There Are Two Types of Entrepreneurs...

In 2007, I launched my marketing company, Noodlehead Marketing. I had been doing some freelancing and IT work, and eventually, I decided to leap into marketing, starting with video production and web design. I grew the company, built a team, got an office, and managed payroll. By many measures, we were quite successful as a small marketing agency. It was a powerful learning experience.

However, in the final year, from 2013 to 2014, I decided to shut the company down. We had transformed it into something we enjoyed—we loved the team and the clients we were working with. But I asked myself: "What do I truly want to do? What type of entrepreneur am I? What kind of business do I want to create? Is it a marketing agency? Is that what I want to be when I grow up?"

I couldn't answer with a full, enthusiastic "yes." Running and growing an agency is hard, and to be successful, you have to be fully committed. Anything difficult—whether it's a business, a marriage, or parenting—requires us to be all-in, because there will be challenging times we don't want to deal with. Building and running a big business was simply not something I wanted to do; it wasn't who I wanted to be.

So, I decided to shift. I shut down the company and transitioned into freelancing. I went from running a marketing company to being an independent contractor. While I still ran my freelancing business, I kept it just myself. I didn't build a staff or hire people. I didn't want to build another agency, despite many suggestions to hire people and outsource my freelancing for profit. I had already gone down that road.

The Idea Business

Along the freelance path, I began building a second business. I published my first book, Path of the Freelancer, in 2017, and my second book, The Jump for Small Business Owners, in 2019. I have a third book in the works now. I started my podcast in 2020 and have been blogging since 2014. This is my content creation business—my intellectual property, my idea business.

Several years ago, I stumbled upon a story that effectively captured the difference between the first type of business I built and the idea business I later began as a freelancer. The financial and time flexibility born out of my freelancing allowed me to pursue these other creative ventures.

This story, which I found in my freelancing and idea business journey, was a quote from Peter Drucker talking to Jim Collins. It was a key insight that helped reassure me: "This is me; this is what I'm trying to do. And I understand this other thing wasn't what I wanted to do, and this is what I want to do."

Peter Drucker said to Jim Collins, before Collins went on to write his influential books and become a massive speaker and author:

"Jim, listen, you can either build great businesses or you can build great ideas. You can't do both, so you've got to choose."

There is a difference between building a company to scale and sell, versus building a business of ideas. As a content creator, I am building a business of ideas. I'm sharing those ideas, transforming them into different manifestations—a book, a YouTube video, a blog post, a podcast episode, a course, whatever it might be. I'm taking ideas and sharing them with the world. I'm creating, developing, and sharing them. That's the type of entrepreneur I am.

For example, Jim Collins wrote the book How the Mighty Fall. I plan to do a video discussing the concepts in this book and how they relate to society. There are ideas that other people have, and I act as an amplifier. In my freelance work with clients, I help them amplify their existing content, making it more powerful and expanding its reach. So, it doesn't just have to be my ideas; I also discover many awesome ideas from other people that I want to share, amplify, simplify, and communicate.

Choose Your Path

For me, I'm the type of entrepreneur who wants to be in the idea business. If that resonates with you, I want to permit you to lean into that. You don't have to build a large company, hire many people, and do all the things you might think you have to do as a business owner.

You can be a business of one.

That's the type of business I've created. My freelancing is in a really good place where it runs smoothly, generating a strong six-figure income while working part-time. At the same time, I have enough flexibility to use my extra time to create content like this artcle and video.

So, Jim, Larry, Sarah, Candice, Ben, whatever your name is, remember Drucker's words: "You can either build great businesses or you can build great ideas. You can't do both, so choose one."

Which one are you going to choose?