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 An interview with Entrepreneur and Investor 
 Mouli Cohen
on the Start-up Environment and Achieving Lasting Success
 
Interviewer:
What makes someone a successful entrepreneur?
Mouli Cohen:
Passion, conviction, vision and above all else, integrity. To lead, you musthave it, and maintain it. Investors, customers, employees and partners deserve it and willreward integrity with stronger relationships and commitment to the success of theventure.You must live the goals and dreams of the company everyday. Whether speaking toemployees, investors, customers or press, if the one who created the dream isn’t thechampion, they have little right to ask anyone else to believe in it.
Interviewer:
Having transformed a number of fledgling companies into successfulenterprises yourself, how would you suggest entrepreneurs begin the process of turningtheir ideas into businesses?
Mouli Cohen:
A great idea is the kernel from which the rest of the business is born. Butthis is only the start, and particularly early on entrepreneurs need to determine whatmakes it truly groundbreaking and sets it apart from the competition. From here you canidentify the audience that you will be selling to and build business strategies that leverageyour innovations.
Interviewer:
The model of entrepreneur as visionary is the classic image that comes tomind when we think of start-ups, but in order to succeed in today’s market, don’t youneed more than just a singular perspective?
Mouli Cohen:
Absolutely. Ideas simply can’t flourish in a vacuum. Because of thenature of a start-up, it is the entrepreneur who establishes the tone, direction and vision of a company, but in order to allow these guiding principles to grow, they need to be shared.As I’ve noted time and again, a company’s greatest asset is its people. An idea withoutthe right people to implement it will never go anywhere. Regardless of the industry, theintellect and passion your employees bring into an organization can practically guaranteeits continued innovation and success.
Interviewer:
How do you ensure that you’re creating the right kind of environmentwithin your company to foster that kind of dedication and passion you’ve mentioned?
Mouli Cohen:
The very best from each individual needs to be respected and encouraged.It is important to set the right expectations, put smart people in charge and give themclearly defined rewards for achieving innovation. They need to be empowered to drivechange and push the boundaries where necessary. Without the right leaders in the right positions, the best businesses will struggle.
 
In order to achieve this, you have to provide constant feedback and support, and beextremely passionate in the process. Too many companies neglect providing ongoingfeedback. As a result employees don't realize how much they have accomplished and begin not to care. And while placing a focus on allowing the individual to thrive is important, companiescan’t forget about the importance of developing team dynamics either. You have to takegroups of individuals and enable them to effectively work together. This is essential for fostering true leadership and efficiency. It also teaches important lessons aboutchemistry. Often it’s not about having a team filled with the best players, but onecompromised of the right players who complement each other’s strengths that will lead tocontinued success.
Interviewer:
You’ve mentioned innovation a number of times, what makes it such adifficult thing to achieve?
Mouli Cohen:
Innovation does not come naturally. It requires push, risk and a strongconviction to achieve greatness. It is easy to settle for conventional thinking, but to trulyexcel you need to look past the old methods of doing things, a process that often involvesmistakes and failure.As a leader of a company, it is critical to design ways that measure performance and balance accountability with the freedom to make mistakes. While it’s no surprise thatmost people fear failure, they fear the consequences of it even more. Few entrepreneursare able to successfully balance these two disparate components.At the same time, it is important to understand that a bad idea costs money. As soon asyou've determined that an idea is not going to work, stop spending on it. Admitting theweakness or failure of a project does not mean it has to be seen as setback, rather it isoften the clearest and fastest path to discovering alternative solutions and successfulinnovations.
Interviewer:
What are some of the advantages that start-ups have over more established businesses?
Mouli Cohen:
First lets look at the challenges faced by companies of any size. A business must always maintain awareness of their course, industry and competition,constantly making subtle changes of direction, as no company of any momentum can stopon a dime and change course.This is especially true of companies in immature markets with bleeding edge products.Stay with the pack too long and you risk being unable to separate yourself and your 
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