Appreciating Practical Wisdom

Or as Entrepreneur Owner-Managers (EOMs), …should we reject most expert advice?
All of the best high-performing EOMs I know read voraciously and constantly, and listen to as many informed opinions they can find, and then… they ignore what mostly everyone else says, and make up their own mind. They aren’t content being content simply receiving advice. They listen and read enough of other people’s experience and advice, compare that with their own scar tissue and intuition, and then know what to apply and what to reject. They hear input and ask “Is that true? Is that true for me? Is that true in my context? Am I going to put it into action?”

Like many EOMs, Mark Taylor joined the family business he would ultimately lead “in the breach” to solve a business problem on what he thought was a temporary tour of duty (a year or two). Fifteen years later he successfully completed the redesign and rejuvenation of Reading Plus’ leadership team for its next chapter, and designed its majority stockholder recapitalization resulting in a great fit new owner who is energized and capable of supporting the team’s go forward plan for the next stage of growth for the company.

When asked if our human intuition is reliable, Nobel Prize recipient Dan Kahneman comically replied “Oh, our intuition is reliable, for sure. It reliably fails us”. As high performing Entrepreneur Owner-Managers, thinking about challenges like ownership transition, and capturing Enterprise Value– or just learning in the private transaction market, are our intuitions about it correct or not? Let’s look at the characteristics of the private transaction market we operate in for ownership transition, and see if it fits Kahneman’s rubric for whether it is sensible to trust intuition or not.