Why Lawyers May Clash with Entrepreneurs: Hypomania Disconnect
Great entrepreneurs have personality quirks that, in a stronger form, would qualify as full-blown mental illnesses.
These entrepreneurs, the New York Times reports, have milder hypomanic personalities, tempered with humanity and interpersonal skills. It’s a matter of degree. “Instead of recklessness, the entrepreneur loves risk,” the story says. “Instead of delusions, the entrepreneur imagines a product that sounds so compelling that it inspires people to bet their careers, or a lot of money, on something that doesn’t exist and may never sell.”
Compare that mindset with that of a typical lawyer. He or she is cautious and rational, anticipating the risks and ready to contract away possible catastrophes.
Suffolk University law professor Jeffrey Lipshaw notes the differences at The Faculty Lounge blog. “Take a look at the Times story,” he writes, “and think about what it would be like to throw a person, fully inculcated by three years of traditional legal education, into a room with somebody like this, and tell the lawyer to do ‘legal work.’ ”
Lipshaw explores the theme in greater detail in an article, “Why the Law of Entrepreneurship Barely Matters, posted at the Social Science Research Network. “The law calls for consistency and coherence in the application of rules,” he writes. “I suggest entrepreneurs are far more at home with inconsistency and indeterminacy.”
