Week 2 Reading Reflection

The biggest surprise from the reading, in my opinion, was that entrepreneurial failure rates are misleading. I always thought failure was a big part of entrepreneurs' ventures, at least much more than was pointed out in the reading. I liked that Kuratko included statistics from Kirchhoff to back this up because it quantified how off my assumptions were. One thing I found confusing was that gazelles typically don't receive venture capital. Since venture capital firms find gazelles attractive, I don't understand why less than 2% of them receive funding from these firms. If I could ask Kuratko 2 questions, I would ask which point of view, macro or micro, is more important, and I would also ask which school of thought he finds the best within each view. Although I agree that entrepreneurs and small businesses are different, I think they are more similar than Kuratko describes. Entrepreneurs may take bigger risks, but these risks are still calculated. Moreover, small business owners may have taken great financial risks to start their business, with possible unique aspects that give them a competitive edge over other businesses in their industry.