications in July 2025 alone. And, according to the 2024-2025 Global Entrepreneurship Monitor, Total Entrepreneurial Activity (TEA) has reached 19 percent. In other words, nearly one in five American adults is actively engaged in starting or running a new business.

Some entrepreneurs launch once and stick with a single company, while others are serial entrepreneurs who regularly start businesses, sell them and move on to the next idea. Whether or not every business owner counts as an “entrepreneur” can depend on how the company was created, but one thing is certain: Every founder of a household-name business started with the same first step.

If you’re thinking about taking that step yourself but are concerned about startup costs and other money issues, finances don’t have to stop you. Many entrepreneurs turn to alternative financing options like angel investors, who provide early capital in exchange for equity, or venture capitalists, who invest in high-growth businesses with long-term potential.

Examples of successful entrepreneurs

Many of today’s most recognizable business leaders started out as unknowns with nothing more than an idea and a lot of determination. Here are just a few examples of entrepreneurial success:

• Steve Jobs: The late Apple co-founder famously started the company in a garage and grew it into a global giant. His journey wasn’t seamless — he even left Apple for more than a decade before returning to lead it into a new era of innovation.
• Elon Musk: Musk built SpaceX from scratch and has become known not just for ambitious ventures in space and electric vehicles but also for high-profile philanthropic efforts, such as funding clean water solutions for schools in Flint, Michigan and donating ventilators to hospitals during the COVID-19 crisis.
• Bill Gates: The Microsoft co-founder has long been one of the world’s wealthiest individuals, but his legacy extends beyond technology. Through the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, he has focused on reducing poverty, inequity and disease worldwide.
• Jeff Bezos: What began as a modest online bookstore quickly grew into Amazon, one of the most valuable companies in the world. Bezos’s ability to scale and diversify turned the platform into a marketplace where customers can buy almost anything.
• Mark Zuckerberg: While still in college, Zuckerberg helped create Facebook, a social platform that forever changed the way people connect. Initially limited to universities, it soon expanded to the public and turned him into one of America’s youngest self-made billionaires.
• Sara Blakely: With just $5,000 in savings, Blakely invented Spanx after being frustrated with traditional pantyhose. Despite having no fashion background, she taught herself everything from patents to fabrics and grew her idea into a billion-dollar brand.

The motivations of successful entrepreneurs

What motivates entrepreneurs to venture forth when so many others would run in the opposite direction?

Part of the answer lies in who today’s entrepreneurs are. According to the U.S. Treasury Department, entrepreneurship is more diverse than ever: 43 percent of self-employed Americans are women, and the share of Black, Asian and Hispanic entrepreneurs is near record highs. That broadening mix reflects the variety of motivations people bring to the table.

Though each person’s inspiration is unique, and the reasons entrepreneurs start businesses vary widely, many are spurred by one or more of the following:

• Autonomy: They want to be their own bosses, set their own goals and run businesses their way. The responsibility of success or failure isn’t a burden; it’s freedom.
• Purpose: Many have a clear vision and feel compelled to fill a gap in the market. Even though numerous problems can kill a business, they’d rather fail while moving forward than stand still.
• Flexibility: Entrepreneurship offers an escape from rigid corporate culture. It’s not about working fewer hours (often it’s more, particularly when growing your business). It’s about working in ways that feel natural and having more control over creating a positive work-life balance.
• Financial success: Some aim to create financial security for their families, while others hope to build the next big thing. While most don’t expect overnight billions, they see business as a path to prosperity.
• Legacy: Many are driven by the desire to create something lasting, whether that’s a family business, an enduring brand or an innovation that makes life better.
• Social impact: More entrepreneurs are motivated by purpose beyond profit. According to the GEM report cited earlier, 60 percent of new entrepreneurs and nearly half of established business owners say they prioritize social and environmental responsibility. That shift is fueling a rise in green business ideas and socially conscious startups.

Advice from successful entrepreneurs

If you’re considering entrepreneurship, it helps to hear directly from those who’ve been there. The founders and leaders below shared their thoughts on what makes a successful entrepreneur. While each perspective is unique, together they highlight recurring themes: vision, grit, empathy, leadership and adaptability.

