Fallen into a pit of vipers

[nancymcc]

During five months of unemployment, I have attended workshops and "taken meetings" that ordinarily would be far enough down on my list to fall off due to time constraints.

Too many of them have triggered my Snake Oil Sensor. I wonder if it is simply at a more sensitive setting than normal?

This afternoon was a meeting about a new business that wants

Comments

[dreamshark]

Something I heard on Marketplace today. Y'know all those new "businesses" that have sprung up to help desperate homeowners avoid losing their homes? The ones with the business plan of charging their customers a huge up-front fee and then watching them get foreclosed on when they stop paying their mortgages so they can pay the fee? Guess who's running most of them. Yup, former mortgage brokers.

[guppiecat]

I run into this sort of thing a bit when I'm looking to expand my business network. The thing that I always see is something like

"Peron X took a big risk, and it paid off, and now they're a millionaire. All you have to do is keep at it."

I always have to wonder why I never hear the stories about those who take the big risk and fall flat on their faces.

[nancymcc]

Definitely in the "oil of suborder Serpentes" category.

I do hear some the big-risk flat-on-face stories, but only as part of ultimate success stories. People with actual big business success usually had a number of failures first, but each time "they by-golly picked themselves up, dusted themselves off, and took another big risk" (and somehow brought another posse of investors along with them).

I am considering starting a "real" business (as opposed to a sole proprietorship offering services), and those stories always make me hesitate at my apparent lack of the entrepreneurial spirit. Also, I can't spell it.