I’m turning 48 this month and it’s so heartening to see this study prove that I am in my prime when it comes to being an entrepreneur.
“Every year of life improves an entrepreneur’s chances up until 40, but they don’t diminish thereafter. Take heart, grey-haired founders!”
Of course, all data has exceptions, but I’ve always said that we as older business owners are far better prepared to start and successfully run a business than are younger folks. Plenty of young people can create great businesses too, but if more of us in later years were on the radar of investors, then they might have a much higher success rate than their 1 in 10 averages.
The full infographic below nicely depicts the results of a Founders Institute study that verifies from studying 15,000 applicants that the data supports the supposition that more experience equals more success.
Let’s break down a few of the results:
(1) The most successful entrepreneurs are 28+ years old. The interesting thiing about this is it is very likely that the data may have been skewed by the fact that more young people likely applied, so the age of success may be even greater. Unfortunately, they don’t disclose the details of the data that I can find.
(2) Real World Experience – Obviously, the older you are the more likely you are to have real world experience, but I assume, that this is also related to real world experience in your target industry.
(3) Project Completion Skills – When you are younger, understanding all the pieces required to successfully plan and complete a project is difficult, because you haven’t had the experience to know what might fail. When you’ve failed enough times over a 25 year career, you know what to look for and you know what things are hidden behind your decisions.
A lot of good data in this graphic, but the bottom line is that if you are older and ready to get rolling with a new business venture, like I am, then have confidence that your experience and expertise makes you much more likely to succeed.
