During the past decades, I have been reading hundreds of books on various topics related to randomness, decision-making, finance, entrepreneurship as well as nearly 500 academic white-papers on chaos theory, cybernetics, randomness, probability theory, philosophy, decision-making and neurobiology. I did this because I often was seeking answers when being confronted with challenges in my personal entrepreneurial journey. Yet, most of the selfhelp and study books, dealing with the topics of entrepreneurship, business management or economics all seemed to discuss sterile environments, devoid from emotion.

The empty suits

None of the situations involve individuals that have a chip on their shoulders, no greed, ego, fear, sex, hunger or revenge. In these books, enterpreneurship is often supported by phony mathematics and financial buzzwords, failing to present it as a social-economic activity that reflects our human nature in all of its grandeur and fallabilities. So time and again, I found myself putting those books down, digesting its nice theories and mathematic formulas, slowly realising how reality seemed to be way more brutal, random and unpredictable. Combined with the Masters of the Universe attitude of most MBA’s, this literature confused me for the first half of my career, instilling self-doubt and eroding my confidence to the point where I even took up studies in Economics and Business Management.

I soon realised, how these theories, methodologies and best-practices seem to give its readers a firmer grasp on reality, while in fact they only project a mirage. In general, models have a tendency to distort reality. For years, I have been up and close with the intellectual arrogance displayed by MBA’s, managers, advisors, business consultants, journalists and politicians to the point where I developed a strong allergic reaction to everything about them. For they are just empty suits; they have a good command of all the superfluous and administrative details of things, but they miss the essential while being blissfully unaware of it. It’s like they believe the compass moves the boat…

Business superstition, be gone!

The big problem with these people concocting theories in their sterile environments, is they actually have a very determinist view of the world, and seem to blatantly ignore the randomness and chaos that surrounds them. It’s as if they have this neurotic need to keep the illusion they can have some predictability over the world in order to put their minds at ease. Most of the management books and studies seem to engage in what I call business superstition.

Much like a chief tribesman, picking his nose while noticing a drop of rain, started to believe that every time he picks his nose rain will appear; managers, consultants and all seem to believe that if you create a strategic plan, raise funds, get the best people on board and have a unique product-market fit, as a founder, you will be successful. Most likely, your business plan is made up by the same silly superstitions as performing a raindance. The dogmatic statements, virtually non-existent empirical evidence and an inability to survive Popper’s falsification theory, the high-priests of business management share more traits with religious cults than with the entrepreneurial reality, that us practitioners, engage in on a daily basis. I dare to suggest we need more parlez-vrai, no more fancy recipes for success. A daring idea indeed.

The birth of A Posteriori

So, I set out to search for more epistemological knowledge on the economic activity of entrepreneurship, bound by unpredictability and probability. What could I gain by studying these topics more in depth? And what is man’s behaviour and impact exactly in such a complex system? Where does luck end, and skill starts?

And I wanted answers.

So with those questions on my mind, I shaped a structure as to catalog my findings in a more coherent manner:

1. Chapter 1: A study on decision-making under uncertainty, taking notes from neurobiology, game theory and studies in randomness;
2. Chapter 2: A study on the psychology, neuroscience, biology and learning theories of entrepreneurs, and how they differ from managers;
3. Chapter 3: A self-reflection on my past two decades of entrepreneurship, and trying to uncover a deeper understanding of events, both good and bad;

So I started writing my first essay on entrepreneurship, called A Posteriori. A (business philosophy) essay that I hope will change your view on entrepreneurship (and life) in general. I will often post excerpts, thoughts and updates on progress.