True or false? In operating a fictional start-up company, entrepreneurs would worry less about money than a group of young MBA students or corporate executives with no start-up experience.

Perception may be that risk-taking entrepreneurs are more likely to trust their ideas and move forward with little worry of financial risk. In actuality though, the original statement is false – entrepreneurs are more likely to fret about financial issues and are more risk averse than an average person.

This was one of the many conclusions presented by Stuart Read, IMD Professor of Marketing, in Lausanne during the two-day Discovery Event entitled Understanding the Mindset of the Entrepreneur held on October 4 and 5.

Other findings of note based on the survey involving the three groups concluded that entrepreneurs were least likely to rely on market research when conducting business operations, but were the group most likely to generate new markets.

“The expertise accumulated by entrepreneurs in the process of new venture creation results in an approach to decision-making which is different from, and some times completely inverted to, that which is employed by the general population,” commented Read.

“That said, an entrepreneur is fundamentally no different from the next person on the street. People are not born entrepreneurs, nor are entrepreneurs psychologically unique. The difference lies in what they have learned.”

In fact, Read believes that it is possible for anyone from a typical corporate manager to a novice with no business experience whatsoever to learn through experience and feedback to approach decisions the same way that expert entrepreneurs do.

Does this imply that expert entrepreneurs make better decisions than others? The answer, according to Read, is that it depends. Within their domain of new venture, market and product creation, the approaches evident in expert entrepreneurs do seem connected with superior performance. However – are those same approaches going to result in success at running a major multinational or playing a master’s game of chess? Not likely. Expertise is something that is highly domain specific – an expert entrepreneur only has an advantage on his/her own home turf.

The event was attended by 47 executives from seven countries representing a number of different industries. Other presenters included James Henderson, IMD Professor of Strategic Management, Florent Gros, Managing Director of the Novartis Venture Fund, Antonio Becherucci, co-owner and Chief Executive of IP01 and Jim Pulcrano, IMD Corporate Development Director for Switzerland and Liechtenstein.

Discovery events are one of the unique benefits that companies can benefit from as IMD Learning Network members.

Professor Stuart Read is the director of the Business Marketing (BM) program. He also teaches on IMD’s Managing Corporate Resources (MCR),  Building on Talent (BOT) and Orchestrating Winning Performance (OWP) programs.