Nature vs. Nurture: Is the Entrepreneur born or made?

The idea of an entrepreneur being born or made is one of the most argued and questioned one when talking about what makes an entrepreneur, so to try and answer this one must first explain what we understand as Nature and Nurture.

As shown by the graph above, there are different schools of thought in psychology that argue for or against nature and nurture and the idea of being born with a certain skill set or being able to learn and acquire said set.

On one end, we have the "nativists" who firmly believe that people are born with a certain propensity to do things better than other individuals, and on the other end we find the "empiricists" which argue that the human beings are born with a blank slate or "tabula rasa mind-set" which is then filled and shaped by experience and the act of learning.


For all the studies that have been made, there hasn't been any conclusive answer to this question. There are several surveys like this one carried by the Entrepreneur Magazine which touch upon the subject and show that people are slightly more inclined to the idea of Nature being the key factor, but as stated in the article, entrepreneurship can also be taught to some extent.

If you are interested in learning more about the differences between Nature and Nurture give this article written by Saul McLeod a read.



Feel free to leave your thoughts and comments on the topic at hand.