September 8, 2019 - Continuing our look at the speakers for next week's inaugural Entrepreneurial Mindset conference in Zagreb next week Next up, corporate consigliere, Fran Mikulicic.
It quickly sold out and there is a waiting list of hundreds should tickets become available. Next week's Entrepreneurial Mindset conference in Zagreb is the first of its kind in Croatia, and it includes a top draw list of speakers, several of the most successful entrepreneurs in the country. TCN will be covering the event and we continue our series interviewing some of the key speakers. Our latest guest is corporate consigliere, Fran Mikulicic.
1. As a Brit, I notice that entrepreneurs are not embraced and supported as much in Croatia as they are in countries with a longer capitalist tradition. How does it feel being an entrepreneur here, and how did you decide to embark on this road less travelled?
Haters gonna hate, and dumbasses will behave like their name suggests. Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do. It is our job to enlighten them. How does it feel? It feels great. Just take your focus from what you can’t change and do put it on what you can. Very liberating and empowering. In my case, the decision just presented itself. When I was a young lad, I worked in a well-known Croatian company. I had my share of poor management, illogical business decision making, bullying and corruption for two lives. Quoth the Raven “Nevermore”. So, when I got back from the U.S. with my MBA degree, I indeed found two roads diverging in front of me. To get a management job in some big company or to take the one less travelled by. And it made all the difference.
2. How would you compare the perception of an entrepreneur in Croatia to one in Germany or the USA, for example?
I’ll stick with the U.S. For starters, in the U.S. one is innocent until proven guilty. In Croatia, being an entrepreneur can mean just the opposite. Second, would you even emphasize the word entrepreneur in the U.S. or would it be the most normal thing that someone founds his own or her own business? Just the normal approach to make a living. My mom still wonders whether I will get a proper job. Third, the different perspective about the failure of your entrepreneurial endeavor. In the U.S. you fail, take the beating, get up, and start again. Here, the shame can be unbearable. The village will talk. Therefore, it is better not to try than to try and not succeed. What shame, you may ask. Precisely. Lastly, the concept of security, or better to say false security, risk-taking, getting out of your comfort zone and looking over the horizon in understanding what is possible.
3. Tell us about your entrepreneurial experience so far in Croatia - the highlights, the lows, the successes and the failures.
There are no failures, just more lessons to be learned. My successes and highlights are always connected to my clients. When they succeed, I did my thing.
4. What are your hopes for the conference and why did you decide to accept the invitation to speak?
The conference will be great by itself. All my hopes are directed to what will and may be happening after the conference. Decided to accept to speak?! A good one. I am honored to be a part of this conference and thankful that the organizers offered me this opportunity. The name of the conference is actually the name of my column in Poduzetnik magazine for last year and a half. That makes me something like a godfather, doesn’t it?! Haha.
5. Tell us a little about your own entrepreneurial mindset.
A little eccentric, I must admit. It is a constant inner struggle between being a business-oriented CEO and learning determined R&D master. For the better or for the worse, it has always been the learning opportunity that drives me. I’ve made at least dozens of financially unsound decisions just to be able to work on challenging projects or with clients who ‘couldn’t be helped’. And don’t even get me started with my voluntary work with young people. As a CEO I should take a stick and give myself a good spanking. But as a mentor, I feel blessed and grateful. The only growth I am really interested in would be the growth in the mindsets of my client. As an entrepreneur, I live with all the consequences of my decisions and action. And at the end of the day, to be able to support people in the improvement of their business and lives is a reward by itself.
6. Instilling an entrepreneurial mindset into a society which has grown up with socialism will take some time and effort. What is the roadmap to achieve this?
I can’t believe these questions. You actually said “some time and effort”?! My dear Brit friend, it will take a lifetime of time and effort and even that does not guarantee the success. Regarding the roadmap, I would bet that it was the same question Hannibal was asked by his men before crossing the Alps. ‘The path, we will either find or create.’ But, what we can’t do will not stop us from doing what we can. And we will continue to give lectures, organize conferences, write articles, support entrepreneurs and mentor students and young people. If we share our vision with enough entrepreneurs and are able to persuade them to start doing some of the things we are doing, then we would be one step closer to the finish line. Entrepreneurship can’t be taught in the classroom. Some management knowledge and skills can be presented and explained. But that’s about it. Imagine experienced and successful entrepreneurs holding mastermind groups in different parts of Croatia influencing future entrepreneurs and helping them get started, staying motivated, and learning the ropes.
7. What advice would you have for someone in Croatia thinking about taking the entrepreneurial route?
OK, I would need a whole book for this. To oversimplify it, whatever people do they do it either out of love or out of need. Both reasons are good for the entrepreneurial route. Some sound advice would go as follows. First, what is your true objection? To make money, to gain freedom, to follow your passion? Be clear about it because there will be trade-offs. Second, you will have your doubts, fears, and insecurities. That’s normal. It would be more alarming if you would not have them. Just set them aside and go to the next point. Third, work more. You will burn the midnight oil and you will see the dawns. People around you will be having coffee and complaining about everything and you will be working. The good thing is that if it is something that you like, you will love every minute of it. Fourth, work smarter. The more you learn, the more you know. The more you know, the more you understand how little you know. Fifth, surround yourself with likeminded people. People who have been through what you will go through. People who will provide you with the right type of support when you will need it.
8. Andrija Colak once told me that the best thing about doing business in Croatia is that if you can succeed here, you can succeed anywhere in the world. Do you agree, and why is it so hard to do business in Croatia?
Haha. This is a very insightful observation. Mostly true. But there are two potential trade-offs here. First, you develop the skills essential to your survival in this Kafkian novel that are totally unnecessary in normal countries. And their entrepreneurs, in the mean time, developed some more meaningful skills that you will have to learn twice as fast. Of course, you maybe want to do business in some other third world country and, in that case, you will be suitably prepared. Second, success here does not prepare most of us to dream big enough and to have that certainty that you can conquer the world. Is it hard? Well, it is not too hard. Yes, small market and low disposable income. Yes, red tape, taxes, and legal complexity. Yes, 90% of the country can’t even grasp the concept of creating and adding value. Hm, maybe you are right. How did JFK put it? We choose to, not because it is easy, but because it is hard?”
9. Three things you would like to see to help entrepreneurs in Croatia.
First, I would love to see financial responsibility from the political caste. So far, so many of them are like a little boy who asks his mother to give him some money. “I don’t have any. We spend it all.”, she replies. “There is an ATM over there. Go and get some”. However, I don’t see this happening any time soon. Like a story about a frog and a scorpion. Second, I would love to see law obeying behavior of the political caste. Have you, Paul, ever seen the inconsistencies in the analysis of the number of citizens over 18 and the number of voters in Croatian towns? More voters than citizens. So, math is also relative, after all. No, I don’t see this happening either. But, if I did I would then like to see the joint, laser-focused, effort of the entrepreneurs and all budget beneficiaries in making Croatia technologically advanced, easy to do business in, fantastic to live here, and full of globally competitive companies. The weirdest part is that it should be the most normal thing. But it isn’t.
More info on the conference can be found at www.poduzetnickimindset.biz and FB Casopis poduzetnik.
To learn more about Fran Mikulicic's services, check out his official website.