Some emphasize vision and courage:

• “Entrepreneurship is at the core of the American dream. It’s about blazing new trails, about believing in yourself, your mission and inspiring others to join you in the journey. What sets [entrepreneurs] apart is the will, courage and sometimes recklessness to actually do it.” — Derek Hutson, Morgan Creek Strategies
  
• “Entrepreneurship is a pursuit of a solution, a single relentless focus on solving a problem or doing something drastically different from the way it is done today. [It’s] aiming to do something better than it’s ever been done before and constantly chasing improvement.” — Blake Hutchison, Flippa
  
• “Entrepreneurship is … the constant hunger for making things better and the idea that you are never satisfied with how things are.” — Debbie Roxarzade, Rachel’s Kitchen
  
• “Entrepreneurship is the mindset that allows you to see opportunity everywhere. It could be a business idea, but it could also be seeing the possibilities in the people who can help you grow that business. This ability to see many options in every situation is critically important; there will be unending challenges that will test your hustle.” — Preeti Sriratana, Kent Hospitality Group
  
• “Being an entrepreneur is ingrained in one’s identity. [It] is the culmination of a certain set of characteristics: determination, creativity, the capacity to risk, leadership and enthusiasm.” — Eric Lupton, Life Saver Pool Fence Systems
  
• “Entrepreneurship is an unavoidable life calling pursued by those who are fortunate enough to take chances. [They are] optimistic enough to believe in themselves, aware enough to see problems around them, stubborn enough to keep going, and bold enough to act again and again. Entrepreneurship is not something you do because you have an idea. It’s about having the creativity to question, the strength to believe and the courage to move.” — Jordan Fliegel, Shareholder Ventures
  
• “You may need to also be a bit of a contrarian. Sometimes it takes a person who thinks differently than the herd to start something new and defy the odds.” — Akshay Khanna, CareClinic
  
• “Entrepreneurs are the dreamers and the visionaries. Without them, the world stagnates and progress stops. Society needs entrepreneurs the same way the body needs air.” — Cynthia Kirkeby, Seasonally Fresh

Others stress resilience and grit:

• “At its core, [entrepreneurship] is a mindset — a way of thinking and acting. It is about imagining new ways to solve problems and create value. Fundamentally, entrepreneurship is about … the ability to recognize [and] methodically analyze [an] opportunity and, ultimately, to capture [its] value.” — Bruce Bachenheimer, Pace University
  
• “The most successful entrepreneurs are the ones who possess grit. Grit is made up of persistence, passion and resilience. It’s the passion to achieve long-term goals, the courage to try again in the face of rejection, and the will to do something better than it has been done before. The most successful entrepreneurs tend to be gritty ones … They do not give up until they exceed their goals. When the going gets tough and they get knocked down, gritty entrepreneurs bounce right back up and try again.” — Deborah Sweeney, Deluxe Corp.
  
• “Being an entrepreneur is like heading into uncharted territory. It’s rarely obvious what to do next, and you have to rely on yourself a lot when you run into problems. There are many days when you feel like things will never work out and you’re operating at a loss for endless months. You have to be able to stomach the roller coaster of emotions that comes with striking out on your own.” — Amanda Austin, Little Shop of Miniatures
  
• “To be a successful entrepreneur, you must have a passion for learning — from customers, employees and even competitors.” — James Bedal, Bare Metal Standard
  
• “To be a successful entrepreneur, you need perseverance. Most successful businesspeople or entrepreneurs have never given up on their idea. When challenges arise, they have found innovative ways of overcoming them. You must be able to adapt to changing economic conditions, and innovate and embrace technological advances to keep your customers engaged. These things take determination and a strong focus on the end goal.” — Stacey Kehoe, Brandlective Communications
  
• “Entrepreneurs and business owners definitely need to get used to taking risks. … You have to get comfortable being uncomfortable. Trying to grow a company or execute on an idea is difficult. It’s not always going to be roses and unicorns. At some point, you’re going to run into issues, lose customers and have financial constraints. It’s at this point you need to get back on the horse and take another risk, whether it’s in the form of a new product, new marketing campaign or a new customer recruitment strategy.” — Matthew Ross, Slumber Yard
  
• “Successful entrepreneurs look past [the] ‘quick buck’ and instead look at the bigger picture to ensure that each action made is going toward the overall goal of the business or concept, whether or not that means getting something in return at that moment.” — Allen Dikker, Galk Consulting
  
• “An entrepreneur must be able to accept failure. Everyone thinks they can accept failure until they come face to face with failing at a major thing they have put their everything into. To be a successful entrepreneur, you have to be someone who is able to risk failure at the deepest personal levels.” — Steven Benson, Badger Maps
  
• “Entrepreneurship is about always moving forward: never stopping, never allowing self-doubt or fear to take over and believing wholeheartedly that even a wrong decision is better than no decision.” — Adam Sherwin, Viakix

Some highlight empathy, leadership and listening:

