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|In: Industry Commentary|Last Updated:

Talk about tough-to-cross chasms …

“How Great Entrepreneurs Think,” (Leigh Buchanan, Inc., 2/1/2011) describes seriously interesting research by Saras Sarasvathy on the difference between entrepreneurs and corporate managers.

Unlike the usual takes on the subject (this old column, for example), Sarasvathy spent hours with a statistically significant number of both in the context of solving typical business problems, comparing their verbalized thought processes to identify the differences.

Her conclusion: Entrepreneurs are “Iron Chefs” — improvisers who figure out how to make something terrific out of whatever is available at the moment. They “… constantly assess how to use their personal strengths and whatever resources they have at hand to develop goals on the fly, while creatively reacting to contingencies.”

Corporate managers, in contrast, are far more analytical. They start by defining goals, “planning the work and working the plan” to achieve them.

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|In: Business Ethics|Last Updated:

The Senate just passed patent reform legislation.

So here’s a thought: Rather than reform the Patent and Trademark Office (PTO,) why not just outsource the sucker to the European Patent Office? It would be cheaper and far less risky than fixing the one we have.

This follows the usual but unadmitted reason businesses outsource. Shorn of all the academic fur that surrounds the subject, businesses outsource when they’ve given up on their own ability to be competent at whatever-it-is.

And so, they turn over responsibility for it to another company, figuring their shortcomings will be magically transformed into superior competence when the relationship they’re managing is with another company instead of a fellow executive.

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