The Best Definition of Entrepreneurship

If you had to explain to someone who was learning English what an entrepreneur is, what would you say?

Maybe it seems like a simple question, but the meaning of the word can get slippery. Howard Stevenson, a longtime professor at Harvard Business School, recounts the story of a senior faculty member describing the field of entrepreneurship to a young person: “You peel it back layer by layer,” the faculty member said, “and when you get to the center, there is nothing there, but you are crying.” 

Stevenson is an expert on the topic of entrepreneurship, and perhaps it’s that frustration that drove him to craft what is in my opinion the best definition of entrepreneurship, one that has been used as a standard by Harvard Business School since the 1980s.

I’d heard it before, but when I came across it again recently, it instantly grabbed my attention. Here’s Stevenson’s definition:

Entrepreneurship is the pursuit of opportunity beyond resources controlled.

It takes a few readings to sink in. At f…