• “The ability to listen, whether it be to the opinions of customers or employees, is also integral to success. While … you must have the confidence to make your own choices, it is still incredibly important not to become detached from the people whose needs you are trying to meet.” — Tirath Kamdar, Walmart
  
• “Entrepreneurship is, fundamentally, the art and science of building profitable systems to help people in ways that other systems do not. The core competency of the entrepreneur is not business acumen or marketing ability but rather empathy — the ability to understand the feelings and needs of others.” — Logan Allec, Money Done Right
  
• “Being a successful entrepreneur also means being a good leader. Leadership is the ability to bring people to a place where they want to follow you, not feel like they are forced to follow you. This takes investing in your team personally. They must know you’re not only going to hold them accountable and drive them to be better, but [you will] also look out for them when they are struggling. It’s not transactional; it’s a relationship.” — Steve Schwab, Casago
  
• “[Entrepreneurs] have to be people-oriented. Your business will die without a good team to back you up. Study management techniques, learn from great leaders, [and] review where you’re succeeding and failing so you can help others improve. An entrepreneur has to be able to build a team who cares about its work, and to do that, you have to care about how you create your team.” — Jonathan Barnett, Oxi Fresh Carpet Cleaning

Others focus on adaptability and innovation:

• “Entrepreneurship is the ability to recognize the bigger picture, find where there’s an opportunity to make someone’s life better, design hypotheses around these opportunities and continually test your assumptions. It’s experimentation: Some experiments will work; many others will fail. It is not big exits, huge net worth or living a life of glamour. It’s hard work and persistence to leave the world a better place once your time here is done.” — Konrad Billetz, Winona
• “A key skill an entrepreneur must possess is self-awareness. An entrepreneur must know who they are and what they need. Self-awareness is the first step for an entrepreneur to build their team.” — Krystal Nelson, Deloitte
• “[Entrepreneurs] must be able to pivot. If something isn’t working, keeping at it won’t make you successful. But changing your approach, changing your business model, changing your plans to make it work is the power of the pivot. You’re adaptable regardless of what’s thrown at you.” — Michael Maher, Cartology
• “Entrepreneurship is seeing an opportunity and gathering the resources to turn a possibility into a reality. It represents the freedom to envision something new and to make it happen. It includes risk, but it also includes the reward of creating a legacy.” — Maia Haag, I See Me! Personalized Books and Gifts

Across all these perspectives, one message comes through clearly: successful entrepreneurs don’t rely on just one trait. They blend vision with grit, empathy with leadership and adaptability with persistence.

How to become an entrepreneur

There’s no single path to entrepreneurship. Success often comes down to having the right mix of skills, mindset and ideas and introducing them to the world at the right time. While there are no guarantees, these steps can increase your chances of building a thriving business:

• Find the right idea. Entrepreneurship isn’t just about chasing profits; it’s about finding a great business idea you’re genuinely passionate about. Almost every industry has room for fresh thinking, and working on something you care about can help you stay motivated when the journey gets tough.
• Develop a business plan. It’s not enough to say you want to start a business; you need a roadmap for how to do it. A strong business plan clarifies your financial goals, outlines how you’ll reach them, and, when you’re pitching to potential investors, shows that you’ve thought things through.
• Identify your audience. Every business serves someone. Your venture won’t appeal to everyone, but you can test interest before you officially launch. Understanding your target demographics will guide key decisions like marketing, pricing and even location.
• Sell your idea. Friends and family may love your product or service, but that’s only a small sample. To gauge potential effectively, you need to market your idea in the right channels and highlight its unique selling proposition — what sets it apart.
• Build your network. Others in your field can be a valuable source of insight and support. Proper networking connects you with mentors, partners or even investors, and sometimes inspiration can come from something as simple as following the right industry voices on social media, such as top Instagram business accounts.

The value of entrepreneurship

Being an entrepreneur isn’t easy. It often takes more hard work, ingenuity and perseverance than a typical 9-to-5 job, and even then, success isn’t guaranteed. But when it does work out, the rewards can be extraordinary. You’re building something on your own terms, shaping your future and often making a real impact on society.

That impact goes beyond individual businesses. According to the U.S. Treasury Department, small businesses — many launched by entrepreneurs — have created more than 70 percent of net new jobs since 2019, up from 64 percent in the previous business cycle. In other words, entrepreneurs don’t just chase personal goals; they play a central role in driving economic growth and job creation.

For many entrepreneurs, those rewards outweigh the risks. There’s never a guarantee an idea will succeed, but that doesn’t stop people from trying. After all, failure is just as uncertain as success, and the chance to build something meaningful makes the journey worth it.