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Steve Jobs on what separates the successful founders from unsuccessful ones

January 03, 2025

Steve is asked what the factors of success and common pitfalls are for young entrepreneurs. He responds:

“I get asked this a lot, and I have a pretty standard answer. A lot of people come to me and say, ‘I want to be an entrepreneur.’ And I go, ‘Oh, that’s great, what’s your idea?’ And they say they don’t have one yet. And I say I think you should go get a job as a busboy or something until you find something you’re really passionate about, because it’s a lot of work.”

Steve continues:

“I’m convinced that about half of what separates the successful entrepreneurs from the non-successful ones is pure perseverance. It is so hard. You pour so much of your life into this thing, and there are such rough moments in time that most people give up. I don’t blame them. It’s really tough, and it consumes your life. I mean, if you’ve got a family and you’re in the early days of a company, I can’t imagine how one could do it. I’m sure it’s been done, but it’s rough because it’s pretty much an 18-hour-a-day job, 7 days a week for a while. So unless you have a lot of passion about this, you’re not going to survive. You’re going to give it up.”

He concludes:

“You’ve got to have an idea or a problem or a wrong that you want to right that you’re passionate about. Otherwise, you’re not going to have the perseverance to stick it through. And I think that’s half the battle right there.”